Recognize! Read online

  This collection includes works of fiction. In those works, names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Compilation copyright © 2021 by Just Us Books, Inc.

  Cover art copyright © 2021 by Floyd Cooper

  All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Crown Books for Young Readers, an imprint of Random House Children’s Books, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York.

  Crown and the colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.

  Photograph and contributor credits begin on this page.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Hudson, Wade, editor. | Hudson, Cheryl Willis, editor.

  Title: Recognize! : an anthology honoring and amplifying Black life /edited by Wade Hudson and Cheryl Willis Hudson.

  Description: First edition. | New York: Crown Books for Young Readers, [2021] | Includes bibliographical references. | Audience: Ages 10+. | Audience: Grades 4–6. | Summary: “An anthology featuring over thirty Black authors and illustrators to honor Black life past, present, and future”—Provided by publisher.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2021022586 (print) | LCCN 2021022587 (ebook) | ISBN 978-0-593-38159-5 (hardcover) | ISBN 978-0-593-38160-1 (library binding) | ISBN 978-0-593-38161-8 (ebook)

  Subjects: LCSH: African Americans—Literary collections. | American literature—African American authors. | Children’s literature, American. | CYAC: African Americans—Literary collections. | American literature—African American authors—Collections.

  Classification: LCC PZ5 .R235 2021 (print) | LCC PZ5 (ebook) | DDC [Fic]—dc23

  Ebook ISBN 9780593381618

  Hand lettering by Adrian Meadows and Sylvia Bi

  Random House Children’s Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read.

  Penguin Random House LLC supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin Random House to publish books for every reader.

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  To Bernette G. Ford, our friend and comrade in children’s book publishing. A true trailblazer who for decades advocated for diversity and inclusion in the publishing industry, her legacy will continue to inspire across generations.

  To all those who know and have always known Black life matters, and to Nikki Grimes, who suggested this anthology, which gives testimony to it.

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Epigraph

  Foreword by Wade Hudson and Cheryl Willis Hudson

  Miracle Child by Sharon M. Draper

  Coloring Outside the Lines by Jerdine Nolen

  James Baldwin’s Great Debate by Wade Hudson

  Black Lives Have Always Mattered by Wade Hudson

  Famous Blerds in History by Keith Knight

  Hank Aaron Passes on the Legacy by Wade Hudson

  The Storms and Sunshine of My Life by Lamar Giles

  At Our Kitchen Table by Lesa Cline-Ransome

  Isn’t It Obvious? by Nic Stone

  The Slave Mother by Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

  Joy Lives in You by Kelly Starling Lyons

  Witness by Nikki Grimes

  You Are…by Denene Millner

  Excerpt from What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July? by Frederick Douglass

  Black Boy Reading by Ronald L. Smith

  Self-Reflection by Kwame Mbalia

  Black Butterfly by Paula Chase

  Art Insert

  Letter from Daisy Bates to Roy Wilkins: The Treatment of the Little Rock Nine

  Darnella Frazier: Eyewitness by Carole Boston Weatherford

  How to Be an Activist by Don Tate

  My Hero Is a Black Cowboy by Robert H. Miller

  Drumbeat, Ring Shout, Roll Call, Cypher* by Ibi Zoboi

  An Interview with Deray Mckesson

  Mary Mcleod Bethune's "Last Will and Testament" by Cheryl Willis Hudson and Wade Hudson

  Claiming My Space by Adedayo Perkovich

  Freedom in the Music by Curtis Hudson

  Back to Myself by Tiffany Jewell

  Recognize! by Cheryl Willis Hudson

  The Devil in the Flowers by Alicia D. Williams

  Your Breath Is a Song by Mahogany L. Browne

  Artist Notes

  Biographies

  Contributors

  About the Black Lives Matter Movement

  Sources

  Photo Credits

  Contributor Copyright

  “It’s important for us to also understand that the phrase ‘Black Lives Matter’ simply refers to the notion that there’s a specific vulnerability for African Americans that needs to be addressed. It’s not meant to suggest that other lives don’t matter. It’s to suggest that other folks aren’t experiencing this particular vulnerability.”

  —President Barack Obama

  FOREWORD

  “No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.” —Nelson Mandela

  Recognize!

  In the colloquial language of urban youth, recognize is a verb—a command or an expression that means “to understand, to comprehend something that is already known.” Already known—Black lives have always mattered.

