On the morning of Monday, March 3, I arrived at Bridgeport Juvenile Detention Center in Connecticut with a large chart paper in one hand and a music stand in the other. I was accompanied by several musicians carrying their instruments—artists I had shared the stage with just nights before.
Classical musicians DeShaun Gordon-King, Alessandro Cirafici, Yhasmin Valenzuela-Blanchard, Rachel Juszczak, Virginia Morales, and I had spent the weekend blending poetry and sound in I Said What I Said, a showcase presented by Castle of Our Skins at the Boston Celebrity Series and Fairfield University’s Quick Center for the Arts. A celebration of Black artistry, history, and music on March 1st and 2nd.
It had been the most I’d ever carried a music stand in my life, I recalled, as we huddled in the lobby, waiting on final details—preparing our minds for the young boys who would soon greet us and our bodies for the metal detectors standing in the way.
A group of 10+ Black boys and boys of color joined us in the gymnasium—our classroom for the morning. Within minutes, the space was full.
I’ve been teaching in carceral facilities for years, but this time was different. The room wasn’t just filled with students. It was packed with guards, social workers, teachers, donors, and program partners—all, I assume, there to observe.
I hated that.
These kids are not a spectacle.
And neither am I.
"Engage. Sit with them. Engage," I told the adults in the room, nudging them to grab a sheet of paper and fold their legs on the gym floor, just like the students.
Beforehand, the musicians and I had discussed a few themes. My workshop was meant to bring segments of the I Said What I Said showcase into this space—to make its purpose tangible. The goal was to get students to explore the power of their voices—to ask what it means to have a voice, or to feel unheard. We would craft lines and, with support from our team of musicians, turn their poems into compositions backed by live music.
"How many of you write poetry?" I asked.
About 85% said they were rappers.
I smiled. Perfect. Maybe they’d battle rap me—not that I was a rapper myself, but that we could meet each other in a space without judgment, fear, or self-censorship.
They got shy—laughing, looking at each other, hesitating. And while I always knew this, seeing it unfold reminded me just how important all of this was.
We were talking about poetry, sure. But what we were really dealing with was something much deeper—expression, trust, the chance to just be.
Young. Boy. Be.
At first, some of them resisted the idea of poetry altogether. Said it was too happy.
So, I asked, “Who said poetry got to be happy?”
“Poetry just has to make you feel something. Make you say something you ain’t always comfortable saying,” I offered them that morning—and myself for many years.
“How you gon’ call yourself a rapper if all you got is one bar?” I challenged them further.
And one by one, they wrote. They walked back and forth across the room. Wrote some more.
They rapped lines to each other, even spit some in front of me. They danced between excitement and reluctance.
They created.
Teaching young artists means allowing them to see that their craft is serious. It requires time, effort, vulnerability, and dedication. I watched as they geared into full concentration.
With the help of musicians, they set their words to live music and built something new. Arranged, collaborated, improved.
And then we held a mini showcase at the end of class. Again, some of them were nervous—understandably so—but they all rose to the challenge.
These workshops ain't ever just about teaching poetry. They are about creating space for self-expression, about showing young artists that their voices carry weight, that their words— spoken, written, or muscialiszed—powerful. That they are powerful.
Every student deserves to learn, to create, to have agency. To feel like children.
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