THE REIGN OF QUIET, OR A RESPONSE TO VICTORIA ADUKWEI BULLEY'S QUIET
This micro-essay is both a meditation on different kinds of quiet and a response to Victoria Adukwei Bulley and her debut poetry collection Quiet which explores both the oppressive and liberating aspects of the concept of quiet. I borrowed the phrase "the way-things-are" from her poem "note on exiting" and Notes 2 and 3 are also references to Bulley, who writes about both black and white noise in the collection. I attempted to emulate the style of "note on exiting" as well as a prose section of her sequence poem "fabula" which closes the book.
BLACK FRAGMENTS
This section is inspired by Christina Sharpe's Ordinary Notes. These fragments range from the personal to the political, from memories to quotes, and other miscellany.
FRAGMENT 2
The Solmaz Sharif quote is lifted from "An Otherwise," one of the two long poems in her gorgeous collection Customs. The italicized line is a reference to "Strange Fruit" by Bille Holiday.
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BORN IN BABYLON
Non-FictionMy school of indifference opened and never closed; I remained its only student. BORN IN BABYLON is a collection of short essays, fragments, prose, creative nonfiction, and other miscellany regarding Blackness, womanhood, memory, identity, and Americ...
