We Are Not Responsible

Mullen both implies and directly uses the symbol of luggage several times in “We Are Not Responsible.” Luggage is replaced with “relatives” in Line 1 and “carrying on” in Line 6. These replacements speak to how Black people’s enslaved “relatives” (Line 1) were treated as possessions—like luggage. This history created generational trauma carried like luggage, also referred to as emotional baggage. “[C]arrying on” (Line 6) is a way to dismiss legitimate emotional responses to trauma. The negative characterization of emotional responses to trauma is a method that systems of power use to not take responsibility for their institution that created the trauma.

The word “luggage” reappears in Line 11: “Our handlers lost your luggage.” This develops the discussion of the emotional baggage carried by descendants of slaves. The relatives of many Black Americans lost their lives because of violence perpetrated by “handlers,” or overseers on plantations, or lost their lives fleeing slavery. The system—the speaker, the “we” and “our” of the poem—continually refuses to take responsibility for empowering overseers, slave owners, and, later, the police.

Mullen uses implied colors in her poem. In Line 16, she writes “gang color.” Gang colors in America typically refer to red and blue clothing and accessories worn by the Bloods and the Crips, respectively.