The Black and Brown Honor Society hosted a poetry slam on Nov. 21 in collaboration with The White Squirrel — U of L’s literary magazine — and The Louisville Cardinal. Rebekah Flowers, a senior double major in Photography and Psychology, took home first place with her poem “Savior.” Read her winning poem below:
“Savior”
By Rebekah Flowers
Jesus
Your Jesus
The white man’s Jesus
The white man’s Savior
With the white man’s eyes
And the white man’s hair
Now tell me he’s mine too
Oh, how overjoyed I must be
The white man has come to save me
Saved me by putting me in chains
Oh yes Oh yes, I am blessed
Saved me by forcing my knees to the ground
Cold and wet with my ancestor’s tears
Surrounded by my mouthless advisors
In place of their lips is that Holy Scripture
Underneath those pages their lips are crying for mercy
To escape from underneath those suffocating words
Oh yes Oh yes, we are blessed
Bang…bang goes the gun….I mean gong of freedom
Ready to whisk us away into conformity, if ignored then
Gladly we’ll be adorned with rope necklaces accompanied best by branches
We sing your songs of pain, but we hum our songs of freedom
While hymns are sung at our feet
Symbolizing our walk to judgment
Heads bowed, symbolizing sympathy
Oh yes Oh yes, how can I not be blessed?
The native tongue which carried the unsung burdens of lost culture
The tendency of uncultured terms to fall from out lips
And the prominence of those kinky curls to surface when doused with water
All of this can be cured by that white savior
And his various white methods
Oh yes Oh yes aren’t we all blessed
But truly, my Savior is no white man
My Savior can not be contained to that tainted image
My Savior has bronze skin, and hair like wool
And with our chains are pulled to safety
Safety where we may finally rest
Oh yes Oh yes, now I am truly blessed
