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I was tracked as a kid. My mother, an immigrant, assumed that the educational professionals knew something she didn’t know about her troublesome girl child and let them put me into “special” ed. As painful and contradictory as that decision was, I don’t blame her. I understand, now, that she didn’t understand the context in…
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This has got to be one of the strangest novels about slavery that I have ever read. This, despite the nature of the Underground Railroad created by the author. It is strange because the overall tone of the book is dispassionate and as such makes it hard to connect to the characters. Still, I read…
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I. If you see me praying in the living room, never sit in front of me. You are not God. Source: Yalie Kamara |
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“Those familiar with my work already know that I champion Historical Poetry. They also likely know that no other group of poets has done more to define, establish, and make an argument for what clearly is a new genre than contemporary African American poets. No other cohort seems as committed to historical truth, arts activism,…
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A few year ago, lamenting the challenges of this juggling act, senior scholars in my department advised me to start thinking about my manuscripts as occupying different places in a pipeline, with proposals on one end and published articles at the other. The goal: Keep your papers distributed along that pipeline, and flowing through. Source:…
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I often think my taste in music is schizophrenic. It encapsulates everything from Americana (aka American roots music) to the Roots, Rock, Reggae of Jamaica; the punk of Patti Smith to the grunge of Nirvana; from the punk of Bad Brains to the virtuoso of Nina Simone; musical storytellers from Bob Dylan to Wu-Tang Clan.…
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Early spring, I went to a local (aka non-big box) gardening store. The experience wasn’t pleasant at all but I came away from the encounter with this growing bag in which I am growing sunflowers and amaranth (loves lies bleeding). The smallest sunflower is a variety I haven’t grown before (Endurance) and I don’t think I’ll…
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I Represent I represent the oppressed black womb penetrated too early in its development. No one takes the time to explain abortion before I am strapped in the clinic gurney to have the baby he planted scraped out. One day, I was watching Dora and the next day my teacher said I was a statistic.…
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Here, I eat the chips of childhood; salt in the air and salt and vinegar in my mouth. Salivating stillness after the turtle-like triumph of treading to the top we put a period on the promenade. Proudly private people we prostrate ourselves in lounge chairs designed for that express purpose. This is one of…
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Lesson Touring the Penn Center, St. Helena’s, SC I am wading through the dark morass of history, Beaufort at dusk fills with humid air from the swamps and the mangrove of stagnant sea water’s calm rice ponds, and the muttering old spirits, the sharp lament of crickets and the trees close in on us. The…
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Tichaona Chinyelu 
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