WV PICKS – Poetry
This month publishers, booksellers, literary organizations, libraries, schools and poets from around the country will come together to celebrate poetry and its vital role in American society. Without a doubt, poetry is an important form of literary expression in which words are used in a concentrated blend of sound and imagery to evoke emotions and responses from those who experience them. The freedom and creative expression poetry brings is very powerful and is one of the reasons why this particular literary form is so popular among RAP and hip-hop song writers today.
This month I pay homage to poets � past and present � that I�ve had the pleasure of reading in preparation of this month�s celebration. They are in my opinion, the �architects� of the black poetic tradition. So join me in celebrating National Poetry Month by including several or all of the collections of poetry featured to your reading list this month!
Poetic Voices of the Past . . .
The Collected Poetry of Paul Laurence Dunbar
by Paul Laurence Dunbar, Joanne M. Braxton, Editor
University Press of Virginia
0813914388
$16.95, Paperback
This new �most complete� edition of the collected poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar, the virtual father of black American poetry, includes sixty poems not included in the previous�and now out of print�Complete Poems. Sixteen of these were found in manuscript form.
The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes
by Langston Hughes, Arnold Rampersad, Editor
1st Vintage Classic Edition
0679764089
$18.95, Paperback
Spanning five decades and comprising 868 poems (nearly 300 of which have never before appeared in book form), this magnificent volume is the definitive sampling of a writer who has been called the poet laureate of African America�and perhaps our greatest popular poet since Walt Whitman. Here, for the first time, are all the poems that Langston Hughes published during his lifetime, arranged in the general order in which he wrote them and annotated by Arnold Rampersad and David Roessel.
Complete Poem
(The American Poetry Recovery Series)
by Claude McKay
University of Illinois Press
0252028821
$40.00, Paperback
Containing more than three hundred poems, including nearly a hundred published here for the first time, this collection showcases the range and dynamism of Claude McKay (1889-1948), the Jamaican-born poet whose life and poetry were marked by restless travel and steadfast social protest.
God�s Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse
by James Weldon Johnson
Penguin Classics
0140184031
$13.00, Paperback
As a poet, Johnson began to experiment with the free verse form, producing what may be his best-known work, God�s Trombones. Though a committed agnostic, Johnson used the work to pay tribute to the black preachers he remembered from his childhood. Each poem presents in lyrical but colloquial language a version of a classic sermon, such as �The Prodigal Son� or �Noah Built an Ark.� Johnson rejected the use of broad Negro dialect as comic and derogatory and revealed the old-time black preacher as a folk figure of dignity and eloquence.
The Collected Poems of Jean Toomer
by Jean Toomer
University of North Carolina Press
0807842095
$17.95, Paperback
With his first published work, the lyrical narrative Cane (1923), Toomer joined the first rank of Afro-American writers. But the creative output that followed went largely unrecognized during his lifetime. He did not, however, cease writing as these 55 poems, many previously unpublished, attest. His poetry became a means of expressing his quest of an idealist philosophy, one in which men were not separated by skin color but, as in the volume�s centerpiece, �Blue Meridian,� would come together to create a new American race. �This attempt to assemble a standard edition of Toomer�s poetical works� deserves a place in all large public and academic libraries.
Poetic Voices of the Present . . .
Transbluesency: The Selected Poetry of Amiri Baraka/Leroi Jones (1961-1995)
by Imamu Amiri Baraka, Paul Vangelisti, Editor
Marsilio Publishers
1568860145
$17.95, Paperback
Poet, dramatist, essayist, fiction writer and political activist, Amiri Baraka is considered by many to be the most influential and preeminent African-American literary figures of our time. Transbluesency reveals a writer shaping a body of poetry that is as well a body of knowledge�a passionate reflection upon the cultural, political, and aesthetic questions of his time.
