The Subjunctive by Steve Bellin-Oka
Like You by Roque Dalton 1935 –1975; translated by Jack Hirschman 1933 –2021
Ode to the Head Nod Elizabeth Acevedo
Drifting by Olivia Ward Bush-Banks 1869 –1944
Changing Is Not Vanishing by Carlos Montezuma
Dignity by Too-qua-stee
“Contemporary poetry serves, for a lot of us, a lack that we feel of spirituality or guidance or truth in our contemporary culture, and I think contemporary poetry is a way that we can turn to replace that loss.” —Steve Bellin-Oka
Steve Bellin-Oka is the editor for November of Poem-a-day. Drifting, Changing, Dignity were his picks and we started with his own poem.
The Subjunctive: a little grammar lesson tucked in a poem! Even if you never learned that the subjunctive mode is used to describe a hypothetical scenario, to express a wish, recommendation or demand... this poem will show you how it works!
Steve uses it to tell a story... but connecting one thing to another. Some felt a great sorrow about the trees. Wrong tree, wrong place, wrong everything. But if... Had my brother... emphasizes a sense of regret.
Knowing a bit about the poet might elucidate the grief he has experienced, but for sure, we feel it,
especially with the last line set off like a singleton to complete the line/stanza break.
I wish ... not sever us... with its lightening like a chainsaw. Fill in the blank for whatever destructiveness.
Like you: It is helpful to know the poet is from El Salvador, and was an activist. We discussed
my blood boils up ... This is not an angry poem. If eyes have known buds of tears, this poem directs us to see our "unanimous blood".
Ode to Head Nod" Fun discussion not just about the poem, but lots of examples of head nods!
On Bicycle, on the street, in India with a snake-like head movement which says, "I'm listening".
A head nod... as "a gilded curtsy to the sunfill in another"... line and stanza break, only to continue
"in yourself". We noted the large white spaces between words, which become clearer with the mention of the copy editor who deleted the word "head" from the title... Negative space in art, dance, emphasizes what is not... not said, where one is not...
How does a "nod" change implication when "head" is gone? The clever use of spacing to illustrate more
than what the words are saying, like its own gesture: to find "the color". Here again, Aceyedo layers implications perhaps such as reference to the fact that black is the absence of all colors, while white is the presence of all colors.
As for the ending: who is the "you"? perhaps God, or the small good inside all of us?
Drifting: I hadn't heard of Olivia Ward Bush-Banks, (1869-1944) and glad to be introduced, thanks to Steve Bellin-Oka. Of African-American and Montaukett Native American heritage, this author, poet and journalist is on the "must know" list of American woman. The poem with its aBcB rhyme, lovely rhythm laced with slant rhymes in drift, tinted, ripple contrasting with the long I in light, white, bright, chiming, life, Time, gently describes life passing on to death.
Changing is not Vanishing: another Steve Bellin-Oka pick. Just in case you missed "Vanishing" in the title, Carlos Montezuma gives it primary place at the end of each line coupled with NEVER.
The crux for me was the penultimate line: "The man part of the Indian is here, there, and everywhere".
We spoke about the importance of Indigenous women, carrying on traditions. You may enjoy this 28 minute video about Dr. Montezuma, born in 1866 in Arizona territory. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t1arhXZjQIY
As a small boy, he was stolen from his family and sold as a slave. He spent his early childhood on the road with an Italian photographer, and performed with Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show before starting school in Chicago.
In 1884, Montezuma was the first Native American to graduate from the University of Illinois and later became one of the first to earn a medical degree. After working for the Bureau of Indian Affairs as a reservation doctor and witnessing the widespread poverty and bureaucratic corruption, he fought tirelessly for Native American rights and citizenship. When his own Yavapai tribe faced removal from their ancestral home, Montezuma went to Washington, D.C., to fight for and finally secure their land and water rights, setting a precedent for other Indian nations. Narration is by Hattie Kauffman, longtime CBS news reporter/anchor and a member of the Nez Perce tribe
Dignity: Another Steve Bellin-Oka pick written by a Cherokee writer, poet, attorney, teacher born in Georgia in 1829. How would you define dignity? We enjoyed the comparison to a summer tree and the unpompous language of "fuss and fight..." the surprising "snow/trickling fatness on fields below"
and that which is by definition, in this poem, "always needed to complete the man." Delightful last lines:
The job quite done, and Dignity without,
Is like an apple pie, the fruit left out.
The Calculus: sheer fun of using dentist-terms and the perfect match of the situation!
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