Never Had A Friend

i never had friends

by age 10 i’d already lived seven years

with no memory of my mother

and three years without my father due to

his incarceration

i never stayed anywhere long enough to

develop meaningful

friendships by age 10 i’d already

survived five serious life-threatening

experiences

asthma head trauma near drowning

swallowed snake poisoning

and suffered a severe form of the flu

nested

within unsafe and uncertain

circumstances coupled

with the deeply wounded and

dysfunctional family

finding quality friendships was critical

for my survival

in those moments

when despair was too bitter to breathe

air it was strangers

that bestowed upon me a tremendous

amount of character concern and care

i witnessed a special kind of friendship

from children who were born and crime

infested

impoverished isolated drug polluted

concrete cages called the housing

projects

we survived by the power of our

friendship

and the truth in our art but before i

tell you the story of my friends i want

to talk to you a bit about trauma

the leading causes of death have been

linked to adverse childhood experiences

also known as aces i was on the brink of

a doctoral degree

when i learned that my a score was 10

10 crushing aces

from chronic domestic violence to my

late stepmother french kissing me and my

brothers before we went to elementary

school

we were defined by trauma and oppression

it shaped the depth of our depressions

the passion

in our affections and the truth in our

expression

a shame to speak so we nourish each

other’s courage to express ourselves

through artistic

confessions the thing you need to know

about our traumas

we get it from our mamas my ancestors

my kin folks were the victims of

american slavery

genocide apartheid and generations of

oppression we are

intimately connected to these atrocities

consciously

or unconsciously my grandfather was

among the first generations to be born

free

my very last name johnson

is a slave name it is not an african

name

but the name that commemorates those who

brutalize my forefathers

many things remain that we learned from

slave masters

such as some parenting practices gong

get that swatch

whip his backside with a belt boy sit

down and

shut up i’m gonna beat your baha

don’t you touch that i’m gonna beat you

stuck all that crying stop all that

crying i’m gonna give you something to

cry about you in this world

and i take you out

what do you think is the source of these

parenting practices

master john i

don’t want no trouble so

but adam bill is my wife she’s the

mother of my children

so she don’t want to share your bed no

more

please sir now you listen here

next time you come from me

taking this tone with me we gonna line

up all your children

where they can see good we gonna beat

you half the death front of them

then i’ma have my way with annabelle

every day

till i get tired of her then i’ma have

my way with your daughters

come from me tell me what i was gonna do

use mine

ungrateful devil we gonna beat your

black behind

before you stone

me or my friends for our imperfections

consider

that we may be rooted within a traumatic

childhood rooted

within social disadvantage rooted within

centuries of oppression

how does one survive while colonized

commodified

cultural genocide strangers in the

struggle become allies

allies become friends and with

friendship

we shifted the tides it gave us drive

encouraged our art empowered us with

pride

friendship gave us the audacity to stay

alive

and now it’s time to tell you the story

of my friends

i was startled by gunshots

from a painful slumber on the floor

drenched in sweat with symptoms of

severe hypothermia

dazed and disoriented i struggled to my

feet and stumbled zombie-like into the

living room

i witnessed my uncle aiming his gun

shooting at my father

i was frozen had my father

just been killed by his own brother

my father survived but we had to leave

rapidly intensely packing packing

the packing triggered childish fears

got to move again another school change

no idea why would end up and too sick to

cry about it

we were packing up again and i was

scared because every time we moved

i got hurt my family never had much

money

the closest thing we had to a deposit

was a rain check

therefore in early 1997

my home became an imposing and stunning

10 story

grimy dull brick building called the

auburn family reception center

located in the fort greene neighborhood

in the new york city borough

brooklyn the same cumberland hospital

where michael jordan and mike tyson were

born had become an emergency housing

shelter for mike johnson

there i was from the house my

grandfather built

to a homeless shelter with my comrades

casualties of american capitalism i saw

young mothers

sleeping on the floor nursing infants

ingesting disparities in the breast milk

of their mommies

it was horrifying but what really made

me nervous

tomorrow was the first day at a new

school

and i had no friends the first day at

ps67 i sat in the back row

the classroom door opens and in walks

this

12 to 13 year old kid floating in slow

motion on a cloud of mystical smoke

his skin was a golden brown he

nonchalantly panned a room with his

bright

hazel eyes covered in football apparel

the students cleared a path for him

the girl’s eyes fluttered the boys

nodded with pride and admiration

it was the grandest entrance i’d ever

seen i turned to the girl next to me i

said

who is this kid she said are you talking

about dayshawn

he the most popular kid in school he

like the prince of the projects

at lunch time i was in the far corner of

the cafeteria sitting alone

the fog emerges from the floor again and

walks deshawn

he walked with an entourage of kids who

should have definitely been in high

school at the time

they walk straight towards me he sizes

me up a bit and says

hey yo son you’re in fifth grade right

i’m deshawn these are my homeboys

i said i am mom i am mike

i’m micah i’m from florida he said

