This is a series of poems that can be read in full here.

Abdul Ali

#9

On the day of your interview a full itinerary is prepared. Jokingly, you wonder

 if you should have requested potty breaks. Never has your day been this structured. 

About six or seven hours of back-to-back meetings. During lunch you meet the only 

Black faculty member in English, who is leaving. You don’t think anything 

of it except that the coincidence is more than ironic. You try to make small talk. 

You want to gauge if there is any coded language from the “sista”  

that says Get Out. Do not succumb to this Sunken Place. Instead, 

you get an unexpected quiz during lunch from the Black faculty member. 

“How will you as a Black man teach these privileged kids

how to read Black literature as universal?” Before you can respond, she cuts you off