dinosaurs in the hood
by Danez Smith
let’s make a movie called Dinosaurs in the Hood.
Jurassic Park meets Friday meets The Pursuit of Happyness.
there should be a scene where a little black boy is playing
with a toy dinosaur on the bus, then looks out the window
& sees the T. rex, because there has to be a T. rex.
don’t let Tarantino direct this. in his version, the boy plays
with a gun, the metaphor: black boys toy with their own lives
the foreshadow to his end, the spitting image of his father.
nah, the kid has a plastic brontosaurus or triceratops
& this is his proof of magic or God or Santa. i want a scene
where a cop car gets pooped on by a pterodactyl, a scene
where the corner store turns into a battleground. don’t let
the Wayans brothers in this movie. i don’t want any racist shit
about Asian people or overused Latino stereotypes.
this movie is about a neighborhood of royal folks–
children of slaves & immigrants & addicts & exile–saving their town
from real ass dinosaurs. i don’t want some cheesy, yet progressive
Hmong sexy hot dude hero with a funny, yet strong, commanding
Black girl buddy-cop film. this is not a vehicle for Will Smith
& Sofia Vergara. i want grandmas on the front porch taking out raptors
with guns they hid in walls & under mattresses. i want those little spitty
screamy dinosaurs. i want Cecily Tyson to make a speech, maybe two.
i want Viola Davis to save the city in the last scene with a black fist afro pick
through the last dinosaur’s long, cold-blood neck. But this can’t be
a black movie. this can’t be a black movie. this movie can’t be dismissed
because of its cast or its audience. this movie can’t be metaphor
for black people & extinction. This movie can’t be about race.
this movie can’t be about black pain or cause black pain.
this movie can’t be about a long history of having a long history with hurt.
this movie can’t be about race. nobody can say nigga in this movie
who can’t say it to my face in public. no chicken jokes in this movie.
no bullet holes in the heroes. & no one kills the black boy. & no one kills
the black boy. & no one kills the black boy. besides, the only reason
i want to make this is for the first scene anyway: little black boy
on the bus with his toy dinosaur, his eyes wide & endless
___________________________his dreams possible, pulsing, & right there.
From Don’t Call Us Dead. Reproduced with kind permission of Chatto & Windus
Forward Prizes for Poetry
Winner Best Collection 2018
Don't Call Us Dead
Danez Smith
About Danez Smith
Danez Smith (b. 1989, St. Paul, Minnesota) writes poems which are simultaneously jubilant and confrontational. Their debut, Boy, won the Lambda Literary Award and the Kate Tufts Discovery Award. After their poem ‘dear white america’ — included in Don’t Call Us Dead — was featured on PBS NewsHour, Smith’s performance received 300,000 YouTube views in the space of a few days.
Smith is African-American, queer, gender-neutral and HIV positive. They first became aware of the possibilities of contemporary poetry through HBO’s ‘Def Poetry’, and honed their performance skills with theatre training and slams (Smith is the reigning Rustbelt Individual Champion). The poems which excite them most, they say, are those which ‘through language, better equip me to re-enter the world and proceed vigorously’.
