[R. S. Gwynn]

http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2...uson-missouri/

[Ian Hoffman]

Greatest poet of our time, man.

[Wintaka]

Not a particularly compelling outline.

[Ian Hoffman]

Seidel is actually a pretty amazing, dumb-founding, and offensive poet, though. I'm not sure about this current poem; it seems drafty, but I usually like his work. And it would be drafty, considering the speed of these events. At least he's willing to offend.

[Michael F]

I think it is supremely difficult to make good art out of current political events, but I applaud a serious effort, and I think this is a serious effort. It engages with some enormous issues of our time (drones, the NSA, Ferguson and all that it entails); it makes a few compelling observations and seems to me, in part, an attempt to jostle us out of complacency and stupor. I don’t follow it all (esp. the zipper and the angel, can someone help?), but for me, it was a worthwhile read. I’d like to see more art engaging worthily with these issues, which I find very, very troubling.

Coincidentally, just today NYT critic A.O. Scott has a piece questioning whether today’s art is adequate to “the challenges of our time”:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/30/ar....html?ref=arts

[Julie Steiner]

I didn't find either Seidel poem particularly moving. To me, both poems seem strangely cold and detached--as distant as Mars, both of them. Which is the same problem I've always had with Theater of the Absurd, too: most of what happens seems so removed from reality that none of it really matters.

I guess my own experience of anger and frustration and bewilderment is more visceral than Seidel's is. That's why I find poems like Rose Kelleher's, which keep things personal, more effective and cathartic. Cf. her "On the Suicide of a Moroccan Girl Forced to Marry Her Rapist" and "Enlightenment." (Probably her poem most relevant to Ferguson is "Maggot," from her book Native Species. Well worth buying.)

I particularly like Rose's (non-)references to Demeter and Persephone in "On the Suicide...," because injustices aren't grand, mythical events, played out on some remote plane of existence; they are happening in the real world, to real people like us, by real people like us. Trying to view such things from a dispassionate distance, as if they are abstractions that don't have much to do with either the poet or readers, but which about which we are obliged to spend a few moments in thought, intentionally diminishes their impact. This philosophical distance may be necessary for some people to be able to deal with such overwhelming subjects at all, but it still diminishes their impact, even while apparently honoring them with a more grandiose-sounding, momentous treatment.

If I'm reading Seidel all wrong, I'm sure someone here will tell me. I suspect it's a matter of personal taste, though.

[Stephen Hampton]

"Fuhgeddaboudit": Honestly, I can think of no better word to accurately describe my thoughts concerning "The Ballad of Ferguson, Missouri". After reading this work, seriously, and also reading all thoughts herein, seriously, I remain - Fuhgeddaboudit.

[Marcia Karp]

Here is a call for papers, poems, and other writing -- an opportunity to be a more widely-read part of the conversation about some of the horrors of our time.
Marcia

Special Issue "Hands Up. Don't Shoot: Critical and Creative Responses to Violence Toward Black Bodies in the 21st Century

College Language Association
editor@clascholars.org

The editorial board of the College Language Association Journal (CLAJ) invites the submission of essays, poetry, short prose, short drama, or book reviews for its special issue entitled, "Hands Up. Don't Shoot: Critical and Creative Responses to Violence Toward Black Bodies in the 21st Century." All submitted works must be previously unpublished.

CLAJ welcomes submissions of essays, poetry, short prose, or drama that engage the brutalization of black bodies in twenty-first century America with a particular focus on one or more of the following:

• the militarization of the police
• the criminalization of black bodies
• the intersections between gender, sexuality, and race

Categories

• Essays (18-25 pages)
• Poetry (3 poems; 30 line maximum)
• Short story (1 story; 2500 word maximum)
• Drama (1 play; 5000 word maximum)

CLAJ also welcomes book reviews of the following:

• Koritha Mitchell, Living With Lynching: African American Lynching Plays, Performance, and Citizenship, 1890-1930 (2011)
• Radley Balko, Rise of the Warrior Cop: the Militarization of America’s Police Forces (2013)
• Charles E. Cobb Jr, This Nonviolent Stuff’ll Get You Killed: How Guns Made the Civil Rights Movement Possible (2014)

Please send all special issue submissions to Dr. Sandra Shannon, CLA Editor, at editor@clascholars.org no later than January 5, 2015