Testify / Simone John.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

John, Simone, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

African Americans--Poetry.

African Americans.

Violence.

United States.

Violence--United States--Poetry.

Genre:

Poetry.

American poetry.

Physical Description:

82 pages ; 22 cm

Place of Publication:

Portland ; Seattle ; Denver : Octopus Books, [2017]

Summary:

Testify, Simone John's first full-length book of poems, experiments with documentary poetics to uplift stories of black people impacted by state-sanctioned violence. The book's first section weaves Rachel Jeantel's testimony in the Trayvon Martin trial with Kendrick Lamar lyrics, fixed form and found poems, and personal artifacts. The second section centers on the audio of the dashboard recording that captured Sandra Bland's fatal police encounter. Excerpts from this exchange are punctuated with elegies for other dead black women, creating a larger commentary about race and gender-based violence. Testify is ultimately a book of witness. It "burdens" its readers "with knowing." Combined, both chapters serve as an unflinching critique of race and gender supremacy in the United States. - Publisher.

Contents:

Order of events

He said

How the man look like

Easy street realty haibun

It mighta been a rapist

Coda

Then what happened

Back seats

The wake, the funeral

Missed calls

Trayvon

Missed beats

From

Small talk

Rachel's earrings

Tally of interruptions

Any day of the week

On watching Rachel

No further questions

Mourning rites

446

Twenty-five percent

Red line

That ass

Never forget

Letter to white people

Nigga du jour

Erasure

Rorschach test

Widows

The rules

Calls home

Twin beds

The currency of childhood

Uncle Eddie

Swinging

Streetlight sutras

Unbecoming language

Collateral. Ars poetica

Elegy for dead black women #1

Cigarette

On [not] watching the video

A brief history of murder

Inciting incident

For colored girls who have been asked what's wrong

Lawful orders

Elegy for dead black women #2

A much more common term

Unanswered questions

Lawful orders : aftermath

A woman's perspective

Elegy for dead black women #3

Things I don't say to the white audience

Only everything I own

Elegy for dead black women #4

I tried

Burning

The poet's eulogy.

Notes:

Author information: Simone John is a poet, educator, and freelance writer based in Boston, MA. She received an MFA in Creative Writing from Goddard College with an emphasis on documentary poetics. Her poetry and essays have appeared in Wildness, The Pitkin Review, Public Pool, and the Writer in the World. She is a contributing editor at Gramma Poetry. Testify is her first full-length book of poems. - Publisher.

ISBN:

9780986181146

0986181145

OCLC:

1001463324

Publisher Number:

99974088525