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At school, as in his neighborhood, Barry didn’t see anyone who looked like him.

He was an outsider

He seemed to wear the wrong clothes

He saw the discrimination

His father was a stranger to him,

They welcomed Barrack as long lost family

He was the child of a white American mother and a black Kenyan father

He called for increased national security, but to also find the source of the madness

He called for people to raise the hopes and dreams of embittered children across the world

He managed to get health care in the nation reformed

He had a commitment to his grandmother, his wife, and his children

But all he wanted to do, was leave the world a better place

Barrack Obama: Our 44th President

I chose this style of poem to allude to the many other things Barack Obama was, other than a great president. The deeper meaning to this poem is, even though its corny, that it doesn't matter what you look like, you can still change the world. (Note, not all the lines are exactly the same as in the book, but very close or just added the word "he" instead of something else or for it to work with "he" at the beginning)

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By: Patrick Dusape

No sport has a color
No sport has a size

Every baller can shoot
Every baller can fly

Black or white we still have fun
Black or white we still are 1

The smallest ones are not the punks.
We all learned only the strong survive.

If i love the sport i'll play it with pride
Strive for greatness

Continue to be humble until you die.

No matter where you are don't discriminate because you don't know what that person has to bring to the table.

My poem was about Allen Iverson the All-Time basketball player. When you learn about his life and watch documentaries. People would really think he was nice at basketball because he was so short compared to other. Also, I added color to the poem because he was like the one to bring braids into the NBA and back then people thought braids was more of an African American thing .

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By Michael Sanders

Jesse was a good leader
used to speak for all the black people.

a young Jackson learned early what segregation looked like.In 1964 Jackson graduated from college with a degree in sociology.

The next year he went to Selma, Alabama, to march with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Jackson never finished his studies but was later ordained by the minister of a Chicago church.

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My limbs are long and incredibly flexible

My muscles are strong which allows me to rehearse

I perform turns and leaps over and over again each day for months on end

But suddenly i could no longer fit into the same costumes the other girls wore

They where too tight on me

“ You need to lengthen”

My body wouldn't fit in at ABT

“ There’s no way you could be a ballerina and be as big as you are. Ballerinas are thin.”

My poems was about girls who struggle with their body and they are told that they are to big and fat and they force themselves to be thin. Dancers, especially ballerina, try really hard to look perfect and as soon as you gain a little weight you are told that you are to big and that you need to loose weight. And this cause

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By Kyra Allen☺

Her mother's illness was difficult for a thirteen-year-old.

Her and her father had long endured an up-and-down relationship.

He never made it a secret of the fact that he favored his other daughter over her.

When her father reprimanded her, she knew she could count on her mother to take her side.

A dying person's pillow was removed from the bed, supposedly to ease  the way into the afterlife.

Her mother did not believe in these folk rituals and did not want them observed at her death.

Losing her mother at thirteen was hard enough.

To believe, as she did, that she disappointed her mother at the end was even harder.

She wrote later, "That moment was the end of a phase in my life. I was old before my time with grief of loss, of failure, of remorse of failure."

Meaning: This poem was meant to describe her relationship with her family. When Nora was younger, she got along with her mother better than her father. But at age thirteen, her mother passed away due to sickness. She was forced to move in with her father even though they never really got along too well. Overtime she realized how her father favors her sister over her. This taught her how to become more independent and not to depend on others anymore.

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Struggles and Strategies
By: Chandani El

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Struggles and Strategies
By: Chandani El

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The drama of the mid-twentieth century emerged on a foundation of earlier struggles.
The Cold War put a hold on expansive conceptions of civil/human rights.
Americans absorbed images of hopeful young people shaping their destinies.

People called racism the nation’s number one enemy.
Gradualism was a smart legal strategy.
However, some thought it was a mistake to suit the nation’s leaders’ ideas of propriety.
Some saw school desegregation as a way to revolutionize American society.
However, the goal of a multicultural America is not achieved simply by proximity.
Life needed to be reformed to meet the needs for all.

I chose these lines because they described what life was like during the middle of the 20th century. They also showed what some people did to change this. I also liked how the words came together to form a deeper meaning in the poem.

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Jesse Jackson: An Influential African American
by Sade Graham

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Jesse Jackson: An Influential African American
by Sade Graham

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Never whistle at a man
Never forgot that moment
In those days, that could ruin one's life
Someday he would be somebody

Jesse was a good leader
Holding weekly civil rights meetings
Became a minister and the old theater became his church
People could listen to his sermons on the radio
Jesse became famous

Organized special fairs and celebrations
Starting a new civil rights group
People United to Save Humanity(PUSH)
PUSH and the Coalition would help poor people of all colors

Jesse told black people to be proud of their African roots
Jesse's work made many Americans realize that they had the power to help black South Africans

He led a march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama
The United States was like a quilt made of many different fabrics and colors

This poem includes Jesse Jackson's quotes and his life story. It shows how he went through segregation and still managed to be one of America's most influential African Americans. He decided to do more with his life and in that process he made a great impact towards the end of segregation.

