Coval Kevin - The Breakbeat poets: new American poetry in the age of hip-hop

Praise for The BreakBeat Poets A cool & diversified version of a mixtape. The BreakBeat Poets is a thorough and complete summation of Golden Era writers who continue to build the scene of literary and performance poetry. Chance The Rapper The BreakBeat Poets presents the struggle-born whispers, joyous shouts, and hopeful flows of a beautiful multitude four decades in the making. Here are the voices of a movement that just wont stop. For the urgent midnight roar of the peoples poetry and the glimpses of freshly conjured dawns awaiting their own breaksthis book is nothing short of essential. Jeff Chang, author of Who We Be: The Colorization of America and Cant Stop Wont Stop: A History of the Hip-Hop Generation Finally! Heres the anthology that puts in print what weve known all along: rap is poetry, and hip-hop is a genre of poetry bigger than poetry itself.

Read these poems and get rid of the notion once and for all that hip-hop poems are meant for the stage and dont work on the page. And the authors statements and essays place these poems straight in the American grain, the current iteration of the African American poetic lineage. The BreakBeat Poets is the essential text for anyone who wants to know whats up with American poetry in the digital age. Bob Holman, Bowery Poetry Club Every generation needs its poets; we never doubted that the rappers were poets, but as The BreakBeat Poets shows, the rappers didnt put the poets out of work. Mark Anthony Neal, coeditor of
Thats the Joint!: The Hip-Hop Studies Reader Its amazing to see how expansive the dialogue has become. This book is heavy! Bobbito Garcia, cohost of The Stretch Armstrong and Bobbito Show Contents Kevin Coval Randall Horton (1961) Joel Dias-Porter aka DJ Renegade (1962) Thomas Sayers Ellis (1963) Quraysh Ali Lansana (1964) Evie Shockley (1965) Tony Medina (1966) Willie Perdomo (1967) Mario (1967) Roger Bonair-Agard (1968) Lynne Procope (1969) Patrick Rosal (1969) Tracie Morris Jason Carney (1970) LaTasha N.

Nevada Diggs (1970) Mitchell L. H. Douglas (1970) Krista Franklin (1970) Adrian Matejka (1971) jessica Care moore (1971) John Murillo (1971) francine j. harris (1972) tai freedom ford (1973) Suheir Hammad (1973) Marty McConnell (1973) John Rodriguez (19732013) Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie (1973) Tara Betts (1974) Paolo Javier (1974) Douglas Kearney (1974) avery r. young (1974) Lemon Andersen (1975) Michael Cirelli (1975) Kevin Coval (1975) Jericho Brown (1976) Mahogany L. Browne (1976) Aracelis Girmay (1977) Idris Goodwin (1977) Enzo Silon Surin (1977) Mayda Del Valle (1978) Denizen Kane (1978) Paul Martinez Pompa Kyle Dargan (1980) Tarfia Faizullah (1980) Samantha Thornhill (1980) Aleshea Harris (1981) Jacob Saenz (1982) Nadia Sulayman (1982) Sarah Blake (1984) Adam Falkner (1984) Chinaka Hodge (1984) Marcus Wicker (1984) Michael Mlekoday (1985) Kristiana Coln (1986) Eve Ewing (1986) Ciara Miller (1987) Morgan Parker (1987) Joshua Bennett (1988) Alysia Nicole Harris (1988) Britteney Black Rose Kapri (1988) Angel Nafis (1988) Jos Olivarez (1988) Joy Priest (1988) Ocean Vuong (1988) Fatimah Asghar (1989) Franny Choi (1989) Nate Marshall (1989) Aaron Samuels (1989) Danez Smith (1989) Jamila Woods (1989) Benjamin Alfaro (1990) Safia Elhillo (1990) Aziza Barnes (1992) Camonghne Felix (1992) Steven Willis (1992) Reed Bobroff (1993) Malcolm London (1993) Kush Thompson (1994) Emon McGee (1996) Angel Pantoja (1997) Nile Lansana (1997) and Onam Lansana (1999) Quraysh Ali Lansana tai freedom ford Michael Mlekoday Douglas Kearney Angel Nafis Aziza Barnes Tara Betts Roger Bonair-Agard Patrick Rosal Nate Marshall Joel Dias-Porter aka DJ Renegade (1962) Turning the Tables (for Eardrum) First hold the needle like a lovers hand Lower it slowly let it tongue the records ear Then cultivate the sweet beats blooming in the valley of the groove Laugh at folks that make requests What chef would let the diners determine Which entrees make up the menu? Young boys think its about flashy flicks of the wrist But its about filling the floor with the manic language of dance About knowing the beat of every record like a mama knows her childs cries Nobody cares how fast you scratch Cuz it aint about soothing any itch Its about how many hairstyles are still standing At the end of the night.

