Brutal Imagination (2001) – The importance of history is that we can see ourselves in the people of the past, but what about the things we see in people who never existed? In Cornelius Eady’s Brutal Imagination, readers relate to the harsh realities of Black male stereotypes in the form of a crime mystery that never actually happened. Poems like “How I Got Born” (1), “What I’m Made Of” (36), and “My Eyes” (44) paint a vivid picture of brutal prejudice, unfair stereotypes, and the typical challenge that black men must face every day to be treated equally, and its end result is as eye-opening as it is heartbreaking. –Jalen White