Brief: Gwen Brooks, We Real Cool

With this poem I would like to discuss aspects of the poem. For example the title “We” “Real” and “Cool”. The title can be broken down and analyzed word by word. These words or concepts are representative or were embodied by black culture currently or at one point or another. This poem address black folks being addressed as a monolithic group by using the word “we”. This implies a sense of togetherness which was the intended goal on the prat of black folks because the communities created were loosely constructed due to restrictions levied against them. The next word is real. We can analyze this word and its importance in recognizing the distinction between real and fake. For example “we cool” is a possibility; however, is you being cool authentic? Yes it is possible to be cool without being real so it is important utilize the word real because the commodifying process can often reduce the level of real to any item. Cool is also a term that stems from the black community. That history goes as followed:

you were considered “Cool” if you still had a swagger about you while facing the unbearably harsh climate of the south and even harsher cruelties of the white folks around them. Those who were able to maintain a sense of even of even keel not reacting to the heat, and body pain from labor and abuse were cool and this is what other black individuals wanted to be. They wanted to be someone who was un-phased.
These concepts remind me of a class I have previously taken which discussed the importance of togetherness, unity, solidarity, through teaching the history of The Great Migration.  Most individuals don’t know the history of The Great Migration or other forms of African American culture so they would not readily identify the significance of each word respectively. In my opinion it is one of those artifacts that someone “Real” does not need to hear to message to get the subliminal aspect of it. In my opinion Gwen Brooks is Signifyin when she wrote this poem. Signifyin' is a form of articulating oneself in the African-American community. Poets in the African-American community use it often as a subliminal act to taunt or boast their intelligence about the wrongs done against them without overstepping their boundaries. A loosely based analogy would be, when a female slave says something horrific has happened to her when she is intelligent enough to know that she was raped she does not say so out of fear of the consequence. Another example of a loosely based analogy would be allowing for a Black History Month to signify acknowledgement of past horrific transgressions.
A question I would pose to the class is, what is the poem about?, is it strong, or long enough for you to gather a meaning? Do you need more of a foundation on black history to better analyze the piece.