Tatem’s latest work addresses causes of crime
By Ryan Haas
Reporter-SKNVibes.com
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Loughlin Tatem
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BASSETERRE, St. Kitts-LOUGHLIN TATEM, one of St. Kitts-Nevis’ most famous writers and teachers, recently revealed his most recent work to a small gathering at the University of the West Indies, St. Kitts extension—a monologue that adeptly addresses the root causes of negativity and crime in youth culture.
The monologue, entitled “They’re not going to hang me”, outlines the life of a 19-year-old young man named Makishna, who recounts his life story while waiting to be hanged.
When the narration begins the character Makishna tells the audience that his mother was 14 years old when she gave birth to him and that his father had been in Her Majesty’s Prison since the day of his birth.
“When I became old enough and my mother took me to the prison to see my father for the very first time, and his first time seeing me…that was when he told me he didn’t do it,” says Makishna.
As the boy grows older he is beaten and scolded by his mother because, through no fault of his own, he reminds her of his father. It is at this point that young Makishna begins to fall through the cracks of what his mother tells him is called “the system”.
“My mother was always angry—angry at me. Telling me how I was stupid like my ignorant, stupid, can’t read father. It took nothing for me to get a pounding from a boxed up fist,” the boy recalls from his prison cell.
Matters worsen for Makishna when he goes to school and is placed in the remedial class 1B7. Unable to shake off the negative stigma of the class, the boy drifts farther and farther away from education and more toward groups of children in similar situations that accept him for who he is. ~~Adz:Right~~
“Some of the teachers we had never used to come to 1B7. They used to say that we were too disgusting, that we were not interested in learning and that we couldn’t read… All of us were convinced that we were soon going to move out of that class and leave all the other duncing people behind.
“We had our pride,” says Makishna. “We struggled to hold on like drowning children to any semblance of self-respect that was available to us, even if we had to lie to one another and lie to we self.”
It is because of these and other factors that when Makishna finally meets up with other dejected youth like himself, he says that his first “daps” felt good in comparison to the blows he used to receive from his mother.
The ensuing life of negativity and crime that Makishna leads is an all too familiar story, and Franklin Dorset, Superintendent of Prisons, commented before the gathered audience that, “Tatem gave a true picture as to what is actually happening today. I have seen many Makishna’s in my years in the prison system.”
Ultimately, Tatem said that his piece was a call to society as a whole to do more for youth that feel “the system” is pushing them aside. He made a call to “parents, teachers and society at large” to reach out to children who are on a negative path, even if those children are resistant to the help at first.
For Makishna, the story ends with him being hanged for his crimes in spite of his assurance to the audience that “they’re not going to hang me for this”.
Once completed, Tatem said that “They’re not going to hang me” will be performed by the Poinciana Theater Productions, though no specific dates for the performance were available at the time of the reading.