  When we were growing up during the 1960s, our parents told us that Black lives mattered. Our lives were important to them, to our extended family, and to our community. No matter what was happening around us, that was a constant truth we were encouraged to embrace. When mean, hurtful words were directed at us, it was true. When our all-Black schools were not supplied with the same resources and materials as schools white children attended, it was true. Even when government agencies and social and cultural institutions declared we were “second-class citizens,” it was true. Our Black lives mattered.

  Recognize!

  Mother Lillian Willis used to say, “Our roots go deep,” meaning that there was much about Black life of which to be proud, and a rich legacy from which to draw! She shared stories of family elders and ancestors—how they had overcome, persevered, achieved, and fought for rightful and valued places in the world.

  Mother Lurline Hudson would say, “Walk with your head held high.” That meant we were SOMEBODY, no matter what others might have said or thought about us. We were special! She sang African American spirituals when she needed reassurance, and she reminded her attentive children that we were made in the image of God. Our lives mattered because God had created us that way. Robbing us of that comforting reality would be difficult.

  Recognize! br />
  Our teachers told us that Black lives mattered, too. In their own ways, no matter how facts were distorted or how our history was excluded from textbooks, Black lives mattered. They lifted role models to show us and culled stories and tidbits from Black history to counteract what the books sought to prove: that we did not matter. Because our lives mattered, our teachers said, we had the right to dream, too. Because our lives mattered, we could and would push forward to forge a better future despite seemingly insurmountable hardships.

  Unfortunately, the idea of Black lives not mattering has been woven into the fabric of our general society. It is a product of systemic racism. We encounter it in many places, and we know it when we are confronted by it. We know it by the way some whites respond to Black folks with contempt even though they do not know us personally. They view us through suspicious eyes and with assumptions melded with stereotypes and caricatures. To them, our skin color speaks for us, ahead of us. We know it when we see people who look like us cast aside, pushed down, profiled, held back, jailed or beaten, and, too often, killed. Like George Floyd. Like Breonna Taylor. Like Ahmaud Arbery.

  Recognize!

  But in Black families, in Black homes, children rise for a new school day and their parents get ready for a workday. Some gather in houses of worship on weekends and play in neighborhood parks on late afternoons. On holidays, Black people gather to celebrate and engage in family love. Achievements and rites of passage are recognized and celebrated with joy at reunions. Black folks go about their daily lives with hope and the expectations for aspirations for successful lives, as do others. That Black lives matter is obvious.

  In this anthology, that fact is illuminated by thirty-one award-winning authors and artists of books for young readers. Recognize! clearly documents a narrative that Black people have always affirmed and declared: Black lives matter.

  The poetry, essays, short stories, and letters cover a broad spectrum of the Black experience—an experience infused with determination, endurance, creativity, pride, and joy as well as struggle. Among them are the brilliant homage to Black storytelling traditions in “The Devil in the Flowers,” the affirming words of gender and identity in “Self-Reflection,” honoring ancestors in “Claiming My Space,” self-affirmation through musical expression in “Drumbeat, Ring Shout, Roll Call, Cypher,” a brave teenager’s use of a smartphone camera to capture the horrific murder of George Floyd in “Darnella Frazier: Eyewitness,” remembering life-altering encounters with police in “The Storms and Sunshine of My Life,” the exuberance of Black boy joy in “Joy Lives in You,” providing crystal-clear answers to why Black lives matter in “Isn’t It Obvious?”

  There are excerpts from speeches, poetry, and letters from Black forefathers Frederick Douglass and James Baldwin and Black foremothers Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune, and Daisy Bates, which provide historical context. A thought-provoking essay by activist DeRay Mckesson adds an important perspective from the front lines of the #BlackLivesMatter movement.

  Eight outstanding children’s book artists have created powerful images that also bear witness to the inherent value of Black life. Rendered in a variety of media from oil painting to collage to digital, the artistic styles provide arresting visual statements that complement the authors’ written testimonies.

  Recognize! pays homage to Black America’s clarion call that all Black lives matter and are precious! It does not matter whether others may think differently. As our mothers and fathers declared, it is so!

  Recognize: Black Lives Matter

  MIRACLE CHILD

  Sharon M. Draper

  I’m a miracle child

  Dressed in brown

  I wear cocoa and fudge

  And a chocolate gown.

  I’m a miracle child

  Dressed in tan

  I sizzle bronzed steam

  In a crunchy baked pan.

  I’m a miracle child

  Dressed in gold

  I’m honey-bright liquid

  Sweet in caramel rolled.

  I’m a miracle child

  Dressed in cream

  I’m fluffed and I’m sprinkled

  Wrapped in sugar-dipped dream.

  I’m a miracle child

  Dressed in black

  I’m dark sweet licorice—

  An ebony-melt snack.

