Usually at the helipad 
I see them stumble-dance 
across the hot asphalt 
with crokersacks over their heads, 
moving toward the interrogation huts, 
thin-framed as box kites 
of sticks & black silk 
anticipating a hard wind 
that'll tug & snatch them 
out into space. I think 
some must be laughing 
under their dust-colored hoods, 
knowing rockets are aimed 
at Chu Lai-that the water's 
evaporating & soon the nail 
will make contact with metal. 
How can anyone anywhere love 
these half-broken figures 
bent under the sky's brightness? 
The weight they carry 
is the soil we tread night & day. 
Who can cry for them? 
I've heard the old ones 
are the hardest to break. 
An arm twist, a combat boot 
against the skull, a.45 
jabbed into the mouth, nothing 
works. When they start talking 
with ancestors faint as camphor 
smoke in pagodas, you know 
you'll have to kill them 
to get an answer. 
Sunlight throws 
scythes against the afternoon. 
Everything's a heat mirage; a river 
tugs at their slow feet. 
I stand alone & amazed, 
with a pill-happy door gunner 
signaling for me to board the Cobra. 
I remember how one day 
I almost bowed to such figures 
walking toward me, under 
a corporal's ironclad stare. 
I can't say why. 
From a half-mile away 
trees huddle together, 
& the prisoners look like 
marionettes hooked to strings of light. 

 
Habituellement à l'héliport je vois qu'ils trébucher-dansent à 
travers l'asphalte chaud avec des crokersacks au-dessus de leurs 
têtes, se déplaçant vers les huttes d'interrogation, 
mince-encadrées comme cerfs-volants de boîte des bâtons et de la 
soie noire prévoyant une traction subite dure de that'll de vent et 
les saisissent dehors dans l'espace. Je pense que certains doivent 
rire sous leurs capots poussière-colorés, connaissant des fusées 
être Chu visé Lai-que l'eau s'évaporant et bientôt l'ongle fera le 
contact avec le métal. Comment est-ce que n'importe qui peut 
n'importe où aimer ces figures moitié-cassées pliées sous l'éclat 
du ciel ? Le poids qu'elles portent est le sol nous marchons la nuit 
et le jour. Qui peut pleurer pour eux ? J'ai entendu qu'il est le plus 
difficile de casser le vieux. Une torsion de bras, une botte de combat 
contre le crâne, un 45 a enfonçé dans la bouche, rien travaille. 
Quand ils commencent à parler avec des ancêtres faibles comme fumée 
de camphre dans les pagodas, tu sais que tu devras les tuer pour 
obtenir une réponse. La lumière du soleil jette des faux contre 
l'après-midi. Tout un mirage de la chaleur; tractions subites 
d'un fleuve à leurs pieds lents. Je me tiens seul et stupéfiant, 
avec un canonnier pillule-heureux de porte signalant pour que 
j'embarque le cobra. Je me rappelle comment pendant un jour j'ai 
presque cintré à de telles figures marchant vers moi, sous le regard 
fixe blindé d'un caporal. Je ne peux pas dire pourquoi. D'un 
moitié-mille loin les arbres se blottissent ensemble, et les 
prisonniers ressemblent aux marionnettes accrochées aux cordes de la 
lumière. 

 
Normalerweise am Hubschrauber-Landeplatz sehe ich, daß sie über den 
heißen Asphalt mit crokersacks über ihren Köpfen stolpern-tanzen 
und in Richtung zu den Befragunghütten bewegen, dünn-gestaltet als 
Kastendrachen der Stöcke u. der schwarzen Seide einen harten Wind 
that'll Schlepper vorwegnehmend u. sie heraus in Raum schnappen. Ich 
denke, daß einige unter ihren Staub-farbigen Hauben lachen müssen, 
Raketen kennend angestrebtes Chu sein, Lai-daß des verdunstenden 
Wassers u. bald der Nagel Kontakt mit Metall bildet. Wie kann jemand 
diese Hälfte-defekten Abbildungen überall lieben, die unter die 
Helligkeit des Himmels verbogen werden? Das Gewicht, das sie tragen, 
ist der Boden wir Nacht u. Tag treten. Wer kann für sie schreien? Ich 
habe gehört, daß die alten das härteste zu brechen sind. Eine 
Armtorsion, eine Kampfaufladung gegen den Schädel, ein 45 stieß in 
die Öffnung, nichts arbeitet. Wenn sie anfangen, mit den Vorfahren zu 
sprechen, die als Kampferrauch in den Pagoden schwach sind, wissen 
Sie, daß Sie sie töten müssen, um eine Antwort zu erhalten. 
Tageslicht wirft Scythes gegen den Nachmittag. Alles ein 
HitzeTrugbild; Schlepper eines Flusses an ihren langsamen 
Füßen. Ich stehe allein u. überrascht, wenn ein Pille-glücklicher 
Türartillerist signalisiert, damit verschale ich, die Kobra. Ich 
erinnere, mich an wie ein Tag ich fast zu solchen Abbildungen beugte, 
die in Richtung zu mir gehen, unter dem gepanzerten Stare eines 
Obergefreiten. Ich kann nicht sagen warum. Von einer Hälfte-Meile 
entfernt huddle Bäume zusammen, u. sehen die Gefangenen wie die 
Marionetten aus, die zu den Zeichenketten des Lichtes angespannt 
werden. 

 
Geralmente no helipad eu v que tropeç-dançam através do asfalto 
quente com crokersacks sobre suas cabeças, se movendo para os huts da 
interrogação, fino-moldados como kites de caixa das varas & da seda 
preta antecipando um reboque duro do that'll do vento & os arrebatam 
para fora no espaço. Eu penso que alguns devem rir sob suas capas 
poeira-coloridas, sabendo foguetes ser Chu visado Lai-que a água que 
evapora & logo o prego fará o contato com metal. Como pode qualquer 
um em qualquer lugar amar estas figuras metade-quebradas dobradas sob 
o brilho do céu? O peso que carregam é o solo nós pisamos a noite & 
o dia. Quem pode gritar para eles? Eu ouvi-me que velhos são o mais 
duros de quebrar. Uma torção do braço, um carregador do combate de 
encontro ao skull, um 45 jabbed na boca, nada trabalha. Quando 
começam falar com os antepassados fracos como o fumo da cânfora nos 
pagodas, você sabe que você terá que os matar para começar uma 
resposta. A luz solar joga scythes de encontro à tarde. Tudo um 
mirage do calor; reboquees de um rio em seus pés lentos. Eu estou 
sozinho & espantado, com um gunner pill-feliz da porta que sinaliza 
para que eu board o cobra. Eu recordo como um dia eu me curvei quase a 
tais figuras que andam para mim, sob o olhar fixo ironclad de um cabo. 
Eu não posso dizer por que. De uma metade-milha afastado as árvores 
huddle junto, & os prisioneiros olham como os marionettes enganchados 
às cordas da luz. 

