Giovanni's Post-Shooting Poem
I referred to this in the previous post. Youll find this up currently if you visit the Virginia Tech English Department website:
We are Virginia Tech
We are sad today
We will be sad for quite a while
We are not moving on
We are embracing our mourning
We are Virginia Tech
We are strong enough to stand tall tearlessly
We are brave enough to bend to cry
And we are sad enough to know that we must laugh again
We are Virginia Tech
We do not understand this tragedy
We know we did nothing to deserve it
But neither does a child in Africa
Dying of AIDS
Neither do the Invisible Children
Walking the night away to avoid being captured by a rogue army
Neither does the baby elephant watching his community
Be devastated for ivory
Neither does the Mexican child looking
For fresh water
Neither does the Iraqi teenager dodging bombs
Neither does the Appalachian infant killed
By a boulder
Dislodged
Because the land was destabilized
No one deserves a tragedy
We are Virginia Tech
The Hokie Nation embraces
Our own
And reaches out
With open heart and mind
To those who offer their hearts and hands
We are strong
And brave
And innocent
And unafraid
We are better than we think
And not yet quite what we want to be
We are alive to imagination
And open to possibility
We will continue
To invent the future
Through our blood and tears
Through all this sadness
We are the Hokies
We will prevail
We will prevail
We will prevail
We are Virginia Tech
--Nikki Giovanni, delivered at the Convocation, April 17, 2007
O.k., writing good poetry is hard, and I've got a certain level of respect for anyone who'd even try to write a poem like this a few days after such an event and put it out there in front of God and the internets and everybody.
But it strikes me as deeply mistaken to be so quick with comparisons that seem to minimize the scope of the tragedy. It is not o.k. to suggest that we get perspective on this event by thinking about "...the baby elephant watching his community be devistated for ivory."
Let me make this clear: I am a big fan of elephants, and, like everyone else, especially of baby elephants. I suspect that elephants might be far more sentient and intelligent than most people think. I think that if you kill one for ivory that there's a good chance that you deserve to be shot yourself.
I am extremely pro-elephant.
But it strikes me as downright perverse to think that this is an apt comparison.
I do not think that the Tech murders constitute the greatest crime in human history, nor that it's even the worst thing that happened in the world last week. For all I know, it wasn't in the top ten. And I think getting perspective is a good thing. But something is really bugging me about this way of doing it.
As always, I could be wrong.
I referred to this in the previous post. Youll find this up currently if you visit the Virginia Tech English Department website:
We are Virginia Tech
We are sad today
We will be sad for quite a while
We are not moving on
We are embracing our mourning
We are Virginia Tech
We are strong enough to stand tall tearlessly
We are brave enough to bend to cry
And we are sad enough to know that we must laugh again
We are Virginia Tech
We do not understand this tragedy
We know we did nothing to deserve it
But neither does a child in Africa
Dying of AIDS
Neither do the Invisible Children
Walking the night away to avoid being captured by a rogue army
Neither does the baby elephant watching his community
Be devastated for ivory
Neither does the Mexican child looking
For fresh water
Neither does the Iraqi teenager dodging bombs
Neither does the Appalachian infant killed
By a boulder
Dislodged
Because the land was destabilized
No one deserves a tragedy
We are Virginia Tech
The Hokie Nation embraces
Our own
And reaches out
With open heart and mind
To those who offer their hearts and hands
We are strong
And brave
And innocent
And unafraid
We are better than we think
And not yet quite what we want to be
We are alive to imagination
And open to possibility
We will continue
To invent the future
Through our blood and tears
Through all this sadness
We are the Hokies
We will prevail
We will prevail
We will prevail
We are Virginia Tech
--Nikki Giovanni, delivered at the Convocation, April 17, 2007
O.k., writing good poetry is hard, and I've got a certain level of respect for anyone who'd even try to write a poem like this a few days after such an event and put it out there in front of God and the internets and everybody.
But it strikes me as deeply mistaken to be so quick with comparisons that seem to minimize the scope of the tragedy. It is not o.k. to suggest that we get perspective on this event by thinking about "...the baby elephant watching his community be devistated for ivory."
Let me make this clear: I am a big fan of elephants, and, like everyone else, especially of baby elephants. I suspect that elephants might be far more sentient and intelligent than most people think. I think that if you kill one for ivory that there's a good chance that you deserve to be shot yourself.
I am extremely pro-elephant.
But it strikes me as downright perverse to think that this is an apt comparison.
I do not think that the Tech murders constitute the greatest crime in human history, nor that it's even the worst thing that happened in the world last week. For all I know, it wasn't in the top ten. And I think getting perspective is a good thing. But something is really bugging me about this way of doing it.
