Push Chapter 3

an Abdul (se__ of God) to see
(and Abdul (servant of God) to see)
see the i
ey see
(eye)
see me
liv
(live)

or

die
poslv
(positive)

0r

negv
(negative)
wh? why?
(why? why?)
must
I li
(lie)
to misel
(myself)
I
must
no
(know)
the truf
(truth)

How does one describe poetry? Or make sense of it, even? What is a poem? An articulation of emotion, a state of being crafted, molded, strewn in words. I find that it often difficult to relay emotion into words for what I feel has more dimensions, is far deeper, than any word could capture. A poem is a series of words that attempts to draw on so much more than meets the eye. For the character Precious, it is a method through which she begins to gain a sense of identity. The poem above conveys this through simple and yet very raw words. What's special about this poem is that it is genuine, real, and honest. It does not try to alleviate through complicated diction, nor does is try to hide behind anything. It is exactly what Precious feels. For the first time in her life, she is able to feel exactly what she is going through, and in a way by writing it down, she is able to face it and carry on. Of course, she is still bogged by the dangers and miseries of her situation, but she is able to look at the more positive side of her picture. She was never able to do this before and poetry has become some sort of means through which she can step back and view herself with outside perspective and gradually realize how special she really is.

Push Chapter 1

Invisibility is the word that highlights the first chapter of Push for me. Precious reasons her invisibility when saying "Don't nobody want me. Don't nobody need me. I know who I am. I know who they say I am"(31). She recognizes that she is human, that she is not this vampire that everyone see's her as. This is why she says she knows what THEY say she is, and this is why she believes that she is invisible. Everyone sees her as a vampire, or welfare queen. A black woman whose sole source of income is welfare, whose "intelligence" is minute, whose sexual deviance is innate, this is the vampire she is seen as. But she is not a vampire, and she knows this. So the real her must be invisible. Makes sense to me.

One thing that struck me as a little ironic is her perspective of the other boys in her math class. She is seen as disruptive at first, after refusing to open her book and openly chastising Mr. Wicher. However, she becomes the authority of the class, keeping the other boys in the class subdued. This is where my interest stems from. I am trying to understand her relationship with the other boys in the class. At the beginning of the class Mr. Wichen had the perspective that precious was loud and disruptive, stemming from the fact that Precious couldn't open the book to the page because she is illiterate. He allows her to remain in class after she affirms her intent to learn in class. However she views the boys through a similar lens that society views her. She does not say that perhaps the boys are also disruptive because of their inability to read, or other factors that can lead to improper classroom conduct. She uses words like native, coon, and nigger (6-7)that make me recognize the irony behind it all. The irony being her misunderstand of the rowdy young men in the classroom.

Precious post 1- Kayla

"My fahver don't see me really. If he did he would know I was like a white girl, a real person, inside. He would not climb on me from forever and stick his dick n' get me inside on fire, bleed, I bleed then he slap me. Can't he see I am a girl for flowers and straw legs and a place in the picture" (32).

I found it difficult to put into words how the first section of Precious, or Push, affected me. I found myself feeling physically sick at times. There were so many points to touch upon in this novel; I was overwhelmed when I sat down to write this blog. I decided to zero in on the quote above. In Precious's narrative, she often wishes she were white. Above she says a white girl is a real person. I have never before read a text towards which I became so emotionally transfixed. The raw material is jolting and coercive in the respect that I didn't want to accept it. I did not want to accept the weight and reality, the gravity of such unfathomable circumstances. And why does it make me so uncomfortable? I am a white female, grew up in a nice family, and I have had no traumatic events in my life. In writing this, I feel as if I am shifting the attention from Precious to myself, and that is not the intention. I merely want to identify why this quote made me so uncomfortable. To Precious, I am a real person. That stood out to me, and I am not sure how I should take it. It makes me feel awkward, undeserving. Why is it that I was born into cirumstances in which I did not have to be afraid, and I grew up with a sense of support and freedom. Why didn't Precious have that freedom or support? Or other girls who suffer as she does in the novel? Why do some people suffer and others do not? I realize there is no rational or concrete answer to that question. Unfortuneatly, because of the history of the country in which we live, a girl such as Precious must wish that her skin were lighter. Interestingly enough, I almost wish my skin were darker for this same reason. Perhaps then I will no longer be ignorant, spoiled, perfect, etc. Perhaps then people will not assume that I have the world at my feet. I don't mean to speak selfishly; I am merely trying to see this quote from all sides--from the perspective of the black girl and the perspective of the white girl. Even though I can stand back and say, "I'm not perfect, I'm not beautiful, life is hard for me sometimes, I am afraid of life." It doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because I wasn't raped by my father. I didn't have a child at twelve, and I can read and write. My hardships are not as severe as that of Precious, or Rita, or Germaine, or any girl growing up in poverty, drugs, fatherless, motherless, fear. Does this make me a bad person? Sometimes I feel that it does. I feel that it is my fault that my life is easier than theirs. It is nothing I can help. Nothing they can help. Society, with it's rigid divides, ideals of ethnic dichotomy, scales of skin tone, society separates, breaks, ruins, hurts the heart and soul and body; leads us to believe that those who look differently are the other, people with which we cannot identify. Even myself--and I have always considered myself open to anyone--I fear a girl like Precious because I cannot grasp her reality and it is not fair to her.

We can all have a place in "the picture." I want us all to be beautiful and unique and ourselves, every distinction illuminated, in the greater picture.