Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem “We Real Cool” though short, sends a clear message about the subjects of the poem. The poem is composed of four stanzas with two lines in each stanza. Each sentence is composed of three short words and begins with the word ‘we.’ The lines are often frequently enjambed and even finish in the next stanza at times. Although this structure might seem odd, it serves a purpose. The subjects of the poem are clearly not folks of higher education which is exhibited through the line “We/Left School” (Brooks 1-2) and the fact that the language used is simple and to the point. Other lines suggest delinquent behavior such as “We/Lurk late” (2-3) and “We/Sing sin” (4-5). The subjects of poem view these actions as cool and choose to behave this way. This way of life for them obviously has undesirable consequences though as demonstrated by the last lines, “We/Die soon” (7-8). This last declaration shows the effects of living in the way that the poem’s subjects choose to live. This result makes the reader think about how the life they live is not as “cool” and simple as the subjects would have people believe and is not a satisfactory option for anyone.
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