Moses Moody Reflects on his Powerful High School Poem, "He Beat The Streets"

My name is Moses Moody. I'm going to be performing an original poem called He Beat the Streets.

It was my senior speech in high school, and everybody had to write a speech. So when they chose me to go, I wanted to keep people awake, keep people engaged. The poem that I wrote in high school is my perspective on different black experiences.

You struggle to reach a destination where my uncle found himself in max incarceration. All because he had this undone infatuation with pride. Though he had to put that pride to the side because he was headed to spend cold nights with straight killers. I'm talking caged up gorillas all fighting for one spot at the top.

First, I started talking about my uncle Mike. He was incarcerated when I was younger. I didn't know him until I was.

Until I was about sixth grade when he was inside. I'm sure he had dreams and aspirations to change his situation, maybe even further, his education. But when he finally got out, he can't even leave his house. See, when I was young, I thought he had went crazy. I was on a totally different page. But when I finally reached a certain age, I started seeing the rage. A grown man spent 18 years locked.

Up in a cage, and he was kind of a like a metaphor for a situation. You know, kids get locked up at a young age, in their prime time, the prime years of their life, to where they can be becoming something. They could be learning. They want to learn. They want to be something. And that fire is kind of taken away from them at a young age.

They treat him like an animal. Only time he got respect is when he roared. When My uncle had the heart of a soldier, the aggression of a prized fighter. Just no one taught her what to fight for. See, the system creates this illusion with lies and confusion. And my uncle fell victim to the trap.

My uncle had the heart of a soldier, the aggression of a prize fighter. Just no one taught her what to fight for. That was inspired by my favorite poet, Black Ice. But that's justice to say. He has these skills. If it was caught early and around, the right influences and the right mentors could become something special.

Well, I'm sorry to say I'm starting to believe the only way to make it out of struggle is put a ball in that hoop, a wrap. It's so hard to make it out.

But instead, no one taught him what to fight for. So he used all those skills in the wrong way. And it ends up where it does.

There's just so many obstacles. Look at Trayvon. He made it through the thugs, drugs, robbing, and stealing. But he still fell short because he ain't know those thugs weren't the only ones doing the killing. But Trayvon Martin's not the only one. That's just the one that everybody knows because that's who everybody shows.

There is so many different things that everybody has to make it through in life. There's obstacles rather, if it's the obvious ones that everybody talks about and warns you about, but there's also those ones that nobody talks about.

But the news is used to desensitize our eyes, so we don't cry no more when we see our people murdered in despair. We don't care. We just change the station. But I can't change the station. When I see my youth dying on tv, I got this deeper connection since they all look like me. I'm tired of seeing five old murdered. Another unarmed black male. But I guess we always aren't, because in their eyes, pigment is equivalent to a pistol.

I have a family that I love and support, and I got positive black figures, rather. It's my aunties, my grandmas, my cousins, my friends that I'm around and I see every day. But so many people don't, you know, if that's not your culture, you don't have those positive emotions towards those people.

But I don't feel like they're bad people. I. I feel like they genuinely scared for their life. In no way am I saying that's all right. But cinematography is used to paint my people in a bad light. But let me ask y' all a question. When you see me, what's your first impression?

When you see me, what's your first impression? Are you willing to learn this lesson? Are you distracting my complexion? Just to say that, you know, race is obviously a thing everywhere. Not to say you can't see it, not to say it's not there. And there's subconscious things that can kind of go into it and just don't be distracted by that.

Are you willing to learn this lesson or are you distracted by my complexion? An impoverished black male making his way out the streets is the equivalent to a flower blooming through the concrete.

That's a reference to Tupac's song when he's talking about the rose that grew from the concrete.

And their success is a product of sacrifice, tenacity and just straight up luck. That sacrifice comes in when you pushing a broke down hooptie and your homeboy got a Bentley truck all because he's selling that stuff.

There's so much trauma and adversity. So many tragic events in the future had. And to be where you are, wherever you are, is something to be proud of. Just to keep going, if you're still going, then that kind of shows that you are a flower that grew through the concrete.

But I'm tenacious. Just like that single flower that busted through that concrete. He had to stand there, eye to eye, toe to toe, staring at defeat.

It was a lot of different messages throughout the whole thing, but overall it was a message to the youth. Take you on a journey through life and different things to look out for, learning from the people that went before you, that done it the right way or wrong way.

But he built different, so his mind is not even wired to consider retreat. And after all that, that young man left standing on his own two feet, had done the impossible. He beat the streets.

At the end. I like how it tied together, because after this long journey, scratched up, cut up, you've been battling this, had to sacrifice this. But that young man left standards on his own two feet, has done the impossible.