The Nikki Giovanni Poetry Collection CD [UNABRIDGED]
by Nikki Giovanni, Narrator
Caedmon
0060514299
$22.00, Audio CD
In a career that has spanned over three decades, Nikki Giovanni has perceptively recorded her observations of both the outside world and the gentle yet enigmatic territory of the self. When her poems first emerged from the Civil Rights and Black Arts Movements of the 1960s, she immediately became a celebrated and controversial literary figure. One of the most commanding voices to grace America�s political and poetic landscape, Nikki Giovanni�s poems embody the fearless passion and spirited wit for which she is beloved and revered.
Shake Loose My Skin: New and Selected Poem
by Sonia Sanchez
Beacon Press
0807068535
$14.00, Paperback
An extraordinary retrospective covering over thiry years of work, SHAKE LOOSE MY SKIN is a stunning testament to the literary, sensual, and political powers of the award-winning Sonia Sanchez.
The Black Poets
by Dudley Randall
Bantam
0553275631
$7.99, Paperback
�The claim of The Black Poets to being� an anthology is that it presents the full range of Black-American poetry, from the slave songs to the present day. It is important that folk poetry be included because it is the root and inspiration of later, literary poetry. Not only does this book present the full range of Black poetry, but it presents most poets in depths and in some cases presents aspects of a poet neglected or overlooked before.
My Manufactured English
by Mikaylah Simone
Trafford
1412032113
$18.50, Paperback
Mikaylah Simone is an emerging African-American poet, whose visceral style brings poetry back to social art through cultural identity, personal redemption, politics, religion, community and the complexity of love.
Rhythm and Rhyme for Children . . .
The Dream Keeper and Other Poems
by Langston Hughes, Brian Pinkney, Illustrator
Knopf Books for Young Readers
0679883479
$8.99, Paperback
Hughes� classic poetry collection, originally published for young people in 1932, is reissued here in a handsome new edition. It includes seven additional poems, a fine introduction by Lee Bennett Hopkins, and a personal afterword by Augusta Baker. Black-and-white scratchboard illustrations in Pinkney�s signature style express the emotion and beat of the poetry, the laughter that hides pain, the celebration and the struggle of the African American experience, and the music of the weary blues. The poems are as powerful today as they were 60 years ago!
The Creation
by James Weldon Johnson, James Ransome, Illustrator
Holiday House
0823410692
$18.95, Hardcover
This illustrated edition of Johnson�s 1919 poem, which won the 1995 Coretta Scott King Award, brings the story of Creation down to earth and into the grasp of young children. Alternating with the poetry are richly expressive double-page spreads and attractive border elements that feature animal motifs and scenes from The Beginning�light, earth, water, plants, animals and lastly, a ruddy, clay-colored human rising out of a field of flowers. An illustrated sub-plot of an animated storyteller relating the Creation story before a group of enthralled children relieves the poem its relative predictability and offers a friendly stand-in for the role of God. It also hints at the importance of human participation, itself sacred and timeless.
Beautiful Blackbird
by Ashley Bryan, Illustrator
Atheneum
0689847319
$16.95, Hardcover
With vibrant cut-paper collages, a Coretta Scott King Award-winner presents an adaptation of a folktale from Zimbabwe that celebrates the importance of appreciating one�s own inner beauty.
In the Land of Words: New and Selected Poems
by Eloise Greenfield, Jan Spivey Gilchrist, Illustrator
Amistad
0060289937
$16.99, Hardcover
In this collection of twenty-one poems, National Council of Teachers of English Excellence in Poetry for Children Award winner Eloise Greenfield journeys to a place where words, creativity, and imagination abound. Featuring the poems �In the Land of Words,� �Books,� and �Poem,� as well as favorites such as �Nathaniel�s Rap� and �Way Down in the Music,� this tribute to the written word invites readers to look within themselves and discover what inspires them.
Love to Langston
by Tony Medina, R. Gregory Christie, Illustrator
Lee & Low Books
1584300418
$17.95, Hardcover
Fourteen poems offer young readers an exciting glimpse into the life of Langston Hughes, one of America�s most beloved poets. Each poem explores important themes in Hughes�s life � his lonely childhood, his love of language and travel, and his dream of writing poetry. Color illustrations throughout and extensive notes at the back of the book expand upon the poems, giving a broader picture of Hughes�s life and the time in which he lived.
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