 
Generalmente en el helipad veo que tropezar-bailan a través del 
asfalto caliente con los crokersacks sobre sus cabezas, moviéndose 
hacia las chozas de la interrogación, fino-enmarcadas como cometas de 
caja de palillos y de la seda negra anticipando un tirón duro del 
that'll del viento y que los arrebatan hacia fuera en espacio. Pienso 
que algo debe reír debajo de sus capillas polvo-coloreadas, sabiendo 
los cohetes ser Chu dirigido Lai-que el agua que se evapora y pronto 
el clavo hará el contacto con el metal. ¿Cómo puede cualquier 
persona dondequiera amar estas figuras mitad-quebradas dobladas bajo 
brillo del cielo? El peso que llevan es el suelo pisamos noche y día. 
¿Quién puede gritar para ellos? He oído que los viejos son los más 
duros de romperse. Una torcedura del brazo, un cargador del combate 
contra el cráneo, un 45 jabbed en la boca, nada trabaja. Cuando 
comienzan a hablar con los antepasados débiles como humo del alcanfor 
en pagodas, usted sabe que usted tendrá que matarles para 
conseguir una respuesta. La luz del sol lanza las guadañas contra la 
tarde. Todo un espejismo del calor; tirones de un río en sus pies 
lentos. Estoy parado solo y sorprendido, con un artillero 
pi'ldora-feliz de la puerta señalando para que suba a la cobra. 
Recuerdo cómo un día casi arqueé a tales figuras que caminaban 
hacia mí, bajo mirada fija acorazada de un cabo. No puedo decir por 
qué. De una mitad-milla lejos los árboles amontonan juntos, y los 
presos se parecen los marionettes enganchados a las secuencias de la 
luz. 

(These are public search results on the terms: 'Yusef Komunyakaa: Prisoners poem')

• Art Beat With Lauren Landau, May 13 | WAMU 88.5 - American <b>...</b> by WAMU 88.5 - American University Radio (2013/05/13 04:02)

  Constellation Theatre Company presents Gilgamesh by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Yusef Komunyakaa and Chad Garcia. King Gilgamesh is part man and part god, but when the all-seeing immortals decide to take him down ...
• Common Good Books: 20 Questions by Common Good Books (2013/05/04 16:18)

  Instead of prison sentences, poems. Instead of a line of ... "The poetry venue I'm looking forward to this month is a reading at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington D.C., with Yusef Komunyakaa and Paul Muldoon.
• May Theater in Washington DC: Can&#39;t-Miss Plays, Musicals, and <b>...</b> by Alison Kitchens (2013/05/01 15:20)

  Opening This Month At Constellation Theatre, Alison Arkell Stockman directs Gilgamesh, Chad Gracia's version of the epic with text by Pulitzer-winning poet Yusef Komunyakaa and a score by Helen Hayes Award winner Tom ...
• MEET CAITS MEISSNER | Caits Meissner by Caits (2013/04/25 22:03)

  ... bodega and win over high level funders in a board room. Communing with people across the spectrum is a passion of mine, whether an inmate in prison, an ex-gang member, a young women suffering heart break, an Upper East Side widow or a small town librarian- ... Caits Meissner is a poet, storyteller and arts educator. Winner of the OneWorld Poetry Contest, Caits attended the 2008 Pan-African Literary Forum in Ghana, studying under Pulitzer Prize Winner Yusef Komunyakaa.
• Essays on <b>Yusef Komunyakaa Poems</b> And Their Themes by Kate (2013/04/16 14:58)

  Yusef Komunyakaa Poems and Their Themes The common theme in Yusef Komunyakaa?s songs is the Vietnam War. He focuses to a greater extent on the experience of it, rather than the reasons for the war itself. In few of ...
• New Nonfiction · added April 2013 « Curtis Memorial Library by mgorzka (2013/04/15 00:00)

  Curtis Memorial Library - A World of Possibility. My Account | Home Catalog Website. please donate. Curtis Home · Catalog · Services · Readers Corner · Research · Kids · Teens. New Nonfiction · added April 2013 ...
• Philadelphia <b>Poetry</b> Month | elcidharth by elcidharth (2013/04/14 05:22)

  Sunday, April 21, 2:00 PM POETRY READING AT THE NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY Poets John Koethe, Yusef Komunyakaa, and Paul Muldoon read to mark the close of the exhibition “Poetic Likeness: Modern American ...
• Written Thesis: Anaylsis <b>Yusef Komunyakaa&#39;s poem</b>, "Tu Do Street" by Peter Jhonson (2013/04/10 23:36)

  The award winning poet, Yusef Komunyakaa not only took a magic spell of duty in Vietnam, he wrote many poems about his be intimate while in Vietnam. I will analyze Komunyakaas poem, Tu Do Street, from a historical ...
• Do My Essay for Me : Writing post-wartime <b>poetry</b> in America: Allen <b>...</b> by Mia Nelson (2013/04/10 23:28)

  Writing post-wartime poetry in America: Allen Ginsberg's "America" and Yusef Komunyakaa's "A Break from the Bush". Experiencing the state of war effects the society deeply. Participating in the war leaves permanent deep ...
• Writing essay paper: <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> Facing It by Sam Black (2013/03/26 01:36)

  Yusef Komunyakaa Facing It. Yusef Komunyakaas Facing It is metrical composition about the roots visit to the Vietnam Veterans archives and his personal experiences in the Vietnam War. The most swell known part of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial is the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall, which is the focal institutionalise of Facing It. The Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall is located ... The poem is a walkthrough of the writers trip to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall.
• Blue Positive: Saturnalia Books <b>Poetry</b> Prize Submissions OPEN by Martha Silano (2013/03/19 08:44)

  http://saturnaliabooks.com/?q=node/12 $2000 and publication by Saturnalia Books 2013 Judge = Yusef Komunyakaa Electronic Submissions: 1. Manuscript must be an original work of poetry written in English. 2. Manuscript ...
• Notes on the paucity of contemporary war <b>poetry</b> :: <b>Poets</b> and War by Leonore Wilson (2013/03/09 10:08)

