![]() Or, well, I tried to fit language into the shape of usefulness. ![]() What is the purpose of a poem, in the face of death, depression, racism, tragedy? Towards the end, she seems to be struggling most with this question of poetic possibility/responsibility. There are several threads through the work: death, depression (occupying the most memoiristic moments) racism, and the response to 9/11/01 (the social/ethical commentary made personal) and a searching for a way to express, which ultimately fails (the most poetic moments fall here). ![]() But that Claudia Rankine puts that freedom to wonderful use. Wright give a phenomenal lecture on poetry, in which she discussed poetry as a catch-all for writing that doesn’t fit anywhere else, and how that’s a problem…the essay is part of a forthcoming book that I am holding my breath for). Poetry lends a freedom that can be dangerous (I recently heard C.D. Except for those working between those forms: Susan Howe, Anna Joy Springer. And I’ve also suggested to my non-fiction writing friends that poetry and non-fiction have more in common than most realize. We read a poem differently than we do a memoir. I’ve long contended that genre is mostly useful to define reading strategy (define? demand? encourage?). ![]() Is it a prose poem? A lyric essay? A hybrid essay-poem? A hybrid poem-memoir? Yes. ![]()
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