I can't find the prompts.
Plus, I was in the library which wouldn't allow me to add a new post. grrrr
Now I'm home and finally posting but it's incomplete.
Mea Culpa.
January 24, 2017/Poets of Color/Professor
Elmaz Abinader
Mimi (Rose) Gonzalez-Barillas
Of Poetry and Protest From Emmett Till to Trayvon
Martin, edited by Philip Cushway and
Michael Warr, Norton, 2016
The first thing I want to say
is “in your face!” But then realize it’s
really more, “Get out mine.” I feel like
Amiri Baraka is telling me, “Don’t hold back.
Tell it.” Actually, he states,
“As long as the oppressed tell their true story it will carry the edge of
protest.” (Of Poetry and Protest p.
23.)
These readings have given me
faith, that even speaking, being in print, holding the light of witness to the
perpetration of murder and systemic violence against Black Americans is an act
of courage. It’s daring to be hopeful in
the midst of such barbarism, and these poets are leading the way through their
very words of acknowledgement and refusal to buy the brutality and ignorance of
racism as normal.
Editor Michael Warr’s
introduction is the resigned sigh of a warrior with a long view. To title his piece, “One Day this Book Will
Be a Relic Chronicling a Period of Insanity and Inhumanity, I Hope…” (Ibid. p.
12) is to name the demon inhuman, insane.
To not be driven to madness or impotence, is an act of personal bravery
achieved by only the fittest spiritual warriors.
Harry Belafonte recalled the
“sense of oneness” (Ibid. p.21) pervading Dr. King’s funeral, acknowledging “a
moment in history that was very, very unique.” (Ibid) For those of us who attended a sister march
on Saturday, January 21, hopefully you could feel what like minds gathered in
unity feels like – to not be alone in the cause. By marching, you made a statement that you
were willing to put your body on the line and count among Oakland’s
84,000. You made yourself accountable in
one small way.
Accountability is what
Belafonte is demanding of us. He said to
the New York Times reporter at Dr. King’s funeral, “…the way in which they had
discredited Dr. King was a great disservice to a rich cause. …wanted him to understand that none of us
were really exempt from a responsibility to that moment by just coming to
grieve the loss, there was no cleansing of responsibility.”
Members of this class, how
will you use your power? What can you
own in this moment? That is the promise and
query of this class, what are we willing to face, admit, own and transform
through our commitment to lay eyes on?
Listen to Elizabeth
Alexander’s advice about writing:
“Approaching a poem from every angle and building up an arsenal of
approaches to solving the problem of the poem became the underpinning of my
work.” Let’s try everything, support
each other, and lend each other the tool of time and empathy to help each other
stand up.
Poets of Color is an opportunity
to “get woke” together. Let’s do this.
I appreciate, Mimi, that you used the content to reflect on the current moment and movement, that you read the essays connecting the motivation for the writing and the thought. The grieving and the activitizing are not mutually exclusive for these writers. E
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