  “Writing Poetry Was The Balm That Kept Guantanamo Prisoners From Going Mad,” was a headline from the San Francisco Chronicle of July 17, 2005. Story has it that “a Pakastani, Abdul Rahim Muslim Dost, ... In past wars we had the likes of Walt Whitman, Karl Shapiro, Randall Jarrell, James Tate, James Dickey, Michael Casey, Bruce Weigl and Yusef Komunyakaa who served in the military and informed the masses. Where are their likes today? C.K. Williams in his ...
• Idra Novey | Elective Affinities by csr (2013/03/03 21:06)

  Idra Novey is the author of Exit, Civilian, selected by Patricia Smith for the 2011 National Poetry Series, and The Next Country, a finalist for the 2008 Foreword Book of the Year Award in poetry. Her work ... George Oppen, Vasko Popa, Lorine Niedecker, Yusef Komunyakaa, Yona Wallach, Muriel Rukeyser, Mahmoud Darwish, Clarice Lispector, Shimon Adaf, Jane Hirshfield, Matthea Harvey, Julio Cortazar, Sarah Shun-lien Bynam, Thomas Bernhard, and Lydia Davis.
• Two <b>Poems</b> | The Feminist Wire by Guest Contributor (2013/02/26 22:16)

  always a garden and never a prison. all you know for sure ... Winner of the OneWorld Poetry Contest, Caits Meissner attended the 2008 Pan-African Literary Forum in Ghana, studying under Yusef Komunyakaa. She has been ...
• Does Mass Incarceration Define America? - Cameron Conaway by Cameron (2013/01/07 10:05)

  Once again we harbor within our midst black outcasts, pariahs. As the poet Yusef Komunyakaa said: “The cell block has replaced the auction block.” I've visited prisons and taught in juvenile detention centers and even have a ...
• The Year in Review: Some <b>Poems</b> of Devotion by Luke Hankins <b>...</b> by The Best American Poetry (2012/12/11 09:31)

  In my first post here at the Best American Poetry blog, I outlined my perspective on the devotional mode in poetry; in my second post, I offered some samples of work from my forthcoming anthology, Poems of Devotion (Wipf &... ... Shivering, praying for this prison of skin. To release this voice to air, that these needle nerves. Unshackle ... He received his M.F.A. from Indiana University, where he held The Yusef Komunyakaa Fellowship in Poetry. His poems, essays, and ...
• Smithsonian profiles Bryan Stevenson: &#39;Mass Incarceration Defines Us&#39; by Fred Clark (2012/12/08 22:39)

  As the poet Yusef Komunyakaa said: “The cell block has replaced the auction block.” ... The government should immediately pardon all non-violent drug offenders, and offer treatment instead of prison for drug addicts.
• Chris Hedges Walks With a Champion of the Imprisoned - Truthdig by editor@truthdig.com (2012/11/21 12:34)

  As the poet Yusef Komunyakaa said: “The cell block has replaced the auction block.” In opening a discussion of American justice and America's racial history, ... Texas Executes Mentally Disabled Death Row Prisoner ...
• The <b>Poetry</b> of Protest | The Progressive by Matthew Rothschild (2012/11/12 06:55)

  And the Vietnam War can't really be studied without reading Yusef Komunyakaa, as my son is doing now down in Madison, or studying Bob Dylan. And the feminist movement and the ... In the prison of his days. Teach the free man how to praise. And his elegy for Freud, too. Check out the humble recognition of the work we all do. “Of whom shall we speak? For every day they die. among us, those who were doing us some good,. who knew it was never enough but ...
• “An Accidental Emissary” by John E. Buri Rattle: <b>Poetry</b> for the 21st <b>...</b> by Timothy Green (2012/10/15 13:23)

  Yusef Komunyakaa says he writes one hundred lines to get 16 very strong lines. God help those workshop ... My big break came when a popular magazine put out a call for poets writing from prison. I hardly qualified as a poet, ...
• The Penguin Anthology of 20th Century American <b>Poetry</b>, Edited by <b>...</b> by A Gathering Of The Tribes (2012/09/03 10:36)

  are minding the prisoner, which is yourself, because you are afraid to go. out, she said. And the struggle of being trapped in the stone of a traumatic past still warring inside of Yusef Komunyakaa's “Facing It:”. “I'm stone.
• HERE I THROW DOWN MY HEART | <b>Poems</b> by Colleen <b>...</b> - Al Young by Al (2012/08/24 15:57)

  The revelations unfold one after the other, enlarging this needful journey, each poem caught in its profound imagery and poignant singing, until we become suspended in a music that enlightens.” —Yusef Komunyakaa ...
• Currently Reading: <b>Prisons</b> of a Kind – pesbo - Pearl Pirie by Pearl (2012/08/24 12:10)

  There's substance paired with word dexterity that sent me straight for a re-read of the whole. p 15 of our prison system in Canada. ... The Chameleon Couch: Poems by Yusef Komunyakaa (Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2011).
• For the Lover in You - The Best American <b>Poetry</b> by Ailish Hopper (2012/08/11 16:07)

  A fine of $100 and 6 months in prison would be imposed for anyone found teaching a slave to read or write, and death is the penalty for circulating any incendiary literature. The ones who longed to read and write but were forbidden, who lost hands and feet, were ... Adrienne Rich, Bruce Smith, Yusef Komunyakaa, Carl Phillips, simply to be in your finalist company is to brightly burn. National Book Foundation and National Book Award judges, there were special high ...
• Kevin Young and Arisa White – Live! From City Lights – Readings <b>...</b> by jeff (2012/07/31 10:00)

  This poet-critic has created an unforgettable, robust trove of insights and lyrical gestures for us to query and embrace.” —Yusef Komunyakaa. “This is a narrative of surprises—a book of secrets, too, though many of those ...
• The City and the Writer: In Santiago de Chile with Idra Novey <b>...</b> by Nathalie Handal (2012/07/05 12:32)

  Beyond being the best indie bookstore in Chile, the owner, a poet named Sergio Parra, is always there and can you tell you, at length, about every book ever published in the country. .... built in 1897 by the French company Schneider & Cie. of which Gustave Eiffel was the head designer), being on a train with Yusef Komunyakaa, and even the Chilean president, reciting Neruda's poems in the streets of Santiago, or on the beach in Isla Negra with thousands of people, ...
• Babstock and Harsent Win the Griffin Prize! | Open Book: Toronto by Grace (2012/06/08 06:30)

