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[besada]

Amiri Baraka, one of the most influential African American writers of his generation, who courted controversy as a poet, playwright and provocateur and who was a primary intellectual architect of the Black Arts movement of the 1960s, died Jan. 9 at a hospital in Newark. He was 79.

Newark Mayor Luis Quintana and other public officials confirmed the death. The cause was not reported, but Mr. Baraka had been hospitalized in intensive care since December.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/enter...0897d2-796e-11e3-af7f-13bf0e9965f6_story.html

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Amiri Baraka was one of my favorite poets, both for his work in social justice, and for his willingness to say the things many of us are thinking, but were too afraid to say. He was a complex man, who also said things that shocked or repulsed us. He's been accused of anti-semitism, homophobia, racism, and more. He also wrote beautiful poetry that made us feel and think.

I'll miss him, flaws and all.

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Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note

Lately, I've become accustomed to the way
The ground opens up and envelopes me
Each time I go out to walk the dog.
Or the broad edged silly music the wind
Makes when I run for a bus...

Things have come to that.

And now, each night I count the stars.
And each night I get the same number.
And when they will not come to be counted,
I count the holes they leave.

Nobody sings anymore.

And then last night I tiptoed up
To my daughter's room and heard her
Talking to someone, and when I opened
The door, there was no one there...
Only she on her knees, peeking into

Her own clasped hands

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You can find other poems here:
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/amiri-baraka
http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/a_f/baraka/onlinepoems.htm
http://www.afropoets.net/amiribaraka.html

 

[Mumei]

I haven't read him before. Do you have a collection you'd suggest?

 

[PhoenixDark]

RIP. Great poet. I stumbled across him as a kid. My cousin was in college at the time, and she had a collection of his work. I was reading anything I could get my hands on at the time, but she refused to let me read it due to "adult content." Eventually I managed to "borrow" it while she wasn't looking.

Interestingly that's also how I stumbled across Black Boy by Richard Wright, which is still my favorite novel.

 

[besada]

I haven't read him before. Do you have a collection you'd suggest?

One of these would be a good stater:

Transbluency
or Somebody Blew Up America & Other Poems

The first covers his work from the 60's until 1995. The second features his incredibly controversial response to 9/11.