I am both captivated and at times confounded by Yusef Komunyakaa’s poem “Facing It.” For the most part, I am able to understand and feel myself sink into the poem and can wrap myself within its stunning and stilling imagery; however, towards the end on the poem, things became a little foggy and unclear for […]
I will start this by saying there is no way I can relate to the feelings represented in Ross Gay’s “Pulled Over in Short Hills, NJ, 8:00 AM”. I am a cisgender white woman who grew up in a privileged area, went to a wonderful well-funded school, and have never had to experience an event […]
How many things could we possibly be thankful for? Ross Gay says that there is a whole lot that we should thank others for and recognize how special the world around the reader can be. His poem, “A Catalogue of Unabashed Gratitude,” was similar to the Thanksgiving tradition of going around a table and saying […]
“The Poetics of Self-writing: Women and the National Body in the Works of Lucille Clifton” by Dr. Tanfer Emin Tunç explains the deep intersectionality that exists between racial studies and feminism as exemplified through the work of Lucille Clifton’s autobiography and her poetry. Dr. Tunç is a professor at University in Ankara, Turkey in their […]
In “Black Names in White Space: Lucille Clifton’s South“, Hilary Holladay attempts to shed light on some of Lucille Clifton’s work, including “at the cemetery, walnut grove plantation, south carolina, 1989”. While Holladay’s work stands on its own, I am including a link to an interview I read on the Modern American Poetry Site between […]
Lucille Clifton 1936-2010 In Joyce Johnson’s journal article, “The Theme of Celebration in Lucille Clifton’s poetry,” Johnson highlights Clifton’s accomplishments, but focuses on how she maintained a celebratory tone in her works even while writing about some of the tough experiences of Black life. Clifton’s “vision is not marred by sentimentality, for she […]
Based upon Berstein’s article “Artifice of Absorption” this poem is absorptive. His use of diction in the poem address the poem itself entire, saying “This line is..” or “This line has…” He does not use any direct address to the reader throughout his lines, simply only referring to the poem and ideas that can be […]
I understand where VZ was coming from when he said we would hate the language poets we’re focusing on this week. I don’t necessarily hate the writing style, but it is very disjointed and frustrating to follow compared to the structures that make up formalist poetry. However, the more I read this week the more […]
In my perhaps idiotic attempt to grasp Language Poetry, I stumbled across an article that I (charmingly, foolishly) believed to be the key to my understanding. This delightful article titled “What is ‘Language Poetry’?” by Lee Bartlett tried and failed valiantly and perhaps ironically to explain this mystifying style of poetics. I looked through half […]
Not Plasir but Jouissance in the Language Poets Unlike the Black Mountain poets and the Black Arts Movement, the Language poets do not unite around a collective manifesto. However, in his eponymous article, Steve McCaffery explains that structuralism, a post-World War II French/Continental “ism,” informs their conceptual framework. For this reason, he further explains that […]