How Shall I Tell My Daughter

"I love the shit out of my daughter. I want to change the world, with words. This started as affirmations for Lilah, which turned into prayers, which turned into love letters, which turned into essays, which turned into poems, which then turned into all of the above.This has been written in the same vein as Claudia Rankine's Citizen, for context. I wanted to write something that could document my experience as a single father, a single Black father, raising a soon-to-be 2-year-old Afro-Latina in the 45th era. I wanted her to know me, and know herself, with the hope that it would help fathers learn their own daughters, and learn themselves, too." -Joel L. DanielsJoel l. Daniels is a storyteller, born and raised in the Bronx. He was the recipient of the Bronx Council of the Arts BRIO Award for poetry, and his work has been featured in the Columbia Journal, Café.com, The Boston Globe, CNN Money, The Towner, Fatherly, Thought Catalog, Philadelphia Printworks, The Smoking Section, Blavity, Huffington Post, BBC Radio, RCRD LBL, URB, BRM, AllHipHop, The Source, RESPECT, and HipHopDX.He's spoken/performed at the Apollo Theater, Joe's Pub, Rockwood Music Hall, Columbia University, Lehman College, City Tech, The National Black Theater, NYU, Webster Hall, Pianos, and Brooklyn Bowl.