As always, I could be wrong.
posted by Winston Smith at
9:41 AM
10 Comments:
I've gotta say - the metaphor is only useful if you understand the author's convictions regarding baby elephants and their lives, and I'm guessing she thinks they're as valuable as people. This doesn't mean she's necessarily minimizing the scope of the tragedy - it could also mean she is maximizing the scope of the elephant tragedy.
However.
The poem sucks, I have to say. I mean, seriously, if I wrote something like that and it wasn't following an act like that at VT, I would expect a C..in high school creative writing class. F in college.
Usually poetry is rated on a couple of factors such as unique combinations of words into somewhat original forms, meter, rhythm, writing in a way that requires the reader to think before arriving at what you're trying to say - requiring him to examine thoroughly the metaphors, the imagery, etc.
You know, overall, poetry has to be unique and intelectually interesting - it has to draw you in with entrancing imagery and cause you to want desperately to figure out what the imagery is trying to indicate. Here's at least a decent poem:
A question well served,
'Is silence like a fever?'
'A voice never heard?'
'Or a message with no receiver?'
Pray they won't ask
Behind the stained glass
There's always one more mask
Has man been a victim
of his woman, of his father?
if he elects not to bother,
will he suffocate their faith?
Desperate to fall
Behind the Great Wall
That separates us all
When there is reason
Tonight I'm Awake
when there's no answer
Arrive the Silent Man
If there is balance
tonight He's Awake
If they have to suffer
There lies the Silent Man
Sin without deceivers
A God with no believers
I could sail by
on the Winds of Silence
And maybe they won't notice
But this time I think
It'd be better if I swim
When there is reason
Tonight I'm Awake
When there's no answer
Arrive the Silent Man
If there is balance
Tonight he's Awake
But if they have to suffer
There lies the Silent Man
-Dream Theater
Or if you don't want to be all metaphorical, even, there's this:
automatons with business suits swinging black boxes,
sequestering the blueprints of daily life
contented, free of care, they rejoice in morning ritual
as they file like drone ant colonies to their office in the sky
I don't ask questions, don't promote demonstrations,
don't look for new consensus, don't stray from constitution
if I pierce the complexity I won't find salvation
just the bald and over truth
of the evil and deception
there is an inner logic,
and we're taught to stay far from it
it is simple and elegant,
but it's cruel and antithetic
and there's no effort to reveal it
graduated mentors stroll in marbled brick porticos
in sagacious dialog they despise their average ways
displaying pomp and discipline, they mold their institution
where they practice exclusion on the masses every day
there is an inner logic,
and we're taught to stay far from it
it is simple and elegant,
but it's cruel and antithetic
and there's no effort to reveal it
decorated warriors drill harmless kids on pavement
simulating tyranny under red alert
protecting the opulent and staging moral standard
they expect redemption of character and self-growth
there is an inner logic,
and we're taught to stay far from it
it is simple and elegant,
but it's cruel and antithetic
and there's no effort to reveal it
-Bad Religion
(copied that one off a lyrics site and I'm not bothering to give it correct punctuation, so..sorry)
Now, regardless of whether or not you actually like either of those, because there's definitely a degree of preference that is included with the critique of poetry, I think that one can plainly see that the latter poems are significantly better in style, intrigue, and it just seems like the guy took time to actually think about and write it. Each line has a meaning that is important..unlike the tech one.
When you say things like
"We are strong
And brave
And innocent
And unafraid
We are better than we think
And not yet quite what we want to be
We are alive to imagination
And open to possibility
We will continue
To invent the future
Through our blood and tears
Through all this sadness
We are the Hokies
"
I mean honestly, I would expect that in 5th grade.
This is the crap that happens after every tragedy - people do things like write poems or songs or whatever, and they suck, but because of their topic, they're immediately glorified by the public and idealized. If you criticize it, not only are you a horrible person because that means you must be supporting the bad guys, but you'll inevitably face the question "Oh yeah? Like you could do better!" Then, even if you do something better (even after explaining that that's not a requirement for being able to tell when something sucks) or provide the person with something better, they will simply scoff at it, degrade it as best they can, and leave.
The same thing happens with argumentation. It will suck, but as long as it in some way condemns what happened, no one feels that they can criticize it or disagree with it. This is a perfect example of that.
P.S. She's a professor of writing at VT and a "distinguished poet"? wtf?
That's a great publication on the subject virginia tech shooting Add your blog site to the bizleadsnet collection.
I'm no English major, but my gut tells me:
That is an astonishingly bad 'poem'. It would have received a gentlemen's 'C-' in my freshman English class, for sure.
