Table of Contents
Foreword Chance the Rapper ix
Shikaakwa 1
Iasalle Wrote It Down Wrong 2
The Father Is a Black Man 4
The Treaty of Chicago 6
Hog Butcher for the World 7
Albert Parsons Can Hang 9
How to Be Down 10
The L Gets Open 11
The white City 12
Eugene Debs Reads Marx in Prison 13
Reversing the Flow of the Chicago River 14
The Great Migration 15
The Eastland Disaster 16
The Murder of Eugene Williams 18
Society for Human Rights (America's First Gay Rights Organization) 19
Thomas Dorsey, Gospel's Daddy 21
Gwendolyn Brooks Stands in the Mecca 23
Hansberry vs. Lee 26
Muddy Waters Goes Electric 28
Nelson Algren Meets Simone de Beauvoir at the Palmer House 29
Pickle with a Peppermint Stick 31
Sun Ra Becomes a Synthesizer 33
Hugh hefner, a Play Boy 34
Mamie Till Bears the Movement 35
King daley Unfurls His burnham Plan 36
The Division Street Riots 37
Martin Luther King Prays in Marquette Park 38
Studs Terkel Drops a Mixtape 40
Carl Sandburg Village (Where My Parents Met) 41
Wall of Respect 43
AfriCOBRA 44
The Assassination of Chairman Fred Hampton 46
Don L. Lee Becomes Haki Madhubuti 48
The Chicago 21 Plan 49
Leaving Aldine 50
Ode to Steppin 51
Disco Demolition 52
Mayor byrne Moves Into & Out of Cabrini Green 54
Ron Hardy Plays the Record Backwards 56
The Assassination of Rudy Lozano 58
Marc Smith Invents the Poetry Slam 59
Collateral Damage 61
The Day Harold Died 63
Patronage 64
Fresh to Death 66
Molemen Beat Tapes 67
Graffiti Blasters: An Erasure (A Buff) 69
The Violent Crime Control & Law Enforcement Act 70
The Etymology of Chicago Joe 71
Common's Resurrection 73
The Supreme Court Makes Color Illegal 74
Erasing the Green 75
Ida B. Wells Testifies in the Ghost Town 77
How to Teach Poetry in Chicago Public Schools 79
Lenard Clark Pedals for Air 81
Baby Come On: An Ode to Footwork 83
A Moratorium on the Death Penalty 85
Praise the House Party 87
Día de las Madres 89
Kanye Says What's on Everybody's Mind 91
I Wasn't in Grant Park when Obama Was Elected 93
Republic Windows Workers Sit In 94
The Night the Modern Wing Was Bombed 95
When King Louie First Heard the Word Chiraq 97
An Elegy for Dr. Margaret Burroughs 100
A Dedication to the Inaugural Poet 103
Memoir of the Red X 105
Chief Keef's Epiphany at Lollapalooza 107
Teachers' Strike in the Chicago Tradition 108
During Ramadan the Gates of Heaven Are Open 110
Ms. Devine Explains the Meaning of Modern Art: A Found Poem 112
Two Cities Celebrate Independence Day 113
We Charge Genocide 115
Atoning for the Neo-liberal in All or rahm emanuel as the Chicken on Kapparot 116
400 Days 119
The Night the Cubs Win the World Series 122
Chicago Has My Heart 124
Notes 129
Illustration Credits 131
Acknowledgments 133