Discovering A Different

Kind Of America

Discovering A Different Kind of America serves as a platform to express the multiplicity of American life and culture.

This unique project welcomes a diverse array of individuals from various walks of life to contribute their personal and collective reflections of the American experience, the American Dream, and their American creed.

Recently, the America, My Oyster Association collaborated with the West Baton Rouge Museum’s publication of American Creed: Connections to the Past, Hope for the Future.

Moreover, AMOA contributed essays and poetry as a response to the screening of the PBS documentary American Creed.

Additionally, Ms. AnTira Jackson, known as “Queen of Expression,” submitted the spoken word piece listed below.

“An American Poet’s Creed” was published in American Creed: Connections to the Past, Hope for the Future.

'An American

Poet’s Creed'

America…crowned for the greater good.

Her foundation was created to give new life.

Preserve all that is noble,

Give birth to world changing realities.

It doesn’t matter what you see when you look at me,

I exist in an imperfect world burdened with ancestral dreams.

Do you hear the cries of the oppressed?

Do you not see the pain embedded in my spirit?
I fought daily for my survival,

Shining light through life’s shadows.

Fighting for my American freedom through bloodshed,

Still feeling like I am barely scratching the surface.

A lot has changed, but there is so much yet to evolve.

Sometimes, I feel like I’m suffocating.

Falling deeper into a pit that was dug for me.

So I allow my pen to bleed a poet’s ink—poetry changed me.

I am blessed to say that poetry has made me free.

Do you know how many have died to be free?

How many have died for equality?

How many times does the American Dream have to be weakened

by persecutions?

You can’t crucify what has been reborn.

I am the peace even after the storm.

You can’t suppress the royalty that resides in me.

I am not a tragedy.

I was created with a purpose,

I am not a curse.

I am not an apology well-rehearsed.

I am bold.

My words allow me to connect the pieces of life’s puzzle.

My American Creed is to continue to write with a purpose.

Encouraging others to exceed beyond their dreams,

Because helping to betTER them…is helping to better me.