Shawntaye, is a writer from north of Pittsburgh. While in college, she was an editor-in-chief of the campus s Literary Magazine. She edited the magazine for three years which always produced well-received issues. Currently I am a Research Associate for the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center.
 
I constantly work to improve my craft and I gain inspiration to write from everyday interpersonal interactions and living. My work has been published on the e-zines Holler, The Writers Crib, Subjective Substance, Now and Forever, Nubian Mindz, MagNetique, Timbooktu, Confused In A Deeper Way, The Soul of Pittsburgh, The Underground Window, The Noyse Magazine, Sage of Consciousness, You Make It Beautiful and the Canadian E-Zines Poetry Stop and 3 Cup Morning. I published a poem in the Summer 2005 and Winter 2006 issue of Stanford University s Black Arts Quarterly newspaper. I contributed a biography on Mildred D. Taylor to the Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Women Writers [Two Volumes], a reference work that will be published by Greenwood Press in 2007. I also contributed a biography in An Encyclopedia of African American Literature, published by Greenwood Press in 2005. I ve also been included in the Forthright Poetry Compilation, Our Truth and The Lion Speaks: An Anthology for Hurricane Katrina, both, which are available on www.amazon.com. have a short story entitled Fighting Strife Through Nature published on  You may contact Shawntaye at mariot6110@hotmail.com

Garrulous Mindset
 
We ve been fettered for many centuries,
Forced to relinquish our various cultures;
Our auras, our sprits, our pheromones,
Everything invisible to the naked eye,
But realizing beneath our sliced flesh,
We may be dying but we won t forget.
 
We, the dark opprobriums of this planet,
Snatched up from our native homelands
By presumptuous, angelic, savage beasts
Will never truly be destroyed; for we are
The mothers and fathers of all humanity,
We will always be the original Adam & Eve. 
 

 

They Love To See Your Face
  
They throw it and splatter it everywhere,
Shamelessly glorifying your criminal status,
Across national newspapers front pages,
Along the nightly news television screens,
Inserted into various Internet news articles.
They love to slaughter and see you like this
as they bash, exploit and murder your image.
 
My brothers from the African diaspora,
My brothers from the Latino diaspora,
My brothers from the Arabic diaspora,
Do you understand the underlying idea
behind this consistent racial exploitation?
Everyday your facial and ethnic features
are the purported faces of evil and crime.
 
First my people who are darker than blue
Were used as scapegoats for centuries here.
Now the position is currently being shared;
The second largest minority group catches it
And any man of Arabic descent is suspicious
Because my brothers of color are regarded as
Murderers, illegal, drug dealers and terrorists.
 
When crimes happen, they love naming you,
Suspect is a Black man, Hispanic man, he is
an Arab man which anymore means terrorist,
but when it s a white man, race doesn t matter.
Pay attention to the news and see it for yourself. 
This racist pattern has been repeated in history 
My brothers please stand up, lead and be strong.