Reading through the first 62 pages in "Of Poetry & Protest From Emmett Till to Trayvon Martin," I found a lot of the words resonated and stirred in me this burning quest to feel something and say something. United, these authors awakens this need to learn, spark awareness, and understand. However, each author speaks to something different even if they touch base on the same topics: the importance and resurrection of poetry to them and how their poems came to be. Writing that line out itself is a bit foggy to me because I'm still trying to comprehend what it means and specifically what it means to me in the reading of poetry and how the poetry transforms meaning.
The only thing I knew to do when I read through these pages were write down quotes that stood out to me because for one reason or another, it did something to make me feel a certain way or gave me an "ah hah" moment that felt prominent and that I should take note of so that I can recall and or refer back to it.
On page 12 of the introduction, it is written that, "Of Poetry and Protest From Emmett Till to Trayvon Martin is unapologetically political. It sees, hears, and absorbs the political in its myriad voices, tones, comprehensions, forms, experiences, performative-interpretations, and experimentations, no matter how far beneath or above the scrutinizing radar, recognizing that beauty can be found in the whisper, the scream, or in silence." I feel from the very beginning, as a reader, we are warned that there's multiple facets to poetry that unifies and creates a piece that moves and shakes its readers in unexpected ways, but also forces us to become aware of the different forms that expands that awareness and almost tests its boundaries.
In these first 62 pages "Of Poetry & Protest," I find that poetry is already introduced to become an importance of both form and content. A lot of what I'm reading feels more like story telling. Wanda Coleman writes about how "At home, however, [she] lived in a Black world and no matter what [she] read, it did not reflect [her] life" (34). Authors speak words that means something to them and by extension, it may or may not mean something to readers, but if it does, it's because they spoke about it. There's a admitted connection to the poetry and story-telling: the telling of stories creates the bond because the author wrote it out to let the world see it and make meaning of it themselves.
The beauty of these words come from that they mean different things to different people. But how an artist such as an author of a poem put these words together, creates a realm of what they imagine and the world they want to paint for their readers. However, because words can mean something different to various peoples, the beauty of it is how it connects and unites memories, people, things, events, the past, the present, and the future. Similarly, Camille T. Dungy writes, "Poetry matters because poets make it matter. We speak to the world around us today and, if we choose our words wisely, we will speak to tomorrow as well." (55). Words have a way of traversing time so that it transforms itself based on transformed people: based on current events and human experiences, it enables people to connect to it differently or similarly. Regardless, by exploring these connections or disconnections, it forces people to learn to empathize and sympathize and or create friction that emphasizes human differences and requires further understanding. The transformation of words and creation of poetry is a reflection of life and how people go through the motions of living, relating, and connecting to one another, as well as question the rift if the connections and relationship amongst people aren't there.
In conclusion, there were many phrases and lines that stood out to me because of how they were worded, what was being said, and how the two unified and accentuated the other. As a result, like music, the stories in the poetry not only meant something, but did something to me as a reader. It shook me and made me feel something and or think about something beyond the written words. It made me see and feel things for the world in which it speaks of. Therefore, poetry becomes a persons voice and an action to the thoughts and beliefs told by the authors. It is the spark that ignites the fire needed to maintain the lives we live and for others who lack the ability and freedoms to do so.
Other quotes that stood out to me are as follows:
"These poets in their black diversity and creative individualism are collectively joined through the transformative work of truth-telling and the underlying desire and demand to stop rampant and unjustified police killings" (Introduction 13).
"We hope that a swirling, shifting stratification of difference is evident" (Introduction13).
"if you are stopped by a cop, do what he says, even if he's harassing you, even if you didn't do anything wrong. Let him arrest you, memorize his badge number, and call me as soon as you get to the precinct. Keep your hands where he can see them. Do not reach for your wallet. Do not grab your phone. Do not raise your voice. Do not talk back. Do you understand me?" (The Talk by Jeannine Amber 14).
"As long as the oppressed tell their true story it will carry the edge of protest. Like so much else in the warped Anglo-twisted version of American literature there is an attempt o convince us that any criticism of the historic pathology of US society is wrong-headed." (Protest Poetry by Amiri Baraka 23).
"I possess a profoundly Black poetic that is attentive to vernacular speech. The poem has to swing, sing, and feel like an utterance that makes sense, even in its strangeness. My generation re-articulated Black culture and widened the diversity of Black art. We illustrated that all Black experience has Black sounds. My poetics are eclectic, influenced by diversity both poetic and rhetorical, driven by literature and history. My poems remind the reader that although they appear on paper, they are made of flesh." (Elizabeth Alexander 25).
"Two photographs of Emmett Till, born my year, on my birthday. One, he's smiling, happy, and the other one is after. His mother did the bold thing, kept the casket open, made the thousands look upon his bulging eyes, his twisted neck, her punched black boy. I couldn't sleep for thinking, Emmett Till." (Narrative: Ali, a poem in twelve rounds by Elizabeth Alexander 26).
"I am not a political poet. I am a political person. And so my poetry becomes political. My poetry seeks to confound silence, I am enacting something wholly political if one understands politics to be the business of how power is used in human society. Because I have been powerless and because I have been powerful, I am a political being." (Kwame Dawes 41).
"The idea that writing has the power to change lives, especially to transform pain, is deeply embedded in my psyche. It has driven my desire to write, and to teach. I often tell students that writing even one poem changes your life. I believe that. As I grow older, I realize that there are some sorrows we carry for generations- the wound of slavery for example. Black poets must have great ambition. Great art has the power, not only to transform the present, but to transform the past, changing our ancestors' oppression into triumph." (Toi Derricotte 46).
"Poetry revealed a safe form, a way to walk the fine line between expressing dangerous feelings and holding them in." (Toi Derricotte 46).
I agree with you- "Of Poetry and Protest" made a candid and successful effort to expand the reader's experiences and consciousness. As you said, these poems, through their multi-facetiousness create "empathy" in their audience. And I think you're saying that this anthology presents a duality: it speaks to the experiences of certain Black poets and historical figures throughout the history of the U.S. which in turn sheds light on the nature of poetry. I think, getting away from formalism in poetry which can feel oppressive and too structured, there is a thread throughout the anthology that reminds us that art and poetry must be about transformation, destroying oppressive forces, and freedom of expression.
ReplyDeleteYour thoughts on how words can connect and unite people across time really resonated with me and is a great way to examine how poetry works and the importance it can have. Your ideas about these poems as storytelling make me read them in a new way, thank you.
ReplyDeleteI love seeing what pulls other readers in and how. You pulled quotes that resonated with you and you also pointed out that the words fall differently to each reader. The power of the narrative style also drew you. I appreciate your points and your excellent specificity. It's interesting to note where the reader sits during a poem and what pulls them specifically. Also worth analyzing is the something for everyone thought. Good job
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Your reaction to "feel something and say something" is real with what these poems seem to demand from the reader, and to me it makes a lot of sense that your question that comes out of that is "how does the reader count as a way of either giving meaning to or transforming the meaning of a poem?". Close reading makes a lot of sense as a progression of this, and then you follow it with another angle about how the meaning depends on the reader, but that poetry matters because it speaks to the world.
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