What is American Poetry?
American Poetry is simply defined as poetry from America
From the works of Phillis Wheatley and Edgar Allen Poe
To the words of Emily Dickinson and Maya Angelou

This will be my American poem
Just like my ears,
filled with sounds of gunfire

Here is my American Poem
Filled with the cries of mothers mourning the monumental loss
of their sons due to a bullet and the increased level of melanin in their skin
Filled with the tears of those who have been told that being who they are and loving whomever they love is a sin

My American Poem
Filled with words as intoxicating as that beverage you downed
on that lonely night
As intoxicating as the hard liquor hidden behind that brown paper bag in the hands of a man sitting homeless on the curb, an ugly sight

My American Poem
That wishes for the freedom of my mind and soul as a little girl would wish for love upon a star
That prays for release as the many people in our overpopulated prisons are

My American Poem
That is tired of religion being used as an excuse for hate
And tired of unnecessary shootings of innocent people,
that have been happening of late

And is tired of worth being associated with the tone of your skin and measured by the size of your various body parts but not based on what we hold within
Tired of seeing my beautiful thick sisters bashed because they aren’t unhealthily skinny or unrealistically pale, ya see this is how it all starts

My American Poem
A poem for the people unlike our newly elected President
One that strives to express the wants and needs of a nation divided

My American Poem
That is there in the darkest hours when your walls are falling apart and the world is tearing up your fragile heart
That will love in all your queerness and will love you even when you don’t know what your gender is
That will cradle you while your body trembles and provide you with shelter when your life’s in shambles

My American Poem
Which is also Your American Poem

My American Poem
Which can also be Our American Poem

My American Poem
A Poem that represents me