  ... published by Gaspereau Press; Yusef Komunyakaa for The Chameleon Couch, published by Farrar Straus and Giroux; Sean O'Brien for November, published by Picador; Joanna Trzeciak for translation of Sobbing Superpower: Selected Poems of Tadeusz Rózewicz by ... Marina Nemat gained international attention in 2007 with the publication of her striking memoir, Prison of Tehran (Penguin Canada), now a contender for the 2012 edition of CBC Canada Reads.
• The Chameleon Couch <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> - Boston Area Small <b>...</b> by Doug Holder (2012/05/18 03:27)

  Yusef Komunyakaa. Farrar, Straus &Giroux Books. ISBN: 978-0-374-53314-4. 2011 $14.00. "a trembling runs through what pulls us. to the blood knot." Some of the poems, in this collection, have a deep throaty. longing. In Komunyakaa's ... "My muse is holding me prisoner. She refuses to give back my shadow,. anything that clings to a stone or tree. to keep me here. I recite dead poets. to her, & their words heal the cold air. I feed her fat, sweet, juicy grapes,. & melons ...
• <b>Poets</b> Remembering Parents, Part II | Reflections on Kosovo by rraymond12 (2012/05/12 08:39)

  I then asked if they could recall where Yusef Komunyakaa got his name and how that naming might relate to the instinct to preserve the parent. No one remembered, so we scanned the introduction for this sentence: ...
• Rusty Morrison interviews Melissa Kwasny - OmniVerse by admin (2012/05/08 17:49)

  Melissa Kwasny: The infamous torture photos from Abu Ghraib that were first released to the public in 2003 in those twenty horrific images of prisoners hog-tied, naked, leashed like dogs with bags over their heads, and posed in forced sexual positions with grinning U.S. soldiers in ... The anthology includes powerful poems by well-known poets such as C.K. Williams, Carolyn Forche, Yusef Komunyakaa, Li Young Li, and Christopher Howell, and less well-known poets.
• Facing It- <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> | Drew&#39;s <b>Poetry</b> Scrapbook by Drew's Blog (2012/05/06 11:38)

  Echo- Christina Rossetti / The Sound of the Sea- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow / We Real Cool- Gwendolyn Brooks / When You Are Old- William Butler Yeats / Facing It- Yusef Komunyakaa / Mid-Term Break- Seamus Heaney ...
• WORDY by Nature | PEN World Voices Festival of International <b>...</b> by Lauren Brandeberry (2012/05/02 08:56)

  Some highlights of participants include, but are certainly not limited to, Margaret Atwood, Steve Bell, Yusef Komunyakaa, Tony Kushner, Anne Waldman, Colson Whitehead, and the most recent Poet Laureate, Philip Levine.
• Jessica of the Awesomeness of Houghton: <b>Poem</b> Fragments by Jessica of the Awesomeness of Houghton (2012/04/11 18:53)

  Poem Fragments. Yusef Komunyakaa From "Prisoners" I remember how one day. I almost bowed to such figures walking toward me, under a corporal's ironclad stare. I can't say why. From a half-mile away trees huddle ...
• April Events at the Schomburg Center Announced | Harlem Trends by Tony E (2012/04/11 07:17)

  This feature-length documentary confronts the impact of social disinvestment in prisoners' families and communities and the inadvertent outcomes. FREE! Sunday ... Celebrate National Poetry Month with Yusef Komunyakaa ...
• A <b>Poem</b> A Day | The New York Public Library by Sylviane A. Diouf, Curator of Digital Collections, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture (2012/04/02 05:01)

  Smith reads some of her poems. On April 17, come celebrate National Poetry Month at the Schomburg Center with Yusef Komunyakaa, Distinguished Senior Poet at New York University. .... The prison is a structure. It has walls and it has smells and there are sounds you hear inside the prison. There are people who work and who live there. There are rules and there are gates and there are also friendships, and barbershops, and rabbis. I have been going to Rikers ...
• Fast Break to Line Break | Books and Culture by unknown (2012/03/30 19:34)

  Some of the writers here do reflect on past basketball-themed poems of their own (Margaret Gibson, Quincy Troupe, William Heyen, Marian Haddad) or comment on relevant poetry by others (Yusef Komunyakaa, Diane Ackerman), but these ...
• i could go on and on: The Romance of Being a Muse by Karen (2012/03/22 21:30)

  VCU was hosting poet Yusef Komunyakaa tonight so I called up a fellow poetry lover to take it in with me. Arriving at the Singleton Center to be ... Inside we found a mostly full auditorium and scored good seats among the crowd of poetry lovers and students. VCU's head librarian noted that ... In "How Is It?" he wrote "My muse is holding me prisoner," acknowledging that "I think she knows with her kisses in my mouth, I could walk on water." That strikes me as very ...
• Kudos for Professor Thaxton « www.whatgoddoes.com by admin (2012/03/15 23:33)

  Her name is Professor Terry Ann Thaxton, author of an excellent poem collection called Getaway Girl. During ... For part of my midterm exam, I was assigned Yusef Komunyakaa's poem, “Believing in Iron. ...... And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison, And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom [is] as the sand of the sea.
• Celebrating Black History Month - Sampsonia Way Magazine by Mariana (2012/02/10 08:49)

  Tags: African American Literature, Amiri Baraka, authors, black history month, claudia rankine, colleen mcelroy, cornelius eady, interviews, sapphire, slide show, Terrance Hayes, toi derricotte, writers, yusef kumunyakaa ...
• Ms.Crespo <b>Poetry</b> Corner: We Never Know by Teaching like a boss! (2012/02/09 21:37)

  by: Yusef Komunyakaa "He danced with tall grass for a moment, like he was swaying with a woman." At first I didn't realize this poem was about war. At least that's what I think it's about. The end really confused me and made ...
• No Uncertain Terms | Books and Culture by unknown (2012/01/13 11:50)

  Equally ruminative but substituting magical jazz for gritty narrative detail are the poems of Yusef Komunyakaa. Under the influence of such masters as Neruda and Vallejo, perhaps, Komunyakaa breathes the poems of The Chameleon Couch ...
• From the Editor&#39;s Bookshelf: A Room 220 Holiday Gift Guide | Press <b>...</b> by nathan (2011/12/09 17:47)