  I’m a miracle child

  Baked with smiles on my face

  I’m grilled to perfection

  Dipped in gravy and grace.

  I’m a miracle child.

  COLORING OUTSIDE

  THE LINES

  Jerdine Nolen

  The gift of the children’s Bible from a family friend was not new. But it had color pictures to go along with the stories. I could read. I was nine years old. I thumbed through the book. I stared at the pages. There was something about the pictures that didn’t seem right—sometimes, I think, it’s that way with hand-me-down things.

  In our house, Daddy always reads the big family Bible aloud to us. He sits in his big Poppa-sized chair and we sit on the floor at his feet. His booming voice sounds like thunder—a sound just right for reading the Bible. And Daddy loves reading aloud. He is such an actor.

  I especially love hearing him read Genesis. He explains what “thou sayeth,” “doth,” and “beget” this and that means. This book didn’t have any of those kinds of words. My three older sisters weren’t interested, so the book became mine.

  I love all kinds of stories. Some I try to memorize, thanks to my fourth-grade teacher, Mrs. Harris, who is also a member of our church. She teaches Sunday School, usually with a map to show where things happened in the world.

  We learned about people who lived close to the belt around the earth’s waist, the equator. That’s where our ancestors came from and the reason for our skin color and our type of hair—the sun is so hot there.

  Whenever I get an old/new book, I sleep with it under my pillow. It makes for a bumpy night’s sleep, but that way I get to know the book. It’s a way to make the old/new book mine.

  I always have lots of questions about the things I’m learning. I didn’t think my questions were hard, but it seemed most of them were unanswerable. For example, on Sunday in church we talked about Adam and Eve. Mrs. Harris told us they were the first people. Then in class on Monday Mrs. Harris showed a filmstrip on the cave dwellers that said they were the first people. I was confused. I raised my hand to ask a question. “If the cave dwellers looked as they did and Adam and Eve looked as they did, who came first? Who were the first people?”

  My serious question was not meant to cause giggles. Immediately, I got Mrs. Harris’s look and pointing index finger. That meant to head for the coatroom in the back of the class. I was glad. It was quiet there. I could think.

  I needed answers, even if no one was around to give them to me.

  That’s when I realized what was wrong with this old/new book. The people all looked like Dick and Jane, the kids in my reading primer, or people on TV—and they were all white. Even Jesus had white skin and yellow hair. Not one of them fit what Mrs. Harris taught us about what the people living near the equator looked like. They had brown skin and dark hair.

  I didn’t like the feeling growing inside me. I was feeling like I didn’t want the book anymore and I wanted to give it back. Momma and Daddy wouldn’t want me to do that. Deep down I really didn’t want to. But the pictures were all wrong. I had to do something.

  If I was going to read this Bible, I had to make it readable.

  Last Saturday, I got a new box of crayons and a new coloring book. I love to color. I always stay in between the lines.

  There were only eight colors and the only one that came close enough to the skin color I was looking for was brown—black would hide features, so
I used that for the hair.

  To keep away from tattle-telling mouths, I worked on my project in the privacy of my bedroom. But this day, I decided to stretch out on the dining room table just as Daddy was walking by.

  “What are you doing to that book?” He picked it up. “This book of all books! And it was a gift….”

  I had no words. But Daddy had a lot of them. The worst thing about his punishments were the talks.

  “We’ll talk later.”

  I prayed to Jesus with the Yellow Hair for almost anything but that. I hoped he’d hear me. Daddy’s lectures went on forever and sometimes into the next day. The thing was to keep a low profile, stay out of sight. All went well for a while—things quieted down, but not inside of me.

  I was already in trouble. I put the book back under my pillow and waited for the house to be quiet.

  I grabbed my box of crayons and the Bible and headed for the bathroom. I locked the door behind me. I wouldn’t let myself turn back. Sitting on the floor, I opened to the story with Jesus and the little children. I colored them first. Now it was Jesus’s turn. After a while, I let out a long yawn and stretched. I packed up all my things. I opened the door and bumped into my father. He was headed for the kitchen for his usual snack. Daddy looked at my hands. I looked at my feet.

  What would happen to me now? Had Daddy run out of lectures for me?

  “Come near to me,” he said. I followed him into the kitchen. “Show me what you were doing with your crayons and that book.” I opened my mouth and started to cry. I blurted out everything. “It’s not fair. It’s not fair! Mrs. Harris says we matter in the world but nobody in this whole book looks like us and the stories take place near the equator where people have darker colored skin like us. See? Everybody in this book looks like the people on TV. Even Jesus has yellow hair.”