Wednesday Poem I pass through the metal detector, inside the front doors of Cardozo High, with xeroxed poems and a lesson planned to introduce my students to the wild iris. After signing my name in the visitors log, I bop down two flights of steps. Outside the classroom things are too quiet and Mr. Bruno (whos Puerto Rican and writes poetry) takes ten minutes to answer the door. Theres a student snapshot in his hand. One of our kids got shot last night, Remember Maurice? Maurice Caldwell.

He didnt come to school much. A Crisis Response Team has the kids in a circle, and Ive never seen them sit so quietly. Every computer in the classroom is dead. A drawing of Maurice is taped to the board, a bouquet of cards pinned under it, Keisha (who writes funny poems in class) says Maurice would help her with math, she liked him but never told him. The Crisis lady says Its OK to cry. Mr. Mr.

Bruno tells me Somebody called him from a parked Buick on Thomas Place NW. When he walked up, they fired three times. I freeze. Thats a half block from my house. There are four crackhouses on that block and I never walk down that street. I wonder why he approached the car, was he hustling crack or weed? Or did he recognize the dude and smile before surprise blossomed across his face and the truth rooted into his flesh.

His face flashes before my irises, I see him horseplaying with Haneef, his hair slicked back into a ponytail. He wrote one poem this whole semester, a battle rap between cartoon characters. Mr. Bruno asks if I still want to teach. I open my folder of nature poems, then close the folder and slump in a chair. unearthed himself (at last) from the dirt had been compressing the species down forever annihilated it is believed not one real muthafucka inhabits america especially has sought to exterminate anything sagging or claiming to be .&..&..&. still on the rise anthropologist say the body perfectly intact a-check-one-a-check two times onlookers blinked at the rustic microphone long suffering in its extinction a conceit the lecherous inability to transform our initial state so often voted its death even the posse ak-(there was none found)-a crew all skeletoid offered introspections on capitalism at the present archivist are looking on the good foot James Brown is making a comeback is what they chant in the streets rejuvenating a precarious species can disappear in a handclap. 2015 Kevin Coval, Quraysh Ali Lansana, and Nate Marshall Haymarket Books PO Box 180165 Chicago, IL 60618 773-583-7884 info@haymarketbooks.org www.haymarketbooks.org ISBN: 978-1-60846-450-0 Trade distribution: In the US, through Consortium Book Sales and Distribution, www.cbsd.com In the UK, Turnaround Publisher Services, www.turnaround-psl.com All other countries, Publishers Group Worldwide, www.pgw.com Special discounts are available for bulk purchases by organizations and institutions. 2015 Kevin Coval, Quraysh Ali Lansana, and Nate Marshall Haymarket Books PO Box 180165 Chicago, IL 60618 773-583-7884 info@haymarketbooks.org www.haymarketbooks.org ISBN: 978-1-60846-450-0 Trade distribution: In the US, through Consortium Book Sales and Distribution, www.cbsd.com In the UK, Turnaround Publisher Services, www.turnaround-psl.com All other countries, Publishers Group Worldwide, www.pgw.com Special discounts are available for bulk purchases by organizations and institutions.

Please contact Haymarket Books for more information at 773-583-7884 or info@haymarketbooks.org. This book was published with the generous support of Lannan Foundation and the Wallace Action Fund. Library of Congress CIP data is available. Cover art from Untitled Negro Mythos Series by Hebru Brantley. Thomas Sayers Ellis (1963) An Excerpt from Crank Shaped Notes [The Non Fictitious Sticks] It was all practice (for something), so you just started hitting them, the books like they were drums and (later) the rototoms like they were books, right in their dark vowels, but first you covered them with towels or thin blankets to muffle the strokes of grammarexcept for the one you hit once, which is how you got a son. Terrell.