  This book is a collection of his interviews, from The Believer and other places, and includes a conversation with, among others, Philip Zimbardo, who conducted the Stanford Prison Experiment. ... By far the best contemporary poet to come from Louisiana, Yusef Komunyakaa returns to his boyhood town after admirably grappling in verse with the horrors of Vietnam, having risen above the rubble of inadequate poetic responses to that war, showing himself as someone ...
• Anodyne by <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> | the second book i read today by olganieta (2011/11/30 19:33)

  Anodyne by Yusef Komunyakaa. Just came across this poem. I like it, although I am not entirely sure why yet. I think I like it because it is about love and self-acceptance, and yet it doesn't sugar-coat anything. Also, Anodyne, according to the OED , is "having the power of assuaging pain." Take a look: Anodyne by Yusef Komunyakaa I love how it swells into a temple where it is held prisoner, where the god of blame resides. I love slopes & peaks, the secret paths that ...
• tamiliti - by unknown (2011/11/19 05:41)

  Publisher of numerous laureates and award-winning poets, including Seamus Heaney, Rita Dove, Jorie Graham, Yusef Komunyakaa, Lisel Mueller, Wislawa Szymborska, Charles Simic, W.S. Merwin, and Eavan Boland, Seneca Review also consistently publishes ... Past special features have included Irish women's poetry and Irish prison poetry; Israeli women's poetry; Polish, Catalan, and Albanian poetry; and an issue of essays devoted to Hayden Carruth.
• NewPages Blog: Endings :: Northwest Review by Denise (2011/11/17 05:01)

  The final edition is a celebration of the work of "poet, colleague, mentor, and friend" Charles Wright and includes poetry by Charles Wright, poetry in tribute to Charles Wright (Yusef Komunyakaa, James Tate, Charles Simic), ...
• The OF Blog: 2011 National Book Award <b>poetry</b> nominee: Adrienne <b>...</b> by Larry (2011/11/13 23:02)

  With the possible exception of Yusef Komunyakaa, Adrienne Rich's collection, Tonight No Poetry Will Serve, is the most varied of the five finalists in turns of theme and poetic presentation. She covers topics such as authority, ...
• The OF Blog: 2011 National Book Award <b>poetry</b> nominee: <b>Yusef</b> <b>...</b> by Larry Nolen (2011/11/12 22:23)

  Compared to the more overt thematic union of Bruce Smith's Devotions and Carl Phillips' Double Shadow, it is not as easy to discern a unifying theme to Yusef Komunyakaa's thirteenth poem collection, The Chameleon Couch ...
• Facing It by <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> | KathleenMcgookey.com by admin (2011/11/11 21:40)

  Facing It by Yusef Komunyakaa. Posted on November 12, 2011 by admin. My black face fades,. hiding inside the ... I go down the 58,022 names58,022 names The number of names of dead soldiers etched on the wall at the time of Komunyakaa's composing of this poem. As of 2009, there are now 58,261 names listed on the Memorial, of which, approximately 1,200 are listed as missing in action (MIAs) or prisoners of war (POWs).,. half-expecting to find. my own in letters like smoke.
• Three Tents, Three Stories, One Running Thread | Storymoja by Storymoja (2011/09/21 06:26)

  In the evening, I listen to Sitawa Namwalie and Yusef Komunyakaa after a glowing introduction delivered by Keguro Macharia. And it doesn't disappoint. Sitawa reads us her ... Yusef, referred to as a “Jazz/blues poet' by Keguro, speaks of a type of poetry known as 'music of meditation' as one that challenges one's emotions. This, he adds, are the ones with longer lines. ... They must have been like a window in prison for him. Sitawa's 'celebration and confrontation' ...
• Nothing to Say & Saying It: A Broken Thing: <b>Poets</b> on the Line Pt II by John Gallaher (2011/09/18 06:06)

  Shara McCallum turns to poems by Gwendolyn Brooks and Yusef Komunyakaa to show “how the line in free verse, chaffing against or in concert with the sentence, creates a rhythm that corresponds to the inflections of an actual, human voice.” Touching on poets as different as Longfellow .... It's good to keep in mind such arguments as Gudding's, but such arguments tend to have the take-no-prisoners tone of manifestos. They have their uses, yes. They stir things up.
• The Rumpus <b>Poetry</b> Book Club Chat With Aracelis Girmay - The <b>...</b> by The Rumpus Book Club (2011/09/13 12:50)

  Every month The Rumpus Poetry Book Club hosts a discussion online with the club members and the author, and we post an edited version online as an interview. You can read the unedited ... Hearts carved into trees. A name. A building that was once a church & then a prison has a new life as a government building… but what is left of each body or each phase of life? .... of time, events, sound, image, language. Yusef Komunyakaa, Lucille Clifton, Gwendolyn Brooks.
• <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> Receives Wallace Stevens <b>Poetry</b> Award <b>...</b> by Silvia (2011/09/13 11:03)

  Yusef Komunyakaa has been selected as the recipient of the 2011 Wallace Stevens Award from the Academy of American Poets. In this video created by Sampsonia Way magazine and published also by Rattapallax, ...
• <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> Reflects on Jazz <b>Poetry</b> Concert 2010 <b>...</b> by Silvia (2011/09/08 09:02)

  The poet Yusef Komunyakaa read at the 2010 Jazz Poetry Concert and wrote about the experience for Sampsonia Way. ... This is where Xiang lived for nearly three years after spending five years in prison in China.
• Jazz <b>Poetry</b> Concert 2011 Broadcast Live | Sampsonia Way Magazine by Michael (2011/09/06 08:42)

  No matter where you are, sit back with a glass of wine and watch on your laptop a concert where, as Pulitzer-Prize winning poet Yusef Komunyakaa said, “music and words can reach an unbelievable register of bittersweet ...
• Reginald Dwayne Betts at NYU | <b>Poets</b> and Writers by RW Blogger (2011/08/22 14:56)

  And, Cornelius Eady and Yusef Komunyakaa sat in the audience alongside emerging poet Rickey Laurentis and Catherine Barnett, a professor at NYU. The room was claustrophobic...in a good way. People squeezed in tight ...
• Fearless Laughter: <b>Yusef Komunyakaa&#39;s</b> Advice to Young <b>Poets</b> <b>...</b> by Silvia (2011/06/29 06:45)

