Tyehimba Jess, poet

This is one of the three poems for this week's (our third) session of the seminar I'm taking with Mark Doty. I had not heard of Tyehimba Jess before today. So I went looking for more on him, and found his recital of this poem (see below) as well as another poem about Blind Boone (ditto). I may not be becoming any kind of a poet myself with this seminar, but I sure am encountering some cool poetry.

Blind Boone's Vision

When I got old enough

I asked my mother,

to her surprise,

to tell me what she did

with my eyes. She balked

and stalled, sounding

unsure for the first time

I could remember.

It was the tender way

she held my face

and kissed where tears

should have rolled

that told me I’d asked

of her the almost impossible—

to recount my blinding

tale, to tell what became

of the rest of me.

She took me by the hand

and led me to a small

sapling that stood not

much taller than me.

I could smell the green

marrow of its promise

reaching free of the soil

like a song from Earth’s

royal, dirty mouth.

Then Mother told me

how she, newly freed,

had prayed like a slave

through the night when

the surgeon took my eyes

to save my fevered life,

then got off her knees

come morning to take

the severed parts of me

for burial—right there

beneath that small tree.

They fed the roots,

climbed through its leaves

to soak in sunlight . . .

and so, she told me,

I can see.

 

When the wind rustles

up and cools me down,

when the earth shakes

with footsteps and when

the sound of birdcalls

stirs forests like the black

and white bustling

’neath my fingertips

I am of the light and shade

of my tree. Now,

ask me how tall

that tree of mine

has grown to be

after all this time—

it touches a place

between heaven and here.

And I shudder when I hear

the earth’s wind

in my bones

through the bones

of that boxed-up

swarm of wood,

bird and bee:

I let it loose . . .

and beyond

me.

Here is Tyehimba reciting it:

And here is (click on the text below to actually be able to read it)

Finally, here's more Tyehimba Jess, in conversation with LIT host Yahdon Israel--which I haven't actually watched yet, but now I know where to find it. And I will watch. I like this poet.

Wait, no, there's a final finally: a TED performance by Tyehimba Jess of his "syncopated sonnets" about the McCoy sisters, "conjoined through the hips. Each possessed her own arms, legs, and respiratory systems. They were born into slavery, rented out as freak show attractions by the age of 3, kidnapped to Britain, and then returned to American slavery. After the Civil War they traveled around the world as multilingual dancing, singing, piano playing stars."

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Today's numbers for Covid-19 for Monterey County: 11,906 total cases, 688 hospitalizations, and 97 deaths; up, respectively 201, 13, and 2 since Friday. I keep hoping for some zeroes, or at least non-double or certainly -triple digits. 

Meanwhile, today was voting day. The map is not looking pretty. But the consensus seems to be that Biden will win. I sure as f*** hope so. Me, I spent the evening at one of our local polling stations, in charge of the big blue bag for provisional ballots and the black plastic box for "qualified" ballots (of which I saw none, so I can't even tell you just what that means). I interacted with half a dozen or so voters. But I was glad to see each and every one of them, and to be able to thank them for voting. In all, today our precinct received just short of a hundred new votes. California made it very easy to vote, with all-mail ballots and dropboxes everywhere. This is how it should be. 

I've decided that if Trump does prevail again, I'm just done with journalism. I do not need another four years with that man on the front page every day with a new outrage. I may be done with social media too--or at least I should edit my list of followed pages. (No more WaPo.) We are actually talking about leaving the country for a while--to do some exploring. Portugal? Spain? Costa Rica? Hopefully it won't come to that. But I find myself getting much happier with the idea of David retiring next year. And doing a little adventuring. Maybe I should stay here and fight, but fight what? I might just be too old and tired to fight the present horror. Or, maybe I can fight from somewhere else. Well, time will tell.