Nikki-Rosa Poem Analysis

In the poem “Nikki-Rosa,” Nikki Giovanni incorporates diction and imagery to prove that her childhood was happy in spite of her hardships. She writes about how throughout her life, her childhood was viewed as a hardship due to her race. However, “Black love is Black wealth” (22), implies that there was a strong community of people that was often dismissed when speaking of her childhood and she implies heavily that it wasn’t as awful as most people perceived it to be. In “Nikki-Rosa,” Nikki Giovanni adamantly refuses to accept others’ beliefs of her childhood only being full of hardships and sorrowful memories. Giovanni utilizes both diction and imagery to stress that her childhood was happy, despite what others believed. She reminisces that “… only everybody is together and you and your sister have happy birthdays and very

When speaking of how childhood remembrances were a drag for Black people, Nikki always associates the outsider’s opinion of her childhood with sadness while her own opinion suggests more delightful words to show that she held her own childhood in a different light. Although people tended to want to put her childhood in a negative light, Nikki retorts by stating things such as “… how happy you were to have your mother to yourself…” (6). In the poem, Giovanni frequently elicits imagery to exaggerate her point on how her childhood wasn’t as heart-wrenching as people believed. She writes about how good the water felt when she took a bath in a big tub and speaks of fond memories such as holiday celebrations. She also demonstrates negative imagery to make a point that even though some bits of her childhood were unpleasant to remember, it was full of happy moments, as well. These images tap into your senses and briefly put you in her shoes, refuting the argument that her childhood was only full of sadness with few happy