  In this video, poet Yusef Komunyakaa describes his revision process, talks about the importance of silence in poetry, and dispenses advice for young poets. The video was created by Sampsonia Way magazine and published ...
• Read more - Silliman&#39;s Blog by Ron (2011/06/21 18:17)

  a collaborative postcard. Poet's Q&A: Mark Doty & Rae Armantrout. Bill Nelson on Rae Armantrout's Money Shot. William Logan on Richard Wilbur, Yusef Komunyakaa, Rae Armantrout, Carl Phillips, Les Murray & Geoffrey Hill ...
• The Crash Scene Of Species Extinction - The Rumpus.net by Barbara Berman (2011/06/17 07:00)

  His peers, including Michael Palmer, Nathanael Mackey, Lyn Hejinian and Yusef Komunyakaa, admire him with perceptive enthusiasm. He's also in two recent volumes of The Best American Poetry. His ninth book, To See the ...
• PEN America: PEN World Voices next week! by David Haglund (2011/04/22 11:33)

  With a stellar line-up of international poets, including John Burnside (Scotland), Ernesto Cardenal (Nicaragua), David-Dephy Gogibedashvili (Georgia), Hasina Gul (Pakistan), Yusef Komunyakaa (US), Juan Carlos Mestre ...
• A Game for “Bright” Players | merlissagamino by merli123 (2011/04/19 04:11)

  The meaning that is portrayed from the relationship between form and content in Yusef Komunyakaa's poem, Slam, Dunk, & Hook, is shown through the diction of different words along with phrases. Also, the tone of the poem is brought out through the usage of end-stopped ... By using denotation, the word “roundhouse” is known as a circular prison that is like the shape of a basketball court. In classical mythology, “labyrinth bodies” is known as a “vast maze” and the ...
• 27. Fourth Season of <b>Poetry</b> Everywhere Debuts « Lyrikzeitung <b>...</b> by lyrikzeitung (2011/04/05 17:45)

  There are poems by Pulitzer Prize winner Yusef Komunyakaa, National Book Award winner Adrienne Rich, former US poet laureate Stanley Kunitz, the great 13th-century Persian poet Rumi, Nobel Prize winner W.B. Yeats, and many ... Worldfocus, Globe Trekker, Simply Ming, America's Test Kitchen from Cook's Illustrated, Lidia's Italy, P. Allen Smith's Garden Home, Murdoch Mysteries, Doc Martin, Rosemary and Thyme, Johnny Cash at Folsom Prison, Liza's at the ...
• ANWAR&#39;S REFLECTIONS: <b>YUSEF KOMUNYAKAA</b>: Trentonian By <b>...</b> by Anwar G. Salandy (2011/03/21 15:02)

  TRENTON-Today, Anwar's Reflections was fortunate enough to sit down with Pulitzer Prize winning poet Yusef Komunyakaa. Many people know that Professor Komunyakaa has written numerous books and won many ...
• Powell42: Facing it by <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> by Powell42 (2011/03/17 20:33)

  Facing it by Yusef Komunyakaa. I have read this poem over and over and at first i thought the poem started out with giving the me (the reader) a sense of fear when he said: "I said I wouldn't,. dammit: No tears. I'm stone.
• I Knocked On The Walls, In A Circle - The Rumpus.net by Paul Corman-Roberts (2011/03/16 07:00)

  Poet Yusef Komunyakaa wants you to know that all the old archetypes are alive and kicking around us, from the mythological Greeks (Orpheus) to Christian martyrs (Beatrice) even if they have mutated into unrecognizable beings that are ... survivors; the mystic and the academic, the muse and her vessel. From “How It Is”: My muse is holding me prisoner. She refuses to give back my shadow, anything that clings to a stone or tree to keep me here. I recite dead poets ...
• February 26, 2011 | <b>Poetry</b> News in Review by David (2011/02/26 18:57)

  Spain's Supreme Court has said it will not revise the death sentence which was handed down by a Francoist tribunal to the Orihuela poet, Miguel Hernández, who died in prison in 1942 after his sentence was commuted to 30 years behind bars. .... Not Gwendolyn Brooks, not Robert Hayden, not Amiri Baraka, not Jay Wright, not Michael Harper, not Yusef Komunyakaa, not Rita Dove — no “person of color” won the National Book Award for Poetry between 1950 and ...
• <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> on Racism as a Mental Illness | Sampsonia Way <b>...</b> by Elizabeth (2011/01/24 09:44)

  “All of our heroes have blood on their hands,” the poet Yusef Komunyakaa muses in this interview about the history of racism in the United States. Over his more than 20-year career as a poet, Komunyakaa has investigated ...
• January 2, 2011 | <b>Poetry</b> News in Review by David (2011/01/02 17:53)

  Donald Revell read “Can't Stand It,” which begins: / I hear the elephant music / Of the playground's rusted swings, and up, / Up higher, then down again, / Happy children take the sound. / No snakes can read. / Walking across ...
• Lit. & Film of Vietnam War: Blog 6 BJR by Brian Read (2010/10/28 10:49)

  Dien Cai Dau, is a collection of poems written by Vietnam veteran and journalist, Yusef Komunyakaa. These poems ... They VC think that they can torture the prisoner until he breaks, and tells them what they want to know.
• Hinemoana Baker: The Page and the Stage | Sampsonia Way <b>...</b> by Elizabeth (2010/10/11 09:51)

  She recently performed her music and poetry at the 2010 City of Asylum/Pittsburgh Jazz Poetry Concert alongside Oliver Lake's Big Band and writers Yusef Komunyakaa (USA), Khet Mar (Burma), Horacio Castellanos Moya ...
• Songs of Rage and Tenderness: The <b>Poetry</b> of <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> <b>...</b> by Brian (2010/08/31 05:40)

  Songs of Rage and Tenderness: The Poetry of Yusef Komunyakaa ... The metaphor is apt; Komunyakaa's poetry is suffused with the rhythms of jazz, which the poet has often cited as a source of inspiration and influence.
• US | First Person Plural: An Interview with R. Dwayne Betts | Of Note <b>...</b> by Grace Ali (2010/08/23 18:53)

  It's not only about young black writers finding support for what they do as black poets, but also a place where Yusef Komunyakaa, Toi Derricote, Cornelius Eady, Sonia Sanchez, Elizabeth Alexander, Afaa Weaver, and many of their ... I learned that in prison. How imagery works and metaphor works. I learned that in prison. I guess though, the most important writing skill I learned in prison was how to dig deeper into an idea, into one thought, and let that drive me for two, ...
• Ships in the Mist: Scenes from a Burmese Childhood | Sampsonia <b>...</b> by Elizabeth (2010/08/04 08:04)