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Feel the Sting of the Butterfly - Jacob Castillo

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Feel the Sting of the Butterfly - Jacob Castillo

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- There came a beautifully arrogant young man who made us proud to be us and proud to fight for our rights
- Float like a butterfly
- Sting like a bee
- Your hands can't hit
- What your eyes can't see
- I told myself I was the best before I knew I was
- To show that in a profession which is mainly brutality and blood, a man can have nobility and dignity
- Ali fought not just for a living, but also for respect and rewards far more precious for money and glory
- I can drown the water and kill a dead bee
-Don't mess with Muhammad Ali

Meaning: I meant for my poem to be inspiring, becuase Muhammad could make the most uninspired person the most over confident person in the world. I looked up to him when I was little, and I was a soccer player. I think the deeper meaning is also to have confidence in yourself. Don't give up. I chose the lined becuase I liked them and they were really cool, you don't see proffessional athletes rapping every single day.

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A person has to remember that the road to success is always under construction.

And I think when you make mistakes and you recover from them and you treat them as valuable learning experiences, then you've got something to share.

You have to get that through your head.

That it is not easy becoming successful.

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By: John Osajie

A runner bearing Olympic flame
Competition began
Fighting the wind
Dig a foothold
Arms and legs pumping
Eyes looked straight ahead
Breaking the world mark
There is so much work to be done

Living in a one room shack
Games of hide and seek,
School boy pranks too
We used to have a lot fun
We never had problems

Did not have enough money
There was usually enough to eat
With all that, there was time to play
I always loved running
you could go in any direction
Fast or slow.

- This poem is talking about athlete Jesse Owens. It shows how his success in track change him and his family life forever. His parents were share croppers and so was he. He gained income through his fame from the track. This is what brought about the the topic of this poem how running track changed his life.

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By: Emma Grumet

No one knows everything

All this is new to me

I am still learning

The mother of the modern day

Gracious and caring

Everyone who meets her

Feels the love she carries

For all of humanity

People had suffered

Had to face this kind of danger

She might not be with us in the future

But she has given me the strength

Strength to say what is right

- After reading my book and really discussing and thinking about all of the amazing lines within it, I choose a few and pieced them together to create this poem. The lines are deep and have so much meaning to them. It described the strength that this woman had, and how she taught people that they shouldn’t be afraid to stand up for change and stand up for what they believe in.

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You were born black or you were born white.

That’s just how life was.

I was born black.

I went to black church and black schools, where we had caring black teachers.

Skin color decided your fate.

That is why we march.

We march for the rights of our parents.

And then we protest.

To make the future bright.

We do this for ourselves.

Our futures.

And we won’t stop marching

Till they hear our voices.

And we won’t stop marching

Till they listen well.

Since words are our weapons.

We won’t do as they tell.

I took the phrases from the book “Turning 15 on the Road to Freedom”. The reason I chose these words is because it shared their thoughts, why they were marching, and what they were doing it for. The Selma Voting Rights March of 1965 was a march to give black people voting rights. Many didn’t raise any hands, but used their words as their swords. It shows through the last part of my poem. Also, many people did try to stop the march. They marchers never listened. They always continued. Most were born black, and you can never change it.

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      Claudette Colvin:
         Take a Stand              
By: Lizbeth Mayancela

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      Claudette Colvin:
         Take a Stand              
By: Lizbeth Mayancela

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How can I get started again?

How in this world can I pick myself up?

My heart began to throb with inexpressible joy.

You could read happiness

I knew then and I know now that, when it comes to justice, there is no easy way to get it.

You can't sugarcoat it.
You have to take a stand and say, "This is not right.”

Each species with which we share the earth is a success story

It was easy to see that it was all crap. I’d had enough of just feeling angry

I was tired of hoping for justice.

When my moment came, I was ready.

Meaning:
Over the years everybody has faced insecurity. Reality vs. expectations is one topic that most people don't fully understand. Instead of hiding  you should show who you truly are. For example, Claudette Colvin didn't give up her seat to a white American. Claudette decided to take a stand to prove that she deserves rights too. People hide their true-selves and act fake because of the expectations that society has created. People fake to be fine but on the inside they're really not. What's the point of acting fake if you're not content? All in all, take a stand and don't hide your true-self.

Quote that I love: "You can't blend in when you were born to standout."- R.J. Palacio

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By: Kyle Bullard

He let the stress get to him
Turned to drugs
Not coming home, drinking, and other forms of destructive behavior
Doing all these things to make himself feel good about himself

It was a routine part of being an actor.

He didn’t even consider himself an addict
He wasn’t robbing his kids piggy bank
That's what junkies do.

His drug use became desperate
His wife found him passed out on the kitchen while cocaine cooked on the stove.
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I used phrases from a biography on Samuel L. Jackson. I used these phrases because Samuel's drug addiction was a very influential part of his acting career, and vice versa. He was actually only able to truly get over his drug addiction when researching for a role. This poem is really about how drugs can ruin someone's life without them even knowing.

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Merely living her life

To the fullest

Most people marry because

They want to control the other

You do not own that thing

That you love

Fight to survive

Or else

No subject too dark

Or too painful

Tackle her with humor

But look on the bright side

Now you are really

Half black

And half white

Meaning:

I chose these phrases from the text “Born A Crime” by Trevor Noah because of his relationship with his mother and how he dealt with being “colored” in a time when being colored was a crime. I also believe that this is personifying the “marriage” between being black and white.