Lighthead

In this book, Terrence Hayes does something that I've never quite seen done before; he's smoothly synthesized the sound-and-emotion-oriented style of spoken-word poetry with the artful arrangement and order of more conceptual, academic poetry. For that, I have to give him some five-star love, even though a lot of the poems talk a lot about African-American identity and racism in a way that I have a hard time taking into my own experience. Yet the guy also references David Bowie, Wallace Stevens, "A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Antony and the Johnsons...so it's blazingly clear that he isn't a one-trick rapper/poet.

Really though, some dazzling stuff here, particularly his invention of the "pecha kucha" form (based on a style of show more Japanese slideshow used for business presentations). The tension between the "slides"/stanzas and their individual titles fleshes out the concepts in an even deeper way, even beyond the surface-level puzzles that he puts forward, so that the pieces end up working on multiple levels and kind of driving you insane and force you to read them over and over, getting more and more out of them each time. There's some game-changing stuff in there.

As mentioned before, I love how omnivorous he is with his references and also with his themes; love, family, the personal vs. cultural/racial history, music...there's even some funny shit in there too!

For all the brou-ha-ha about the National Book Award committee being so ivory-tower-y, I can't fault them picking this book, at least. It's just so fluid and deft and thoughtful, and perfectly emblematic of how other cultures are slowly infiltrating and destroying the "old dead white men" paradigm of modern poetry, and re-making it into something way more strong and deep and hardy, giving it more of a fighting chance to become a significant part of more people's lives. This is a service Hayes does without being at all self-conscious, and the fruits of his labor are pretty damn miraculous. show less

Smart and threaded with music, playing with form in a smart, smart way. Difficult to pierce at times, but frankly that's on me.

I know so little about what it means to be Black, though I do try to read books by African-Americans and other Black people. I do know, for example, the reference to 'strange fruit' and it does make me sick & tearful to be reminded of it. But I found these poems mostly incomprehensible. A few lines caught my ear (yes, I sub-vocalized, as I do with poetry) but I couldn't make sense of them. A few bits of ideas almost latched on, but not enough.

I'm sorry. I'm sure it's me, not the poems or the poet. But I just can't say that I read the whole thing.
August 2024

Lighthead spins some magic.