Discovering Wes Moore

Graffiti symbolizes the young Wes Moore’s desire to leave his mark on the world. Graffiti tagging is a common youth activity in Wes’s Bronx neighborhood, and he eagerly takes it up as a kid. He comes up with his own pseudonym, “Kid Kupid,” which he spray-paints on walls. When his friend Shea gets Wes to tag a wall with him, Wes looks at his work: “I had added my mark to Laconia Avenue, a testament to the world that Wes Moore lived—or at least Kid Kupid did. Nobody could ever deny I was there.” Hidden in this act of youth rebellion is Wes’s profound anxiety over not leaving any meaningful trace of his existence in the world, an anxiety fostered by the seeming hopelessness of his circumstances. This anxiety gets an outlet through destructive vandalism, but at military school, one of Wes’s instructors memorably encourages him to leave his mark on the world in other ways. Wes takes this advice to heart, using it as motivation to make his mark on the world by helping others and giving back to his community. In this sense, when Wes stops graffitiing, it marks the onset of his maturity. As a youth he cared more about expressing himself as an individual; but with age and experience, he learns that it’s more important to express one’s agency through giving back to others.