![]() To the biased judge and jury, that means, "I am man/ He is boy/ I am criminal/ He is victim." With an ineffective defense attorney and character witness, Amal is falsely convicted of aggravated assault and battery. ![]() Amal knows that the only fact holding weight is that he is black and Jeremy is white. Nor does the truth about what happened that night: the racial slur that instigated the fight, others' actions and Amal's actual involvement. Where Amal came from and who he really is-a beloved son, an artist and poet, a student aiming for college-do not seem to matter in the courtroom. He knows the details well because Umi, his mother, makes him watch a video of it every year, insisting " you gotta remember/ where you came from!" This memory is quickly supplanted by the bleak present: Amal is in a courtroom awaiting a verdict on his involvement in a fight that left another boy, Jeremy Mathis, in a coma. ![]() Part one of three opens with 16-year-old Amal recounting his birth. The poems-sharp, uninhibited and full of metaphors and sensory language-quickly establish Amal's voice, laying bare the anger, despair, hope and talent it holds. ![]() Zoboi and Salaam masterfully join forces in this mesmerizing novel-in-verse. Punching the Air, by Ibi Zoboi ( American Street) and activist Yusef Salaam of the Exonerated Five, tells the unforgettable story of Amal Shahid, a teenager incarcerated for a crime he did not commit. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |