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Professor: Wetzel...

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Dominique Aruede CRA First Draft

There is quite a lot to be said about the issue of racial inequality in America, and “The Magic Wand” captures this idea perfectly by telling a story from the perspective of one man. In the poem, Lynn Manning addresses how a disabled black man is perceived in the eyes of ‘you.’ ‘You’ represents society, and the ‘black man’ represents every black man mistreated by ‘you.’ In the poem, this man had two distinct characteristics: his blackness and his walking cane, referred to as a magic wand. In the poem, Manning draws many comparisons between the struggles that the speaker faces in being both black and blind, and the hardships within the entire black American community. “The Magic Wand” is a testament to how society continues to treat black people and people with disabilities, and within this recount is an apt reflection of the experience of the black man in America. The poet includes a series of details about the speaker that describe how exactly it feels when a label is placed on him. He is constantly placed into categories by ‘you.’ He states “From God-gifted wizard of roundball / to God-gifted idiot savant composer / pounding out chartbusters on a cockeyed whim.” Here we can see that either when he’s perceived as black or blind, he is assumed to be a stereotypical version of himself: black and good at basketball, or blind and a musical genius. Also, both seem to be ‘God-gifted’ as if is expected to feel blessed about his situation. It must be very stressful and actually quite alarming to have to deal with these assumptions. These stereotypes are actually very real for real people. “From welfare-rich pimp / To disability-rich gimp.” The ending rhymes almost suggests a mocking tone directed to toward the speaker, as if to say he really can’t win either way. Throughout the poem, the speaker contrasts being black and being blind, and having to transform from one to the other by just “whip[ping] out [his] folded cane.” The cane acts as the magical medium through which most of his life is established for him. Meanwhile, magic in and

of itself is a wishy-washy practice with no grounds to prove it even exists. This idea leaves both the reader and the speaker wondering if he is even real at all. Near the end of the poem, the speaker states, “My final form is not my choosing.” This singular line describes the utter lack of autonomy this black man has, not to say that one of the options is even better than the other. Whether a “welfare-rich pimp” or a “disability-rich gimp,” he can’t win. In other words, either one is abhorred by societal standards. ”Whether from cursed by man to cursed by God; / or from scriptures condemned to God ordained.” We can clearly see here that the speaker is left with a sense of longing for something more to fulfill him or rescue him. It is damaging to always put one’s life into some else hands, to trust so completely, someone is bound to get hurt. By the end of the poem, the speaker possesses neither the freedom to pick the identities available to him nor the freedom to choose what he becomes nor even the freedom to develop his own feelings. The language, references, and rhyme scheme all suggest that he speaker is forced to live in a perpetual loop that he can neither get out of, nor control. The loop is of a nature akin to torture, in which he has no choice or say about his own identity. The poem is not only a description of black oppression, though; the poet’s use of present tense suggests that the experience of the speaker is relevant for not only the past, but the present as well. Even the decision to make the speaker a male has significance. America has a long history with the oppression of the black male. Since the start of the slave-trade, it’s been normalized by society to strip black men of all their power, dignity, and individuality until they are a shell of their former selves. To constantly be referred to as the “White Man’s burden,” and just as hurtful, “every man’s burden,” is simply dehumanizing. Whether it was through the physical chains of the 1500s, or the chains of hyperincarceration and targeted harassment from the law, oppression exists. Manning portrays the everyday constant struggle of the black man in America by rendering the experience down to a choiceless metamorphosis: “It is always a profound metamorphosis.” The word selection, ‘metamorphosis,’ literally translates to ‘the process of

changing shape.” It’s never clarified what the speaker first started out as. It seems intentional that the poet wrote it this way so that the speaker could become even less autonomous. The speaker never actually mentions his starting form at all, which further adds to the concept of letting go of one’s individuality and once again leaving the decision up to the all powerful ‘you.’ The use of the word ‘profound’ is also quite interesting because anything profound is often also penetrating or perhaps even difficult to conceptualize. This strange metamorphosis is indeed both of those things. In this way, the speaker is almost questioning who he is. In a similar way, most African Americans are in the unique and quite unfortunate position of not knowing truly who they are by way of not knowing where they originated from. In the stretch of time it took for slave traders to rip Africans away from their families and strip them of any trace of who they once were, origin stories, culture, and family ties were lost. Generations down the line, African Americans are still left with a sense of loss, not belonging, never knowing the truth. African Americans are labeled as simply “black,” but what even is “black?” “Black” can’t be traced back to a motherland, to a country, to a home. This phenomenon that Manning captured might just be one of the biggest injustices of all time. By robbing blacks of who they are, society keeps blacks oppressed, and in a way, never truly free. “The Magic Wand” explains why and how people get mistreated based on uninformed assumptions,. What may seem like a harmless stereotype is actually a cruel and targeted perpetuation of an unfair power dynamic. This proves just how significant it is to maintain accurate representation of character. “The Magic Wand” tackles the concept of inequality so well, it is relevant in both the past and the present definition of black oppression. By being both physically, mentally, and historically stuck in a loop, the black man is constantly susceptible to the powers that be, always under the boot of society. To wriggle free, one must be prepared to continually remind, continually be reminded, and continually fight for freedom.

Academic Acknowledgements

I would like to thank my Professor, Professor Wetzel, for opening my eyes to what close reading is truly about, and allowing me to see the poem for everything that it is, rather than for everything that it at first seems.

Works Cited Manning, Lynn. “The Magic Wand.” The Disability Studies Reader. 18 Aug. 2018. Web. 18 Sept. 2018....