  Khet Mar will also be reading her work on September 11, 7:30 at the 2010 Jazz Poetry Concert along with American poet Yusef Komunyakaa, former COA/P writer in residence Horacio Castellanos Moya, New Zealand native ...
• War, Literature, & <b>Poetry</b> — Jeremy Hawkins Visits Class: Day #1 <b>...</b> by ryan_browne (2010/06/15 17:57)

  After the count cleared we got right into our first day of discussion of the poetry collection, Dien Cai Dau, by Yuesf Komunyakaa. This is the first of two complete collections of poetry we will work through this summer (the other ...
• LIT333: Vietnam War: Blog 7 TJM by Tim M (2010/03/29 18:32)

  Dien Cai Dau is a book of poetry written by Vietnam Veteran Yusef Komunyakaa. Yusef ... He opens the poem with the vision of the prisoners crossing the helipad towards the interrogation rooms with bags over their heads.
• LIT333: Vietnam War: Blog#7: Dien Cai Dau RGV by Rvermette (2010/03/29 18:32)

  Through his book of poetry titled Dien Cai Du, Yusef Komunyakaa portrays the experience of an African-American soldier during the Vietnam War. In his poem, "Hanoi Hannah," Komunyakaa discusses several themes ... In this piece, an African- American prisoner of war is kept in a room on a one-legged stool in a state of delerium and hallucination under the watch of an enemy Vietnamese soldier. The Vietnamese soldier tries to play off of the racial tension between ...
• NABNYC: Martin Luther King, Jr.&#39;s Opposition To The War In Vietnam by NABNYC (2010/01/18 12:08)

  There are more African-American men behind bars than in college. 'The cell block has replaced the auction block,' the poet Yusef Komunyakaa writes." "The fact that prison and urban ghettos are populated primarily with ...
• "<b>Prisoners</b>" by <b>Poet Yusef Komunyakaa</b> - Call To Mission <b>...</b> by Call to Mission Evangelistic Ministry (2009/11/16 09:41)

  Prisoners Usually at the helipad. I see them stumble-dance across the hot asphalt with crokersacks over their heads, moving toward the interrogation huts, thin-framed as box kites of sticks & black silk anticipating a hard wind ...
• Facing It by <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> : <b>Poem</b> Guide : Learning Lab : The <b>...</b> by unknown (2009/10/07 17:22)

  And on one in particular: the poet Yusef Komunyakaa. From 1969 to 1970, Komunyakaa served in Vietnam as a correspondent and managing editor for the military newspaper Southern Cross, work that earned him a Bronze Star. Though he ...
• <b>Poem</b> response 2 | Pj&#39;s Blog by s1ckv1ck (2009/10/05 10:38)

  The poem Prisoners by Yusef Komunyakaa tells the story of what is is like during war. He talks about the prisoners inthis poem and what kind of treatment they get. the line I picked to write about was “How can anyone love ...
• <b>Poem</b> Response 2 | Mike Palangio&#39;s Blog by mikepalang (2009/10/05 08:52)

  The poem “Prisoners” displays the truth behind what it is like to be a prisoner of war. Yusef Komunyakaa, the author, uses the stories of how the prisoners were tortured to describe how committed and determined his people ...
• <b>Poem</b> Response 2 | Jamieson&#39;s Blog by jamiesonb91 (2009/10/04 17:57)

  The poem Prisoners by Yusef Komunyakaa describes the harsh reality of what it is like to be a prisoner of war, and the tactics used to dehumanize, and break down the prisoners. The line “I've heard the old ones are the ...
• <b>Prisoners</b>: <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> | danibell&#39;s blog by dmanzoo (2009/10/04 09:41)

  Prisoners: Yusef Komunyakaa. Posted in Uncategorized at 4:41 pm by dmanzoo. Everybody knows that to get an answer out of somebody it is difficult. There is a line in the poem prisoners “you know you'll have to kill them to ...
• <b>Prisoners</b> | ni hao kai-lan by gi matrumalo (2009/09/28 10:08)

  In the poem “Prisoners” by Yusef Komunyakaa there is a line that says “how can anyone, anywhere love these half broken figures?” There are many people that are terrible in this world. However, like everyone else, they need ...
• <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> – <b>Prisoners</b> | Zatch08&#39;s Weblog by zatch08 (2009/06/17 19:03)

  Yusef Komunyakaa – Prisoners. June 18, 2009. Prisoners. Usually at the helipad. I see them stumble-dance across the hot asphalt with crokersacks over their heads, moving toward the interrogation huts, thin-framed as box kites ... the prisoners look like marionettes hooked to strings of light. This was a poem very different from poems I have read. This poem seemed to be a bit more straight-forward. It confuses me as to whether or not Komunyakaa had sympathy or not for the Prisoners ...
• Reading Meme – Just for fun | Regular Rumination by Lu (2009/06/06 09:20)

  Ella Enchanted, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, A Wrinkle in Time, Many Waters. Those four are the ones I read more than any other when I was younger, and the ... How about my favorite poets? Yusef Komunyakaa, Derek Walcott, Allen Ginsberg, ee cummings, Pablo Neruda. What is your favorite epic poem? Pablo Neruda – “Canto general” What is your favorite non-fiction? In Cold Blood by Truman Capote (Easily one of the most terrifying, nightmare ...
• gas: Warhorses Reviewed by Brett Strickland (2009/03/17 15:17)

  Like Aphrodite rising from the foam of Uranus's severed genitals, the poems in Yusef Komunyakaa's most recent volume, Warhorses, begin in violence and birth a warped sort of love. Komunyakaa draws heavily from stories of ancient war for ... In “Someone's beating a prisoner”, an interrogator beats a prisoner until he “makes him piss on the stone floor,” then “orders the man/ to dig his grave with a teaspoon.” This immersion in violence is not without consequences.
• Vermont <b>Poetry</b> Newsletter – February 4 2009 « PoemShape by upinvermont (2009/02/04 19:01)

