Read An Excerpt From 'Black Punk Now'

A canonizing, bold, and urgent anthology setting a new precedent for Black Punk Lit, created by generations of Black punks—featuring both new voices and those from the not-so-recent past

Intrigued? Well read on to discover the synopsis and an excerpt from Camille A. Collins’ feature in Black Punk Now, which is out now.

Black Punk Now is an anthology of contemporary nonfiction, fiction, illustrations, and comics that collectively describe punk today and give punks—especially the Black ones—a wider frame of reference. It shows all of the strains, styles, and identities of Black punk that are thriving, and gives newcomers to the scene more chances to see themselves.

Curated from the perspective of Black writers with connections to the world of punk, the collection mixes media as well as generations, creating a new reference point for music-lovers, readers, and historians by capturing the present and looking towards the future. With strong visual elements integrated throughout, this smart, intimate collection is demonstrative of punk by being punk itself: underground, rebellious, aesthetic but not static—working to decenter whiteness by prioritizing other perspectives.

Edited by graphic novelist and filmmaker James Spooner, and author Chris L. Terry, contributors to the collection include critic Hanif Abdurraqib and Mars Dixon, conversations with Brontez Purnell, and a roundtable of all femme festival organizers.

I.

They invited me to my own beating like genteel southern ladies planning an afternoon of bridge and sweet tea: with a cordial phone invitation to meet up on Sunday. I tried not to sound too geeked up when the phone rang and Mom said Kerri was on the line, but of course I’d been hoping for their call.

We’d moved from our respectable apartment in Coronado to a scuzzy area of San Diego after the landlord methodically ratcheted up the rent. This meant a new school and an abrupt end to seeing my closest friend every day. The meetup marked my first trip back to Nado in the two months since we’d left.

“We haven’t seen you in so long! Come over to my place around two—it’ll be so much fun!”

It was a quick call, sure, but Kerri’s tone was strangely womanish, her words subtly rehearsed. It was odd that the call came from her and not Alexis. I generally tolerated Kerri because, as one of only two Black kids in my grade and five in the entire school, I had very little control over anything.

Two years before, we still had baby fat on our faces when Kerri accused me of kicking her cat during a sleepover. “I saw you with my own eyes! You stuck your foot out on purpose and kicked Mimi when she walked by!”

I was stunned by her capacity to make me out to be a cat-kicking ogre, when I’d done nothing of the kind, and I ran to the bathroom, crying. My stubborn absence finally convinced the girls to go easy.

It clicked after the fact. Alexis and I snuck out one night to see Black Flag without telling Kerri. It had to be faced; she was a simple, top-40 radio girl who never showed much interest in punk, but I figured she accused me of kicking the cat because she was mad about being left out. Maybe she wanted to hint to Alexis that I wasn’t such a savory companion after all. That was the demarcation where I started to count Kerri as one of Alexis’s friends—not mine. Still, I was happy to get the call because, at that moment, they were all I had.

II.

Mother was a beauty queen in Birmingham, deflecting accusations of delusion her whole life, but living in California had been a childhood dream. “I’m done losing,” she said, packing us into her old Cadillac, vowing never to be caught dead at a fish fry in the Bip ever again. I bought into her bravado then but in time realized it wasn’t fearlessness, but heartbreak over Aunt Vonne, that ignited her.

By sixth grade, I was starting middle school in Coronado. Peering down from the bridge that connected the island to San Diego, the surrounding waters were a glistening jewel. The town itself felt freer and more friendly than our old neighborhood in Birmingham. I don’t recall exactly how Alexis and I became friends, I only know it wasn’t long before we’d morphed into a single shadow, one child indistinguishable from the next. Awash in the lucent violet of this new moment, I’ve no doubt I took its beauty for granted.

“Come on, dork!” Alexis beckoned, mocking my fear of treading too far out to sea. The flash of her smile and sunrise aura seemed to set her in dappled neon as she laughed at me. Whether we were risking an ocean depth that exceeded my prowess, or our bodies were reverberating with the thrill of an explosive live punk band, those days with Alexis were my first sighting of that heartrending lavender aura. I alone could perceive the wondrous beam that washed and salvaged me, while also laying bare my doubt; abandoning me in nothing but flesh and ravaged armor.

III.

I was fourteen and in eighth grade, the very same age as George Stinney, when I learned he was the youngest person ever sentenced to death in America. He was so small the electric chair helmet slid around his head and they had to make adjustments before blasting the poor kid to kingdom come. The idea that a young Black boy would have brutally killed two white girls for no reason must have been just as preposterous to the people who wrongfully charged him as it was to anyone else with a single brain cell—but, as I wrote in my first history paper, “being Black means being expendable in America.”

Review: The Conference of the Birds by Ransom Riggs

I got a D on the paper. My history

y teacher, Mrs. Sneed, asked to see me after class. “It’s a solid paper, Essie, but I just can’t get past the last sentence. It’s a very jarring remark and we talked so much about grounding things in fact. Please keep facts, dates, and statistics in mind next time. I think you’ll be much happier with your grades if you do.”

It’s not very punk to be a crying mush, but I was proud to have an original topic for my Black History Month essay. Everyone else was writing about Martin Luther King Jr. or Rosa Parks. “But I worked so hard on it,” I sniffed. Mom was chopping tomatoes for our taco supper as I explained about the line that had offended Mrs. Sneed and cost me a better grade. Mom rested half a tomato on the cutting board and turned to face me. “I’m sorry, Essie. It was a beautiful, intelligent essay, babe, no matter what anyone says. They just don’t see it, because they don’t want to; don’t have to . . . I don’t know, but better you get used to it so you’re not constantly disappointed.”

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CAMILLE A. COLLINS (she/her) has an MFA in creative writing from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. She has been the recipient of the Short Fiction Prize from the South Carolina Arts Commission, and her writing has appeared in The Twisted Vine, a literary journal of Western New Mexico University. Her debut novel, The Exene Chronicles, was published by Brain Mill Press in 2018. She likes writing about music and has contributed features and reviews to Afropunk, BUST, and other publications.

Instagram: @camillecollinsauthor | Twitter: @camilleacollins