Reponse to "We Real Cool"

"We Real Cool"
by Gwendolyn Brooks

THE POOL PLAYERS. 

SEVEN AT THE GOLDEN SHOVEL.

 We real cool. We 

Left school. We

 Lurk late. We

 Strike straight. We 

Sing sin. We 

Thin gin. We 

Jazz June. We 

Die soon. 

                      

The poem "We Real Cool" by Gwendolyn Brooks captures the sense of rebellious and fun-loving spirit of youth.  The poem begins with two lines that are separate from the poem and set the scene and introduces the speaker and subject of the poem.  Playing pool gives the speaker and his friends a sense of cool and mysteriousness  that traditionally follows the activity.  The number seven is considered one of the holiest and luckiest numbers as it has many biblical references while the word "golden" connotes prosperity and fortune.  Both suggest that the speaker and his friends are fortunate and will find success; however, the word "shovel" contrasts with the positive connotations.  The word "shovel" is connected to death and despair, which is once again touched on later in the poem.  

While reading this poem, I couldn't help but notice the unusual line separations and how it could be read. While read sentence by sentence, the poem has a simple rhyme scheme as well as rhythm as every adjacent line rhymes with each other and every line has 3 syllables.  If read as written with "We" at the end of each line, however, the poem has a certain rhythm to it.  This  rhythm focuses on the "We" of the poem and has less emphasis on the actions.  It gives the speaker and the people he or she is speaking for a sense of mysterious conceitedness, as if they thought they were above the rules they were breaking.  The alliterations and broken rhymes of the poem makes the speaker sound almost playfully indifferent about the rules being broken.

After the introduction, the poem is a series of actions, all alluding to the rebelliousness.  It feels like Brooks is trying to capture how the rebellious youths feel about themselves.  The first stanza of the poem mentions how the speaker feels about breaking the rules by skipping school.   The idea of going against authority and rebellion repeats many times throughout the poem with the actions like "Lurk[ing] Late", "Sing[ing] sin", and "Thin[ing] gin".  During the time of Brooks, Jazz music belonged to the black community and was considered immoral outside of the black community as it was music infused with a unique passion that was interpreted as sexual.  The mention of Jazz also adds to the unruliness of the pool players.  The word "cool" that the speaker uses to describe his friends and himself denotes superiority in a sense that they are above authority and all of their peers who are subject to authority.  

The poem's last line concludes the work in such a drastic shift in meaning that it almost seemed like there wasn't enough time to shift to the tone of the poem to a more somber tone that better suits the topic of death. This sudden change makes the speaker sound detached from the issue of impending death, giving death a sense of inevitability.  This inevitability is Brooks' commentary on the futility and  foolishness of youthful rebellion.  The speaker and his friends feel like they are somehow making a difference with their actions but in reality, their acts of rebellion are meaningless.