Council for Wisconsin Writers

Supporting Wisconsin writers from 1964 to 2022

Nakila Robinson

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Honoring the Life of Nakila Robinson, Young Poet of Milwaukee

By CWW Board Member Jennifer Morales

Last fall I was invited to be part of the Bridge Poetry Series at Madison’s Chazen Museum of Art. I was fortunate to be asked to write a poem on Romare Bearden’s “A Black Odyssey,” his extensive set of collages and watercolors depicting Homer’s Odyssey with an all-black cast.

Viewing the brilliantly colored collages, I was thrilled by Bearden’s ability to bring the tumultuous emotions of Odysseus’ journey out and onto the canvas. But Bearden, a lover of literature, didn’t just want to celebrate the epic poem in paint and paper; he wanted to invite those who might feel disconnected from this beloved piece of writing into it its story. He painted the characters black, he said, “so … if a child in Benin or in Louisiana … sees my paintings of Odysseus, he can understand the myth better.”

At the Bridge reading in November, I performed my poem, “Ego, Trouble,” — on Penelope’s feelings about being left behind while her husband fought his way across the world — to honor the missing woman-voice in the collage series.

It was an angry poem and I pushed into the audience’s comfort zone by leaving the podium and stepping up to look various listeners — mostly strangers — directly in the eye.

One listener who met my Penelope-fury straight on was Nakila Robinson, an up-and-coming poet from Milwaukee who was in Madison to study creative writing. Nakila met my eye and nodded and nodded. After the reading, she came up and introduced herself. “It’s good to hear some voices from home,” she said. “Milwaukee voices.”

We had a number of writer friends in common back in the big city, so we talked about that, but mainly she spoke about the challenge of being a young, African American writer in a mostly white city. Also, the poets in Madison were “toned down” compared to the livelier Milwaukee style, which she missed. At Nakila’s request, I gave her the copy of “Ego, Trouble,” that I had read from and my email address, so she could send me any writing that she wanted another set of eyes on. I left, charmed and impressed by this young poet’s determination to write and succeed in a poetry scene not quite yet ready for her fabulousness — and her determination, like Bearden’s, to bring everybody into the story with her.

Nakila died in July, unexpectedly, while traveling. She was 22 and, although she didn’t yet have an extensive publishing history and wasn’t known in most writing circles around the state, I want you to know her because she was essential to a group of young writers of color who don’t often get the attention they deserve.

To help me introduce Nakila to the Council for Wisconsin Writers community, I asked Dasha Kelly, her writing teacher at the Still Waters Collective in Milwaukee, to share some comments about what Nakila meant to Milwaukee’s young writers.

What Dasha wrote is so lovely that I want to make sure you can read her tribute in full here. But this line stands out:

I’m convinced that Nakila has merely converted into energy. She was too full of fierce electricity and love to simply transcend and leave nothing of herself behind.

Nakila did indeed leave something of herself behind, in her work and in all of us who were affected by it. What will we do with that energy?

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Nakila

by Dasha Kelly

[Dasha Kelly is the founder and director of Milwaukee’s Still Waters Collective, a writing program that has been central to the development of the city’s youth spoken word community. — Jennifer Morales]

Of the hundreds of teens my arts program has reached in the past 12 years, fewer than 20 have sat shotgun in my car. Many were bashfully grateful for the ride, murmuring turn-by-turn directions to their front door. Some were intimidated by my banter; others were uncomfortable with any silence. All of them left behind bits of their story, perhaps as fare, and I would wait for them to wave back at my car before disappearing into an open screen door. I would drive away, counting the coins of their hard and glimmering truths.

Nakila made me rich. She filled every minute of our ride with her observations, dilemmas, musings and questions. So many questions, with that one. In the early years, she asked about poems and slam and her team and how our program started and how I started and where was I from and why did I write and what did I believe in and how would she know that she’d found her voice too.

In a recent interview, artist Dario Robleto said, “I didn’t know what an epiphany was until I had one.” The statement made me think of the tender and defining years of my students, of their gallery of “aha moments,” of their inevitable blossoming, of Nakila. From that passenger seat, I watched her flights of questions manifest into poems and performances, into leadership, into a four-year college scholarship, into ride-or-die friendships, into a love affair with the boy she would love into manhood and heartily, I’m sure, beyond the day she died. She evolved from sequestering herself away from life’s uncertainties to unapologetically baring the insides of her skin to the world. Nakila wore her uncertainties as boldly as her absolutes, which made her endearing and enchanting to anyone who met her.

“Dasha Kelly, I have questions for you.” This was less than a month ago. She wasn’t in my car this time. She was sitting on a café stool in my kitchen, peppering me as I put away my groceries with queries about adult slams and self-publishing and writing residencies.

Over the next few weeks — her final few weeks — I watched Nakila coach and mentor a new branch of writers on our ever-expanding family tree. Traded text messages about the absurdity of the large outing of white children evacuating the swimming pool when her large outing of black children arrived. I listened to her long-time love make casual references to lifelong plans, wedding songs and kids’ games. I watched her beloved friends coo and vibrate at the news of her upcoming performance. I clicked “like” on the show photos. I clicked “like” on the memorial photos people posted after she’d gone, too.

I’m convinced that Nakila has merely converted into energy. She was too full of fierce electricity and love to simply transcend and leave nothing of herself behind. Our community family collapsed with her death and clung tightly to help one another back to our collective feet. As we gathered and laughed and wept and celebrated and held ourselves open to one another in my backyard, I felt Nakila turning to wave at me, letting me know it’s safe for us all to drive on.