Olivia Brown
Bio
Essayist, poet, afrofuturist sci fi lover.
oliviajbrown.com
Stories (4/0)
I Used to Be a Hero
Who decides who gets to be a hero? What makes someone a “hero”, anyway? Is it bravery? Courage? Goodness? Where is the line between goodness and evil and why is it that whoever drew it is allowed to move it whenever someone like me gets too close to the good side?
By Olivia Brown3 years ago in Journal
Blackademic Blues
“I think she’s… I think she’s looking for sympathy?” I said to myself, furrowing my brow and squinting my eyes at the screen dumbfounded by the virtual spectacle my classmate was making in our Zoom classroom. Surely, this couldn’t be an Ivy League graduate student near tears, sympathy mongering from her Black classmates after they expressed their fear of living under another Trump presidency during a discussion about the past election season. She couldn’t seriously be equating merely having to read her family’s racist Facebook posts and not knowing what to respond with the actual racism that I and other Black students in the class experience. Right?
By Olivia Brown3 years ago in Education
Alt-Girl Uprising
I was in the 7th grade, 13 years old, and it felt like a first date. Not between me and my best friend who had invited me to her house after school but, between me and the music she played while I was there. My heart raced watching her Youtube recommendations on her TV as she scanned the screen for a search bar. I had heard of Evanescence and Green Day but only on TV. It was the music that white kids told their parents “I hate you” to and my hands started to sweat. Black girls, at least none of the ones I knew, listened to music like this. “Devil music” both my grandmas would’ve called it and as I watched my friend search for a song to play, my thoughts raced. “She’s going to play music like that isn’t she? Am I going to like it? Oh my God, if I like it am I going to hell? Yes. If I don’t like this will Celeste still be my friend?” No. I should just play sick and call my mom and--” The questions, answers and escape plan I was thinking of were interrupted by drums, loud ones. Then guitars. Then him. “I don’t care what you think as long as it’s about me, the best of us can find happiness in misery”Patrick Stump sang, indoctrinating me to a new belief system. I was falling in love and it was only our first date. “You’ve never heard of Fall out Boy'' Celeste asked me, giggling at my wide-eyed reaction. The answer was no but all I wanted to do for the rest of the afternoon and beyond was hear Fall Out Boy and music like that over and over again.
By Olivia Brown3 years ago in Beat