  Yusef Komunyakaa 18. Sonia Sanchez 19. Jane Kenyon 20. Mark Strand. Most Popular Historical Poets. 2008. 1. Langston Hughes 2. Emily Dickinson 3. Walt Whitman 4. Robert Frost 5. E.E. Cummings 6. Edgar Allan Poe 7. William Carlos Williams 8. Sylvia Plath 9. ...... and Departure (Norton, 2003). She edited and contributed to The Art of Translation: Voices from the Field (Northeastern, 1989), and has edited three chapbooks of poetry by prisoners. She has won ...
• Vermont <b>Poetry</b> Newsletter: January 16 2009 « PoemShape by upinvermont (2009/01/21 20:41)

  Secret markers run from flatland to river town, pale desert to mountain, grassland to autumn skyline. From here I see a lighthouse, love of the planet bringing a polar bear back to its ice floe. By Yusef Komunyakaa. divider. The World ..... I hope to speak in a voice that is in touch with California, about California — perhaps to children reading poetry for the first time, hospital patients, inmates of prisons or anyone fascinated or intimidated by its unlikely power. To speak ...
• The Vanilla Blues News: <b>Poetry</b> Daily Newsletter October 6, 2008 by admin@drobicho.com (2008/10/06 03:00)

  ... 13 at 8:15 pm. The Poetry Center also presents two Pulitzer Prize-winning poets on Thursday, October 16 at 8 pm—Jorie Graham and Yusef Komunyakaa. .... In Argentina the torturers demanded the prisoners. Address them ...
• Slamdunk3: Slamdunk by <b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b> by Ms. Lukas (2008/09/17 10:17)

  I agreed with them yet not many people said what his meaning might be so I read Slamdunk multiple times and it struck me that this poem might be about life. For example, Yusef uses the basketball term "fast break". Its similar ...
• Word Synapse: The Spoken Word Revolution by sinapps (2008/08/13 22:58)

  http://www.ibiblio.org/ipa/poems/komunyakaa/anodyne.php. Anodyne By Yusef Komunyakaa Photobucket I love how it swells into a temple where it is held prisoner, where the god of blame resides. I love slopes & peaks, the ...
• Largehearted Boy: Book Notes - Peggy Munson ("Pathogenesis") by david (2008/04/10 08:41)

  Of the book, Yusef Komunyakaa wrote: "Peggy Munson's Pathogenesis is forthright and magical in scope. The minute ascends to the ... We were all waiting for something to wake us out of the elevator music of physical denial, a language of cohesion: something as urgent as Akhmatova's poems conceived while standing in a prison line to see her son, where “over us were the stars of death.” My friend told me today that he and his co-workers have a tradition of sending ...
• Detainees: Tran Da Tu by Linh Dinh (2008/03/26 01:49)

  American readers are familiar with the Vietnam War poetry of Bruce Weigl and Yusef Komunyakaa, etc., some may even have read former NVA Bao Ninh's novel, The Sorrows of War, but almost no one has read the war poetry of the South Vietnamese, ... In 1989, a year after Tran Da Tu was released from prison, the couple and their children received political asylum from the Swedish government, but later moved to the US and now live in Southern California. His war ...
• <b>Poetry</b> & <b>Poets</b> in Rags: Great Regulars: Here, <b>poet Yusef</b> <b>...</b> by Rus Bowden (2008/03/11 15:48)

  Great Regulars: Here, poet Yusef Komunyakaa,. who teaches at New York University, shows us a fine portrait of the hard life of a worker in this case, a horse and, through metaphor, the terrible, clumsy beauty of his final ...
• SPACE: Workshop 4: Chen and Rachel by chen (2007/10/27 17:26)

  Rachel brought in a poem called "Safe Subjects" by Yusef Komunyakaa, from his collection of poetry "Copacetic." There are a ... She then went on to talk about writing habits in and out of prison, and wasted talent. We've had ...
• Post 2: (<b>Yusef Komunyakaa</b>, Talking Dirty to the - Of <b>Poets</b> and <b>Poems</b> by j. gilbert. (2007/07/06 19:21)

  Post 2: (Yusef Komunyakaa, Talking Dirty to the Gods) "In the moon who showed him how. To tread footsteps Napoleon left. After prisoners worked ice, Routing a canal through an eternal. White field of loneliness, he didn't ...
• Transcript: Tony Hoagland in Conversation- <b>Poets</b>.org - <b>Poetry</b> <b>...</b> by unknown (2007/06/21 08:08)

  by Yusef Komunyakaa. The Atmosphere is Alive: Nathaniel Mackey in Conversation by Nathaniel Mackey. The Line Between Two Worlds: Tracy K. Smith and Elizabeth Alexander in Conversation by Tracy K. Smith. The Poet Philosopher: John Koethe in Conversation by John Koethe ... I know that people often say "you want to learn poems by heart so that if you ever go to prison you can say them to yourself, and it will give you consolation and comfort and companionship." I think that ...
• One <b>Poet&#39;s</b> Notes: Lynda Hull: COLLECTED <b>POEMS</b> by Edward Byrne (2007/01/11 11:29)

  (Collected Poems also carries an insightful introduction by Yusef Komunyakaa that acts as an enticing invitation into the poetry of Lynda Hull.) The series could not have ... The conditions in which Hull's friend Emily is depicted at the time leading to her death display an individual whose world has collapsed as much as any vein too often stabbed by an addict's needle: "Emily's // in prison again, her child's lost to the State, / Massachusetts. Fatigue, pneumonia, / the ...
• <b>Poems</b>: Ginsberg&#39;s "America," "To Aunt Rose," and <b>...</b> - J&#39;s Theater by John K (2005/04/26 21:04)

  That on the spot poetizing (which Yusef Komunyakaa also used to do), along with these three poems and others (such as "Howl," "A Supermarket in California," "At Apollinaire's Grave," "Sunflower Sutra," etc.) cemented my Ginsbergophilia, which has since waned quite a bit, though I still occasionally return to his ... and twenty-five-thousand mental institutions. I say nothing about my prisons nor the millions of underprivileged who live in my flowerpots under the light of ...
• Life, Dreams and Reality -- Sohel&#39;s Blog by Sohel (2004/02/16 21:20)

  A poem by Yusef Komunyakaa, Jehan's father, began "I am five"; the friend who read it wanted to evoke an age Jehan would never reach. People read from Reetika's own poems, too, of course: the one starring Billie ...... They could not bear to abandon their children through their own deaths, explains Meyer, a Wright State psychologist who interviewed 40 surviving mothers in prison. They said and thought things like, "I cannot go on. And no one can raise my child as ...

(These are public search results on the terms: 'Yusef Komunyakaa: Prisoners poem')