Iman Saif
Structured like a nursery rhyme, “Did You Know” conveys themes of ignorance effectively with additional help from repetition and beautiful imagery.
Did You Know
Did you know
That today
I saw a green shark with birds for eyes,
Who hated the sea but loved to eat flies,
Who hated to swim but loved to hear his mother cry…
His mother has a winged blueberry pie!
Did you know
That one time
I heard that a kitten’s heart is in its head,
That yesterday I bled
The color blue and green and purple but not red,
That a baby rhinoceros…
Will eat its mother, once she’s dead!
Did you know
That yesterday
I heard about a girl named Ash,
Who was found in a car crash,
In the same car as her high school math teacher
(or was it the town preacher?)
Her top off and with mangled features…
What a man eater!
Did you know
That when I was five years old
My mother told me
To stay away from the little boy in my class,
With skin like ebony glass
With a name that sounded like fresh Somalian grass,
With a toothy white smile who looked sweeter than treacle,
Because his father went to timeout for big people,
And left his mother with another father
Who smelled like daddy on Saturdays
And left pink and blue and purple marks
On her skin ever
Single
Day…
Oh what a display!
Did you know
That whatever I say to you,
you might not believe
And I might sound like i’m stupid and annoying and naive.
But what I say will stick in your head and absolutely will not leave
Your conscience and your mind
Until you tell everyone around you,
Tell everyone what I told you like your tongue is blind
Until you talk talk talk and talk
About a person you’ve never met
Until you ruin their life with zero regret
For them or their family or their friends,
But it doesn’t matter because
you just told one person
Just
A single
person.
Right?