Why I Will Vaccinate
by Sagirah Shahid
Christa David, a hope: new earth, better days, hand cut paper collage, 9 x 12 inches, 2020. Courtesy of the artist.
WHY I WILL VACCINATE
SAGIRAH SHAHID / JAN 2021 / ISSUE 4
3) Justice
Before the Belmont report when the U.S. Government gathered 600 Black men
who tilled Alabama’s blood stained terrain with their calloused hands, first generation
to grow up technically free, in the sense that
2) Do No Harm
My whole life I was told I should become a doctor, become a doctor for our people.
We do not trust doctors (unless they Black)
or the medical profession. And who are you to judge,
Marion Sims with his torture devices upon us
and our literal pain?
1) Respect for Persons
I am at a dinner table trying to stay six feet away from my mother
and I’m not necessarily trying to argue the holiness of this vaccine
and I’m not necessarily trying to absolve the racism of the U.S. government,
its capitalistic medical profession, wherein the wealthy can afford healing
wherein people like us are told to wear masks as we punch into our shifts,
but I am trying to convince her,
3) Justice
to grow up technically free, in the sense that
masters had to compensate a body’s time,
in the sense that, lynchings lingered
where slave catchers and their dogs left off
in the sense that, to find a decent doctor
willing to treat Colored folks, people without wealth, people
whose bodies were once mortgaged to build wealth for landowners.
Colored folks like my great grandparents who gained debt tending
this land they did not own, this land that once owned them.
To feed their families,
399 of those 600 Black men,
2) Do No Harm
and our literal pain?
In the name of our maternal mortality rates.
In acknowledgement of Dawn Wooten
In remembrance of Dr. Susan Moore
In remembrance of Erica Garner,
In remembrance of my own great grandmother, whose twin boys were intentionally laid
upon an icy hospital floor by a white nurse, directly following their births,
them Mississippi doctors ain’t give a damn about negro boys. They died.
This pain hunted my great grandmother each year of her life.
1) Respect for Persons
I keep trying
while I hover behind a register
scanning barcodes, hoping to pay my rent on time
exhausted and parroting back
the same handful of phrases:
“Stand over there please.
Give me some distance please.
Put on your mask please.”
Over and over again.
2) Do No Harm
This pain that hunts us,
I demand justice and reparations for us.
I demand presidential medical treatment for us.
I demand vaccines for us.
I demand rest for us.
I demand shelter for us..
I demand stimulus checks that don’t hesitate for us.
I demand healing and relief for us.
I demand culturally competent and holistically conscientious pathways
to wellness and recovery for us.
3) Justice
399 of those 600 Black men.
In 1932, after being solicited by the United States
government and
offered free health care
offered free meals
offered free burials
and
for 40 years these men were enrolled in a study without their informed consent,
these sons and fathers of our people became known as the
“Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male”
By the 1940’s penicillin existed
and was widely available for Americans.
The study continued well into the 70’s.
These men did not receive the medicine they needed
and slowly died.
My grandmother gave birth to my mother in the 70’s.
1) Respect for Persons (Informed Consent)
Over and over again I replay the year
I made a joke about conspiracy theories on Facebook
only to have conspiracy theories on Facebook infiltrate everyone I love.
“Who told you the vaccine was made from that?”
“Are your sources reliable?”
“Chip?! Anytime you turn on your devices, anytime you log on,
search, click, swipe your card—that is data. We are surveilled.”
“Yes I still believe in herbal remedies but when my ankle was sprained
you took me to the doctor. When I had asthma attacks as a child
you used medicine from the doctor.”
People are suffering. People all over the world are dying from this
and the world is scrambling to fight this virus we know so little about.
The vaccine isn’t even available to people like us yet.
But when it is
I need you to know,
I need you to survive this virus too.
Sagirah Shahid is an African American Muslim poet and arts educator from Minneapolis, MN. She is a recipient of a mentor series award in poetry from the Loft Literary Center, a Minnesota Center for Book Arts mentorship award, and Twin Cities Media Alliance’s Our Space is Spoken For, a collaborative public art and performance fellowship for Black, Indigenous and artists of color. In 2019 she was a writer-in-residence for Wisdom Ways, Unrestricted Interest, and 826 MSP. Sagirah’s poetry and prose are published in Mizna, Winter Tangerine, The Drinking Gourd, Puerto Del Sol, the American Muslim Futures virtual exhibit, and A Moment of Silence an online anthology of 50+ Black Minnesotan voices during a historical moment of transformation. Sagirah’s debut collection of poetry “Surveillance of Joy” is forthcoming from Half Mystic Press in 2021.
Christa David is a visual artist, writer and researcher. Inspired by the artistic works of Romare Bearden, Wangechi Mutu, Alma Woodsey Thomas and literary works of James Baldwin, Christa fuses the mediums of painting, collage and assemblage to create and recreate stories about home, belonging, faith, and identity. Christa hold a BA and MPH (Master of Public Health) from Columbia University. Her work is in private and public collections throughout the United States including the David C. Driskell Center, and has been recently on view at Longwood Gallery at Hostos College in Bronx, NY and PRIZM Art Fair at Art Basel in Miami. Her work was recently featured in Elle. Christa currently lives and works between New York City and Atlanta.