I sketched a poem soon after #Verelove '24 in hopes of chiseling it throughout the year for this year's verse love. Early in my teaching career I read an article written by Sara Corbett that introduced me to the historical experiences of children uprooted by war in Sudan. The story redirected all I hoped to achieve as an educator, including how I might use the power of words to change the world for the better. Katherine Applegate’s middle-grade verse-novel, Home of the Brave, details the story of Kek, a Sudanese child relocated to the U.S. as a refugee-background youth. One of the poems in the book, Scars, details a remorse felt for not having a gaar ceremony , the Dinka tradition of scarring a young boy’s forehead as an initiation into adulthood.
You’re lucky, Ganwar says.
Why would you want such scars?
Here they mean nothing.
There they meant everything, I say. (p. 175) I like to pair Applegate’s “Scar” with a song by Emmanuel Jal, author of War Child: A Child Soldier’s Story. The song, “Scars” features Nelly Furtado, and has helped me to get students and teachers writing for years. The refrain, My scars are what got me this far / And now I can touch the stars / Coz it don’t matter who you are (who you are) / We all got scars allows me to ask others: What scars do you have? Where are they? What stories do they tell?
Then, while editing it one night while my father was watching me do as I do on my computer, the poem twisted in a different direction. Always on the road to find out, and Cat Stevens singing in my error. It's one of those full-circle moments and from it, I find serenity.