As noted above, poetry is a medium that invites critique, and as a result (or maybe I am getting cause and effect screwed up here) is treated as pretentious and, if not initially accepted as fantastic...dreck.
As an English major and minor fan of poetry (I will, on occassion read a set of lines that send me reeling, but mostly, um, no) I think this is unfortunate. However, it is real. Poetry and poets are treated by almost everyone (especially fellow poets) as deigning to talk about things that they don't know about, or if they do, don't talk about properly.
It is a rarified form of expression, and its creators and subjected to scrutiny by poets and non-poets alike in a (usually) hostile manner. So it goes, the pretense and presumed intellect that are supposedly inherent in every stanza make it really easy to dismiss it as a reasonable form of expression on any subject, particularly particularly horrific current events.
This is merely an observation, not any kind of advice as to how we should react to particular poems. I will say that any person who is in a position to have to react publicly to this type of tragedy should probably be given a whole heck of a lot of lee-way. There is really nothing that can be said that will come across as some how helping the situation (although, of course, if such a thing were to be said, we would all be thankful for it).
"We are the Hokies - my friends
And we'll keep on fighting - till the end -
We are the Hokies -
We are the Hokies
No time for losers
'Cause we are the Hokies
Of the world!"
or mebbe better would be...
"All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated...No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."
Good post here, good food for thought...
absurd thought -
God of the Universe says
endanger everyone
don't force help on crazies
they have right to murder first
.
I'm with a-funk: poets should be given lots of leeway. Poetry is hard and virtually invites ridicule. And almost none of us know anything about it.
I'm not dissing the technical qualities of the poem (though it's fairly hard to maintain this neutrality in the face of Tom's Queen version, which cracked me up).
I'm really just bugged by jumping to what seem like politically programatic comparisons so soon and in this context. I mean, really, do we have to bring baby elephants and Appalachian strip mining into this three days after the fact?
As the Mystic points out, one could, theoretically, of course, attribute to Professor Giovanni an extraordinarily and inexplicably high regard for baby elephants... But barring that desperate lunge at a defense, this poem seems to minimize the awfulness of the recent murders.
Look, I don't want to make too big a deal out of this. This is all hard and hard to get just right. Blogs invite us to complain at length about people saying things that are not *exactly* optimal. And that may very well be what I'm doing here.
I don't think it's that big of a stretch to think she places that much value on baby elephants. Animal rights activists aren't exactly infrequent about asserting that animals have as much value as people, so if she is one of them, she probably thinks the same way.
I don't know if that's right or not - I'm not giving a critique of the view, just saying that I know more than a few people who are very intense about their views on animal rights and who believe that animals are every bit as valuable as people. So I'm just saying it's not as uncommon as you might think to hold that belief, however right or wrong it may be.
You are right, though, that it appears to be a politically motivated poem. I guess it's up for debate whether or not that's bad too. If she's using the deaths of people to forward her own unrelated views, then it's probably bad, but if you use the tragedy to push forward new policies that will help prevent future tragedies, I think that'd be good.
Probably being too hard on her. I'd just give her the benefit of the doubt that, while it's a crappy poem, I doubt she meant any harm.
OK, aside from the bad composition, this poem does have some bizarre and maybe culpable moral problems. For example, apparently, the only way to merit comparison of your tragedy to this one is to be small and cute, i.e.: an infant, a child, or a baby elephant. The oldest fellow victim mentioned is the Iraqi teenager. One presumes that the real sufferer in the ivory trade would be the elephant acually shot and cut up, but, since the old elephants killed are not Mancini-inspiring cute, Giovanni works the baby into it with the wierd notion of it watching its "community" be decimated. What's wrong with "herd", aside from the fact that it reminds us that an elephant is an animal? ("Decimated the community" has gotten to be a cliche describing what was happening to gay people during the early phases of the AIDs crisis, which adds to the wierdness of the stanza.) To me however, what is really wrong with Giavanni's outlook is not her insistance on adorable victims, but her willingness to flat make them up in order to analogize things she doesn't like to the shooting. Now, I don't think strip mining is a good thing. In addition to its horrible environmental effects, uncute miners are no doubt killed in the process. But has a baby ever been crushed by a boulder sent rolling down a hill by a strip mine, presumabley uphill from its nursury? No. It's a Rube Goldberg scenario that Giovanni cooked up just to condemn strip mining, to implicitly compare Alcoa (or whomever) to Cho. Such a move is manipulative, self-indulgant, and wrong.
My question is whether it's a poem at all. Except for the passage with the standing tall tearlessly, it's, well, Rita Mae Brown put it best:
"Art is moral passion married to entertainment. Moral passion without entertainment is propaganda, and entertainment without moral passion is television."
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