Black Feeling Black Talk, and Black Judgment by Nikki Giovanni

Source of book: I own this

 

Both of these collections came out in 1968 - they were Giovanni’s first poetry collections. Because neither was that long, I decided to read both of them. 

 

Nikki Giovanni was one of the luminaries in the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s. She was an activist and educator, in addition to writing poetry and prose. 

 

While I have read fairly extensively from the Harlem Renaissance, I hadn’t spent as much time with the next great flourishing of African American artistry until recently. James Baldwin is probably the one I started with. More recently, I have read poetry by Gwendolyn Brooks and Audre Lorde and plays by Adrienne Kennedy. 

 

The Black Arts Movement may be in the same tradition as the Harlem Renaissance, but the forms and aesthetic are quite different. The earlier movement mostly adopted traditional European forms - rhymed poetry, linear novels, persuasive essays - while the later one was far more experimental. And more overtly political. 

 

This is certainly the case for Giovanni. These two collections contain many political poems, and even the ones that seem less so contain pointed references to the political situation. 

 

Giovanni was a lesbian, who was eventually able to marry her long-term partner Virginia Fowler after gay marriage was legalized. She also had a child as a single parent by choice in her 20s. 

 

She taught for many years at Virginia Tech, and had the mass shooter in her class. She demanded he be removed, and threatened to quit, because he was such a nasty hateful person. She succeeded in having him removed from the class, and was totally unsurprised when he shot up the campus two years later. 

 

She taught well into her late 70s, and only retired a couple years before her death. 

 

These poems are by the young Nikki Giovanni, and reflect her activism in the Civil Rights Movement as well as the big emotions and idealism of youth. They feel very fresh and relevant today, and also sound great read aloud. 

 

Here are the ones that I chose to feature. 

 

I’m Not Lonely

 

i’m not lonely

sleeping all alone

 

you think i’m scared

but i’m a big girl

i don’t cry

or anything

 

i have a great big bed

to roll around

in and lots of space

and i don’t dream

bad dreams

like i used

to have that you

were leaving me

anymore 

 

now that you’re gone

i don’t dream

and no matter

what you think

i’m not lonely

sleeping

all alone

 

I love the irony in this one, the way the meaning and the words are so opposed. 

 

The Funeral of Martin Luther King, Jr.

 

His headstone said

FREE AT LAST, FREE AT LAST

But death is a slave’s freedom

We seek the freedom of free men

And the construction of a world

Where Martin Luther King could have lived

and preached non-violence. 

 

The freedom of free men indeed. 

 

For Saundra

 

i wanted to write

a poem

that rhymes

but revolution doesn’t lend

itself to be-bopping

 

then my neighbor

who thinks i hate

asked - do you ever write

tree poems - i like trees

so i thought

i’ll write a beautiful green tree poem

peeked from my window

to check the image

noticed the school yard was covered

with asphalt

no green - no trees grow

in manhattan

 

then, well, i thought the sky

i’ll do a big blue sky poem

but all the clouds have winged

low since no-Dick was elected

 

so i thought again

and it occurred to me

maybe i shouldn’t write

at all

but clean my gun 

and check my kerosene supply

 

perhaps these are not poetic

times 

at all

 

I love the dig at Richard “I am not a crook” Nixon. Honestly, the root reason Trump is not in prison where he belongs dates back to the pardon of Nixon. He too should have died in prison. And man, this poem seems of our own time too. 

 

I’ll finish with this personal one. 

 

For Teresa

 

and when I was all alone

facing my adolescence

looking forward

to cleaning house

and reading books

and maybe learning bridge

so that i could fit

into acceptable society

acceptably

you came along

and loved me

for being black and bitchy

hateful and scared

and you came along

and cared that i got

all the things necessary

to adulthood

and even made sure

i wouldn’t hate

my mother

or father

and you even understood

that i should love

peppe

but not too much

and give to gary

but not all of me

and keep on moving

‘til i found me

and now you’re sick

and have been hurt

for some time

and i’ve felt guilty

and impotent

for not being able

to give yourself

to you

as you gave

yourself 

to me

 

There are more, but given the short length of the collection, I didn’t want to just reproduce the whole thing. I would definitely recommend adding these poems to your own collection.