Toy Boat

“A Small Needful Fact” by Ross Gay (2015)

“A Small Needful Fact” is written for Eric Garner, an unarmed Black man who was accused of selling individual cigarettes without charging taxes, then choked to death by a New York City police officer. Following Garner’s death in July of 2014, Garner’s last words—“I can’t breathe”—quickly became a rallying cry for the Black Lives Matter Movement. When Tamir Rice was killed by a police officer a few months later in November of 2014, the Black Lives Matter Movement also protested his death. “Toy Boat” is, of course, dedicated to Rice, but the poem is in conversation with other poems written for unarmed Black people killed by the police, including “A Small Needful Fact.”

“The Tradition” by Jericho Brown (2015)

While “Toy Boat” is written for Rice, “The Tradition” is written for three Black men killed by the police: Eric Garner, John Crawford, and Michael Brown. Like Rice, Garner, Crawford, and Brown were all killed in 2014.

“Nightstick [A Mural for Michael Brown]” by Kevin Young (2018)

Approximately three months before Rice was killed by a police officer in Cleveland, an unarmed Black teenager named Michael Brown was shot and killed by a police officer in Ferguson, Missouri.