…Of Rivers, poem by Langston Hughes

…OF RIVERS
by Langston Hughes

I’ve known rivers:
I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.
I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.
I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.
I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset.

I’ve known rivers:
Ancient, dusky rivers.

My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: James Mercer Langston Hughes (February 1, 1902 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist. He was one of the earliest innovators of the then-new literary art form jazz poetry. Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance. (Read more at Wikipedia.org.)

PHOTO: Langston Hughes by Gordon Parks, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Your World, poem by Georgia Douglas Johnson

YOUR WORLD
by Georgia Douglas Johnson

Your world is as big as you make it.
I know, for I used to abide
In the narrowest nest in a corner,
My wings pressing close to my side.
 
But I sighted the distant horizon
Where the skyline encircled the sea
And I throbbed with a burning desire
To travel this immensity.
 
I battered the cordons around me
And cradled my wings on the breeze,
Then soared to the uttermost reaches
With rapture, with power, with ease!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Georgia Douglas Johnson (1880-1966) wrote plays, a syndicated newspaper column, and four collections of poetry: The Heart of a Woman (1918), Bronze (1922),An Autumn Love Cycle (1928), and Share My World (1962). Born in Atlanta, Georgia, to parents of African American, Native American, and English descent, she graduated from Atlanta University Normal College and studied music at the Oberlin Conservatory and the Cleveland College of Music. Johnson published her first poems in 1916 in the NAACP’s magazineCrisis. Her weekly column, “Homely Philosophy,” was published from 1926 to 1932. She wrote numerous plays, including Blue Blood(performed 1926) and Plumes (performed 1927). (Read more atpoetryfoundation.org.)

PAINTING: “The Promise” by Rene Magritte, 1966.

Your World, poem by Georgia Douglas Johnson

YOUR WORLD
by Georgia Douglas Johnson

Your world is as big as you make it.
I know, for I used to abide
In the narrowest nest in a corner,
My wings pressing close to my side.
 
But I sighted the distant horizon
Where the skyline encircled the sea
And I throbbed with a burning desire
To travel this immensity.
 
I battered the cordons around me
And cradled my wings on the breeze,
Then soared to the uttermost reaches
With rapture, with power, with ease!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Georgia Douglas Johnson (1880-1966) wrote plays, a syndicated newspaper column, and four collections of poetry: The Heart of a Woman (1918), Bronze (1922), An Autumn Love Cycle (1928), and Share My World (1962). Born in Atlanta, Georgia, to parents of African American, Native American, and English descent, she graduated from Atlanta University Normal College and studied music at the Oberlin Conservatory and the Cleveland College of Music. Johnson published her first poems in 1916 in the NAACP’s magazine Crisis. Her weekly column, “Homely Philosophy,” was published from 1926 to 1932. She wrote numerous plays, including Blue Blood (performed 1926) and Plumes (performed 1927). (Read more at poetryfoundation.org.)

PAINTING: “The Promise” by Rene Magritte, 1966.

Jazz Haiku by Etheridge Knight

 

JAZZ HAIKU
by Etheridge Knight

Making jazz swing in
Seventeen syllables AIN’T
No square poet’s job.

…From The Essential Etheridge Knight (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1986). Copies available at Amazon.com.

Illustration: “Colorful Music Notes” by FunnyMusic. Postcards available at zazzle.com.

…Of Rivers, poem by Langston Hughes

…OF RIVERS
by Langston Hughes

I’ve known rivers:
I’ve known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins.  
 
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.
 
I bathed in the Euphrates when dawns were young.
I built my hut near the Congo and it lulled me to sleep.
I looked upon the Nile and raised the pyramids above it.
I heard the singing of the Mississippi when Abe Lincoln went down to New Orleans, and I’ve seen its muddy bosom turn all golden in the sunset.
 
I’ve known rivers:
Ancient, dusky rivers.
 
My soul has grown deep like the rivers.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: James Mercer Langston Hughes (February 1, 1902 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist. He was one of the earliest innovators of the then-new literary art form jazz poetry. Hughes is best known as a leader of the Harlem Renaissance. (Read more at Wikipedia.org.)

PHOTO: Langston Hughes by Gordon Parks, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Sears Life, poem by Wanda Coleman

SEARS LIFE (Excerpt)
by Wanda Coleman 

it makes me nervous to go into a store
because i never know if i’m going to
come out. have you noticed how much
they look like prisons these days? no display
windows anymore. all that cold soulless
lighting-as atmospheric as county jail-
and all that ground-breaking status-quo
shattering rock ‘n roll reduced to neuron
pablum and piped in over the escalators.
breaks my rebel heart. and i especially 
hate the aroma of fresh-nuked popcorn
rushing my nose, throwing my stomach off
balance. eyes follow me everywhere i go like
i’m a neon sign that shouts shoplifter.
and so many snide counter rats want to
service me, it almost makes me feel rich 
and royal. that’s why i rarely bother to
browse. i go straight to the department of
the object of conjecture, make my decision
quick, throw down the cash and split…

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Born in 1946, Wanda Coleman grew up in the Watts neighborhood of Los Angeles. She is the author of Bathwater Wine (Black Sparrow Press, 1998), winner of the 1999 Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize. A former medical secretary, magazine editor, journalist and scriptwriter, Coleman has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation for her poetry. Her other books of poetry include Mercurochrome: New Poems (2001), Native in a Strange Land: Trials & Tremors (1996), Hand Dance (1993), African Sleeping Sickness (1990),  A War of Eyes & Other Stories (1988); Heavy Daughter Blues: Poems & Stories 1968-1986 (1988), and Imagoes (1983). She has also written Mambo Hips & Make Believe: A Novel (Black Sparrow Press, 1999) and Jazz and Twelve O’Clock Tales: New Stories (2008). Coleman is known as the “unofficial poet laureate of Los Angeles.” (Source: poets.org)

Photo: Wanda Coleman, circa 1970s

Happy Birthday to Playwright August Wilson

“I know some things when I start. I know, let’s say, that the play is going to be a 1970s or a 1930s play, and it’s going to be about a piano, but that’s it. I slowly discover who the characters are as I go along.” AUGUST WILSON (1945-2005)

For writers who make it up as they go along (and I plead guilty), August Wilson‘s comment about his working method makes us feel…well, okay about not knowing where we’re going when we start.

Born on April 27, 1945, Wilson grew up poor in Pittsburgh, dropped out of high school at 16, and educated himself at the Carnegie Library while working a series of menial jobs. In 1965, at age 20, he purchased a used typewriter for 10 dollars and started to compose poetry. A few years later, in 1968, he cofounded the Black Horizon Theatre and began to write and produce plays — starting with Recycling. Wilson went on to author many plays — including the Pulitzer Prize winning Fences (1987) and The Piano Lesson (1990). One of the all-time great American playwrights — with a career that spanned nearly 40 years — Wilson’s work continues to inspire and promote discussion. He passed away at age 60 in 2005, and has been the recipient of many posthumous tributes — including a theater in the New York City Broadway Theater District named in his honor.