Characters

Where did the idea for “Characters” come from?
Jason Reynolds: The idea came from social media. I’m using the word characters to discuss social media and how all of us pretend to be people that we are not, right? So it’s about the Twitter characters and the avatars that we take upon ourselves in order to type those characters out.

You are very wise, Jason!
JR: I’ll tell my mother you said that.

Why is it important to consider “the weight of each word”?
JR: We have to be careful what we say. We have to be thoughtful about the way that we are speaking, and the way that we are talking to people and about people.

What inspired you to become a writer?
JR: I started writing poetry as a 10-year-old. It made me feel good. And when somebody tells you that what you said or what you wrote made them feel a certain way or made them feel better, it’s like “Oh, I have a superpower!” But I didn’t know anybody who was a writer. I didn’t know how far I would go. Becoming a writer wasn’t something that I could even imagine, but here we are.

What is your process for writing a poem?
JR: I look at it like a jigsaw puzzle: The first thing you do is dump all the pieces out of the box. Then you spread the pieces out and find the corners. For me, it’s the same [with poetry]. I put the words on the page, and then I start moving those words around.

Any advice for Scope readers when it comes to writing?
JR: I think that kids can sometimes be afraid to put words on the page. They might think they’re going to do it wrong. But what writing really means is putting words on a page in an effort to communicate. That’s it. Writing is writing a song. Writing is writing a poem. Writing is writing a list. Writing could be a journal entry. Writing could be paragraphs with no punctuation. All of these things count as writing!

_{This poem was originally published in the December 2021 / January 2022 issue.}