hey yo son you got a wild accent b

you sound like a farmer mike fifth grade

means

you have mr miranda after lunch i could

show you

hey yo this kid here is farmer mike

we’re gonna take him to class a small

crowd followed as he escorted me to

class and just like

that i became a crew member homeboys

with deshawn the prince

of the projects i would never eat lunch

alone again

mr miranda was a young latino teacher

with hope in his eyes

he had long shiny dark silky hair kept

in a ponytail

he was more than our teacher he was our

friend

his subject was math but he also taught

us character and artistic expression

there was an explosion of creativity in

fort greene at that time

this brooklyn renaissance gave birth to

spike lee erica badu chris rock

most deaf talib quality saul williams

and so on

mr miranda convinced us that we had the

finest quality of art inside of us

mr miranda used hip hop and shakespeare

to help us process our emotions the

story of macbeth

like our own so tragic so beautiful

so gangsta in fort greene our

friendships were forged

by our common struggle anger agony and

dream

of redemption we were counseled by

crackheads

drinking old english so we figured

shakespeare was just like us

and we were just as rough as mcduff we

too were casualties of the noble classes

economic and political ambitions

only when your friends and family have

been killed and incarcerated can you

truly

understand what it was like for macduff

to come face to face with macbeth

the symbol of his persecution and in

that brooklyn ghetto far away

from shakespeare and 15th century

england imagining the moment when we

could confront our oppressors and avenge

our friends we channeled

the spirit of mcduff

i have no words

my voice is in my sword

thou bloodier then then terms can give

thee out

despair thy charms

and let the demon whom thou still hath

serve tell thee

mcduff was from his mother’s womb

untimely ripped

then yield the coward

and will you’ll live to be the showing

gaze of the time

and we’ll have thee as our monsters are

painted upon a pole and under

it here may you see

the tyrant

mr miranda took us to the world’s famous

apollo theater in harlem for me

it was a holy trip a sacred rites of

passage

it was surreal and sobering to rub that

legendary tree at hope

i had become a writer and a performer

right there

on frederick douglass boulevard

deshawn promised me that one day

i would tell our story and it would be

liberating

the people would appreciate our art and

be inspired by it

to practice we played freestyle games we

could be anywhere anytime

we would stop and immediately perform

improvised rap poetry

how many years until that young boy

grown

left alone tried to be strong but never

had no home his faith has gone but with

his homies he can do no wrong

heart of stone but miranda tried to

change that tone brooklyn’s own

homegrown showed me how to get in that

zone at a young age jumped on the stage

and processed that rage

many days in dade county i was in that

daze

the hate they gave her was amazed by

that two-part phrase crime pays ryan

page the only ways to escape that maze

i was raised in a blaze of drugs

violence daddy in that cage

just the craze on the slaves decapitated

in that grave

desean tried to walk me home every day

but i had a morbid fear

that the whole school would discover

that i was homeless

and i would no longer be worthy enough

to hang out

with the most popular kid in school my

daily homework

was to convince deshawn to let me walk

him home

to avoid being exposed humiliated

and losing my friend

one day on the way home they shine

abruptly stopped and said

hey yo son where’s your building

i’m walking you home where’s your spot

man

ironically where he stopped

on the sidewalk was right in front of

the entrance to the homeless shelter

i tried to change his mind but he was

committed he would not be moved

it was 100 percent clear to me that this

is the day deshawn learns that i’m a bum

i’d be exposed to the entire school they

would torment me every day

about my head and shame i said

technically you’ve walked me home every

day

i live right here motioning with my head

toward the homeless shelter

deshawn’s eyes glared

toward that towering structure he said

oh man word

mike you live here

i bowed my head even lower humiliated

embarrassed broken

desean planted his feet squared his

shoulders

looked me directly in my eyes and said

we’re not going to diss you son

i will never diss you nobody is gonna

diss you

and in that instant we were forever

bonded

on the deepest level of friendship

i’ll never forget that experience at my

lowest and most vulnerable point a child

in an icy ghetto said those edifying

words of compassion

mercy humility and pure gangster

and his promise was kept no one ever

said a word about the homeless shelter

not even a single joke

i found happiness

in a homeless shelter because of my

teacher mr miranda

and my best friend deshawn

24 years since that day

i still marvel at the quality of those

childhood friendships

the best kind of friends authentic

loyal present pure

honorable and pleasant that

kind of friendship is empowering it’s

life-saving

it represents the highest quality of

love

there is so much we can learn from

disadvantaged children

the quality of their character the

beauty in their art

and the power of their friendships you

never had a friend

until you’ve bonded with one who can

understand your lived experiences

and the historical struggles of your

family you never had a friend

until someone has loved you the same

through your tragedies and your triumphs

you never had a friend until someone has

encouraged your voice

believed in your dreams and vowed that

no matter what

they would never betray you they would

never harm you

they would never diss you i pray you

humanize the children

who suffer from poverty invest in the

places they live

invest in their gifts and invest

in their friends

you