One more poetry post for today, this one a gem you can find at "From the Fishouse." Although I first heard this poem on the "Poetry Off the Shelf" podcast, I have been learning more about "From the Fishouse," an audio archive of emerging poets, for several weeks now. You see, our department is hiring someone in the field of poetry and poetics this year and, as a result, I've been reading lots of application packets from perspective applicants. Lots of these folks are poets and literary scholars and several of them have poems at Fishouse, which has brought me to the site to have a listen.
Anyway, check out this poem by Tyehimba Jess. For the full experience, though, you've got to listen to the audio recording. It will knock your socks off. A note about the form: it's an example of stichomythia in which alterating lines (or in this case, half lines) are spoken by alternating characters. That's pretty essential to understanding the poem. The scene: 1934's MLA convention in Philadelphia, where the scholar Alan Lomax had taken the blues musician known as Lead Belly to perform. You can find more background on the people in the poem here and here.
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