Young Mind
By: Tyree Jackson
“You wanna fly, you got to give up the shit that weighs you down.”
― Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon
I.
Get rid of that gun you have so tightly
in your hand and hold this pen.
Allow that pen to be friends with
your mind, because in time it will sketch
your thoughts on the clouds.
II.
Get rid of that weed and open
your eyes to the book you can now see.
That fluttering book going from tree
to tree wants to preserve your voice within
every passage you read.
III.
Sit down my child so that your mind
can feed—on every noun, verb, and
adjective you can find from that book’s page,
because even though you’re surrounded
by drugs, guns, and gangs, that doesn’t
mean that you should be the same.
👁 6💬 3
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