Chicago Tribune on Leslé Honoré’s #BlackGirlMagic

At Chicago Tribune, Darcel Rockett spends time with Leslé Honoré whose recent poem about Kamala Harris went viral, and was featured on programs like Nightline and Good Morning America. According to Rockett, Honoré has had other poems that "gained traction over the years after she posts a work of hers on social media." More: 

She said the first time entailed a poem after the killing of Tyshawn Lee. Subsequent poems dealt with the “conversation” Black and Brown parents have with their children entitled “Backpacks.”

“It talks about ‘you are my baby, but the world doesn’t see you like that.’ And how to prepare them and give them some tools to hopefully help them come home alive — this very heavy talk where you literally steal your kid’s innocence away,” Honoré said.

Then Meghan Markle became royalty and Honoré honored Markle’s mom, Doria Ragland, with words. The poet and mother of her three “dragons” has been writing with immediacy since 2016, a time when she said everyone was seeing a huge spike of police brutality visibility.

“It’s always happened and been happening since 1619, but that summer we were documenting it with such immediacy and sharing it on social media,” Honoré said. “The outrage when even with live video it was happening and still not finding justice? I was writing about that so much. I wanted hashtags to not just be something that scrolls across your screens. I wanted us to take a moment and pause and acknowledge that this was a life attached to a family, attached to hopes and dreams and so I started writing extensively about that and really found my niche in writing with immediacy — as soon as something happens, pulling over and pulling out my phone, just writing about it immediately.”

Continue reading at Chicago Tribune.