My impulse was to write the last black play ever for myself. I really believed if I put it all into one play, people would leave me alone.
—
Branden Jacobs-Jenkins
Two Poems by Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie
- Gilles Peress by Carole Kismaric
- Matthew Ritchie by Jenifer Berman
- Tim Roth by Gary M. Kramer & Steve Buscemi
- Amy Hempel by Suzan Sherman
- Kendall Thomas by Lynne Tillman
- Christian Wolff by Damon Krukowski
- Emmylou Harris by Lucinda Williams
- George Walker by Stephen Haff
- Wallace Shawn by Patrick McGrath
Interviews
- Wolf Kahn by Stanley Moss
Artists on Artists
- Bruiser by Richard House
- Untimely Meditations by Saul Williams
- Brothers Keep Me Up by Suheir Hammad
- Jupiter by T'Kalla
- Two Poems by Tai Allen
- Memory of Loss by Amanda Means
- Wolf Soup by Vijay Seshadri
- Brooklyn Moon Cafe Poets by Zoë Anglesey
- Two Poems by Connie Deanovich
- Nosotros Necesitamos Zapatos Para Zapatistas by Federico Perez
- Van Gogh’s Bad Café by Frederic Tuten
- Sid by Jah'ni
- Jazz by Jasiri
- The Sweetest Revolutionary by Jessica Care Moore
- Kill Kill Faster Faster by Joel Rose
- Requiem by Kathy Acker
- The Keepsake by Kirsty Gunn
- Two Poems by Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie
First Proof
- Vikram Chandra’s Love and Longing in Bombay by Betsy Sussler
- Cédric Klapisch’s When the Cat’s Away by Liza Béar
- Patrick McGrath’s Asylum by Betsy Sussler
- Linda Yablonsky’s The Story of Junk by Lynne Tillman
- Rick Moody’s Purple America by Betsy Sussler
- Fernanda Eberstadt’s When the Sons of Heaven Meet the Daughters of Earth by Anney Bonney
- Robert Antoni’s Blessed is the Fruit by Jenifer Berman
- Yannick Murphy’s Sea of Trees by Suzan Sherman
- Kula Shaker: Retroculture by Lynn Geller
- Brad Mehldau by Zoë Anglesey
- Carolee Schneemann: Like a Cat on a Fish by Darryl Turner
- Judith Belzer by Jack Stephens
- Ingrid Calame by David Pagel
- Don Gast’s When We Were Kings by Jenifer Berman
- John Singleton’s Rosewood by Susan Shacter
- David Lehman’s Valentine Place by Robert Polito
- Bradford Morrow’s Giovanni’s Gift by Jim Lewis
Editor's Choice
Raindrop Women
Me?
I roam sable streets
searching for white candles and coconuts
to wash the chaos from my skin
even still I have to write it out
make dyslexic thoughts rearrange themselves
put order to the recklessness
that is one spirit
on three planes
woman with many names
who sees rush hour
and thinks middle passage
spirit crashes
in to unborn daughters who will never know
my / this / our pain
if the job is done full time
the scripting of manifestos and declarations.
We are …
women refusing to tiptoe
we
march stomp scream
kick sing write
whatever to sever the ties
between oppression and ourselves … .
Lineage
I
He was the only son
of ambrosia, with one
kiss it was confirmed
II
His grandmother toiled
in cane fields, sugar was
the scent of her sorrow
Related
“I would like to do more of that kind of thing: travel, spend some time in a place and really work from a different vantage point. I don’t know what will happen in my work from that, but I trust my ability to find the tools to find my way into my work. I think I will sit out in the woods more.”
In the slave yard, it sets a standard. Desperate folks demonstrating who is hardier, or more foolish.
The Practice + Theory series is sponsored in part by the Frances Dittmer Family Foundation.
Originally published in
BOMB 59,
Spring 1997
Featuring interviews with Tim Roth, Amy Hempel, Emmylou Harris, Matthew Ritchie, Wallace Shawn, Christian Wolff, Gilles Peress, Kendall Thomas, and George Walker.
