Removing the Masks of Masculinity

TIME: 2:00 PM EST/ 11:00 AM PST

Conference Link: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/85845354181

With: Monroe Howard, MSW, MPA

What Mask are you wearing? This seminar will explore the roles of men in Black culture, and how we can facilitate community healing using tools such as communication, vulnerability, and self-awareness.

We Wear the Mask

BY PAUL LAURENCE DUNBAR

We wear the mask that grins and lies,

It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—

This debt we pay to human guile;

With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,

And mouth with myriad subtleties.

Why should the world be over-wise,

In counting all our tears and sighs?

Nay, let them only see us, while

       We wear the mask.

We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries

To thee from tortured souls arise.

We sing, but oh the clay is vile

Beneath our feet, and long the mile;

But let the world dream otherwise,

       We wear the mask!

Paul Laurence. Dunbar, "“We Wear the Mask.”" from The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar. (New York: Dodd, Mead and Company, )

House of Ease