“a song flung up to heaven”: a poem for Maya Angelou
Today is Maya Angelou’s birthday. Continue reading “a song flung up to heaven”: a poem for Maya Angelou
Tag: black poetry
“What a friend we have in Jesus” (& Nikki): A musing response to Nikki Giovanni’s “A Good Cry”
I turned myself into myself and wasjesusmen intone my loving nameAll praises All praisesI am the one who would save —Nikki Giovanni, “Ego Tripping (There May Be a Reason Why)” Jesus wept. (John 11:35) I find Jesus and Nikki to be quite similar, maybe even one and the same. Admittedly, however, I don’t know either that well. But I think I know enuf about them to make such … Continue reading “What a friend we have in Jesus” (& Nikki): A musing response to Nikki Giovanni’s “A Good Cry”
Remembering Amiri Baraka: Teaching “Somebody Blew Up America”
I was talking to @drrema when—in the middle of our conversation—she reported Amiri Baraka’s death. My heart catapulted to my stomach floor. Real story. My heart catapulted to my stomach floor, & my mind immediately traveled back to about 2005 when I saw Amiri Baraka (for the second time—the first time I was a graduate student at Florida A&M University (FAMU), & our neighboring school, … Continue reading Remembering Amiri Baraka: Teaching “Somebody Blew Up America”
Black Women’s Poetic Genius: In Response to Audre Lorde’s “Poetry Is Not A Luxury”
Every time I read Audre Lorde’s “Poetry Is Not A Luxury,” I feel like swallowing Mari Evans’ “Who Can Be Born Black” and throwing it up into the universe—with hopes that none of it hits the ground, but splatters on everybody’s faces. In her 1970 poem, Evans asks, Who can be born black and not sing the wonder of it the joy the challenge And/to … Continue reading Black Women’s Poetic Genius: In Response to Audre Lorde’s “Poetry Is Not A Luxury”
Take Back the Night, University of South Florida, 2010
In 2010, the University of South Florida’s “Take Back the Night” Committee asked that I open its annual “Take Back the Night” Ceremony. I opened the invitation to “testify” with the following peace: Take It Continue reading Take Back the Night, University of South Florida, 2010
Winners of the College Language Association’s Margaret Walker Poetry Prize, 2012
I wrote the following peace in 2007 while my high school students watched a Civil Rights film. It is a celebration of a woman whose aura woos me. a poem for YK (because there’s something about her aura) I wrote “If Jesus Were A Smoker, He’d Be My Daddy” after a conversation I was having with a former partner wherein I described to her my father’s smoking … Continue reading Winners of the College Language Association’s Margaret Walker Poetry Prize, 2012
We Be Theorizin
The following peace is published in “The Inside Light”: New Critical Essays on Zora Neale Hurston. Ed. Dr. Deborah G. Plant. California: Praeger, 2010. 263-265. Although it serves as the text’s Afterward, I wrote it after reading Barbara Christian’s “A Race for Theory.” We Be Theorizin Continue reading We Be Theorizin
