Nikki Giovanni's poem sucks.

[fflo]

Watch it here.

Yeah, she said "AIDS" out loud in a room with George Bush in it. And she cites a few other tragedies that link tragedy to tragedy in a way I'm sure Americans can't hear enough. But what is this "prevailing" she's talking about? And doesn't the poem just suck?

Comments

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

1. i had no idea she was at VT
2. sadly, it does suck. sadly, it was done overnight, on the spur of the moment, at the behest of the emotion shaped by american media, so that it both parrots it and authenticates it. and no time for revision---always a bad thing.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

yeah & yeah. i admit she's not a poet i jump up & down or do cartwheels for anyway.

she had the guy in class, it turns out.

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

just listening to that. he was "mean" and clearly was eerie. i actually remember a few "quiet types" in my own classes who i always thought were capable of blowing people away.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

one does wonder.

shame she doesn't do a better job explaining what was "wrong" with his poetry.

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

it was BAD. unlike her bad.

[johnpowers.livejournal.com]

Crazy huh? Did you catch the articles including NG's impression? Strikes me as opportunistic, but I'm probably wrong.

http://www.gotpoetry.com/News/article/sid=4482.html

[fflo.livejournal.com]

there's so much opportunism going around, it's hard to catch it all, in all its distinct moments. but, yeah, crazy. and nice to "meet" you---will have to check out your site. looks good.

[johnpowers.livejournal.com]

Yes, please check us out. The community part of the site is pretty good. The poetry news is well... poetry news. Regular articles are always good. Our reference material is getting old.

p.s.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

the chronicle of higher ed links to an mp3 of it here that ends with (over half the file length) quite a few seconds of applause and then athletic-event cheering ("let's go hokies" and "wooooo!!!"). very weird. disturbing in its own right, to me. mainly cuz it's just nuts.

Re: p.s.

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

it is. and then they have people in military uniforms leading the cheers, and everyone is yelling like they're hoisting themselves up and ready to take revenge. they will indeed prevail, and one wonders over whom.

Re: p.s.

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

speaking of prevalation (my new noun to replace prevailing), the learned societies of america have just informed me that 17.5 people have prevailed over me for their fellowship. it's getting a bit old, the prevalation.

Re: p.s.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

oh, the prevality!

[sprig5.livejournal.com]

I won't be able to watch this 'til I'm at home. But the Giovanni "mean" quote struck me too, when I saw it in print. I had read that Cho was evaluated at some sort of mental facility, and he may have been on antidepressants, and may have been on too high a dose. But no specific info. Anyway, I'm just saying, it's much more complex than being "mean." Was he severely depressed and suicidal? Bipolar? Something else? Seems he fell through a lot of cracks.

I just noticed too, that articles refer to him as "Cho Seung Hui," in Asian style, with surname first and then first and second names, rather than "Seung-Hui Cho." I wonder why.

[sprig5.livejournal.com]

It's as if you had put, on your lj,

"I figured out that my passion is not really for music. My passion is actually for people." --Ma Yo Yo

[fflo.livejournal.com]

Not "Ma Yo-Yo"? Is the hyphenation with the American(- or Western)ization?

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

i wonder about this too. i wonder if they'll finally announce what the medication was and whether it was possible for it to cause hallucinations and such. or whether he decided to go off the stuff. wonder who'll get sued for either version of culpability.

[sprig5.livejournal.com]

a friend made the point that she hopes that all of this doesn't make things harder for people who have mental illness.

[fflo.livejournal.com]

a co-worker made the point that it's gonna make it harder for weirdo don't-fit-in types. which has some crossover with mental illness, i'm sure, but probably in that it leads to mental illness just as much as cuz mental illness leads to weirdocity.

speaking as someone with both conditions, to varying degrees at varying times of life.

[shmizla.livejournal.com]

very timely. look in today's nytimes--there's already one text about how this was a failure on the part of the university to isolate him, but that informing his parents and isolating him would also be an infringement on his privacy rights and freedom of movement. there are several precedents mentioned in which various students were removed from the classroom or dorm because they were found to have a mental illness. one family sued MIT for $65m for not being told their daughter was being treated, after she had set herself on fire.

see, for example,
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/19/us/19protocol.html?n=Top%2fReference%2fTimes%20Topics%2fOrganizations%2fV%2fVirginia%20Polytechnic%20Institute%20and%20State%20University

[schroederjt.livejournal.com]

I actually like a lot of Giovanni's older work. Love Poems had some nice stuff in it, and Blues: For All the Changes. But she's been phoning it in for the last dozen years, at least. This poem, as awful as it is, is actually better than most of the tree-killing pulp that prevails in her most recent book.

And, should you think for even a second that I am exaggerating, I refer you to the Poetry is Doomed column by scottwoods, which makes the case with abundant examples. Yeech.

http://www.gotpoetry.com/News/article/sid=3902.html

[fflo.livejournal.com]

oooh, and you think i was afraid to click on the "this may be cruel, but" comment...! i think i'll have to save this link for a little later.

i have some old book of hers that didn't stink to high heaven, by a long shot. "phoning it in"--- ho. well, she does have her schoolroom gig now and everything.

not that that ruins everyone.

okay, i looked

[fflo.livejournal.com]

SO snarky funny --- Aw, man, who farted?! !

And, gawd, don't write about Nina Simone at ALL if that's what you're going to do.

Do you know this scottwoods?

Re: okay, i looked

[schroederjt.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry if reading those exerpts hurt your eyes. Or your brain. But you see what I mean about her recent work being all junkified.

scottwoods is the Slam Master in these parts.

And yes, for the love of all that is holy, it's Nina Simone!

Nikki G with Ali G

[(Anonymous)]

ALI G: Booyakasha, check i' out. I is here wif my main man, poet Nikki G, my big bro from Staines. How is you become poet?
NIKKI G: We're communicators, it's in our blood.
ALI G: Blood, West Side. Sis, you is get, I mean, sorry you is my bro now, you is get some edumacation. You went to America?
NIKKI G: I went to Fisk in Alabama.
ALI G: Tell me about how you is expelled for crack...
NIKKI G: It wasn't for crack.
ALI G: Wha'eve. Anyway you is still my main man, big shout out for poet Nikki G from VT.

Re: Nikki G with Ali G

[fflo.livejournal.com]

Good to see (courteous of some Ali G fan... ?) that the intrepid interviewer is on the case. If only in our imaginations.

And Terry Gross gets all the kudos! Go figya.