Author: Michelle Graham

   While reading Giovanni’s bio, the idea of individualism struck out. She asked the question, “I write what I see and I take responsibility for it. Why should thirty million people have to have me as a spokesman?”(Par 3, pg 879), it is stated that this question, this idea, this thought [of individualism] is what stamped and certified her standard of purity within her writing, “Nikki-Rosa”. Her poem was based on what she sees, and after knowing that and reading the poem, it’s easy for one to think that she has indeed seen an outside toilet, felt the goodness of the water in one of those chicago barbeque bathtub, and that she has a sister. Her poem screams her individual silent thoughts that are heard by her audience and felt by those who can relate. While thinking about the fact that this poem has her individualistic memories and experiences, there’s the line that implies that she and her family went through redlining, as we have talked about in previous classes, while reading and discussing ‘A Raisin In The Sun’. “As the whole family attended meetings about Hollydale”(line 13, pg 882), while in the description, it stated that Hollydale was a all-black neighbourhood in Cincinnati, OH, where Giovanni and her family hoped to build a home, yet could not because of loan discrimination in the housing industry. In ‘A Raisin in the Sun’, the Young family was trying to be bought out of a house that they bought in a dominantly white neighbourhood. ‘A Raisin in the Sun’ took place in the 1950’s in the south side of Chicago, Giovanni’s family was denied access from obtaining a loan for the all-black housing district around 1952 in Cincinnati, OH. 

   Another thought that jumped out at me was the idea of perspective. She ended her poem stating that she hopes that no white person ever has cause to write about her because they will never understand that Black Love is Black Wealth, though they were poor and went through so much, there was still love and that love was wealth itself, yet, a person only can tell what they see on the outside, from their perspective, and she doesn’t want her story to be misinterpreted into what society would consider the truth, though truly, it’s the outsider’s perspective truth. An outsider would only see loss, poverty, arguments and drinking and write/talk about that, but not the fact that everyone is together, that there is still love, and like every family, there will be bad times, as much as there will be good times. The idea of perspective also brings us back to the idea of individualism. Giovanni only writes what she sees and not nobody else’s, cause it seems, just as how she don’t want others writing her story from their perspective, she don’t want to be writing other’s stories from her perspective, and she can’t be the spokesman for thirty million people, everyone should share their own story from their own individualistic perspective of their own lives. She concludes her poem, “they’ll probably talk about my hard childhood and never understand that all the while I was quite happy.”(lines 26-28, pg 882), which supports the idea that there is so much more and it’s much better to speak from your own perspective of your own life than to speak of someone else’s, cause there’s always the greater a chance of misinterpretation speaking of someone else’s story, which is what Giovanni seems to avoid. She states in her poem, “if you become famous our something they never talk about how happy you were…” (lines 5-6, pg 882), which it gives the idea that the last line was to counter the fact that they would not talk about how happy she was, while she was indeed “quite happy’.

   To conclude, Giovanni wrote with perspective and individualism. She wrote her own perspective of her own life and not no one else’s. She wrote her perspective of a black childhood, and what it actually means to have Black Love, and that not all black childhoods are a drag and that there is indeed happiness. She is a woman who knows that she alone does not represent the black community, that she can’t be a spokesman for such a large community. She does not seem to care for an outsider’s perspective on her life, but her own. She used her intimate poetry to  create and cause an audience to stop and listen to what she has to say, for you know that the words she is speaking is of her own and not nobody else’s, it’s true and authentically her story, words, and feelings. ‘Nikki-Rosa’ was a well written poem that expresses Giovanni’s childhood as a black person and expresses the fact that she was quite happy.

 

Discussion Questions

1. What is your take on Giovanni’s method of writing her poetry, that it was an expression of her own individual experience and not the black community as a whole?
2. What other examples are in Giovanni’s poem that expresses the idea of individualism, perspective or both and how does it relate to those ideas?

 

Citations

Giovanni, Nikki, ‘Nikki-Rosa‘ Google Drive, https://drive.google.com/file/d/101A5ylyw9XbgUH5Rh-jEj6znoDIeNqBJ/view. March, 2024