Afro Clouds & Nappy Rain: The Curtis Brown Poems

By James B. Golden

In his second book, Afro Clouds & Nappy Rain, James B. Golden introduces the world to Curtis Brown, a troubled teen struggling with growing up Black and male in America. The collection was composed over several seasons that Golden worked in a rehabilitation setting with boys like Curtis. The poems speak of the emotional warfare many young men experience beneath their rough exterior.

Golden sprinkled these poems with vulnerability, while remaining expressly frank about depression, hopelessness, fatherlessness, abandonment and rape. His voice is poignantly explicit and stripped of sweetener, but understanding and stimulating as well.With titles like The Night You Had Sex With My Journal, Rotten Diamonds On Th e Inside, and Letter No. 5 To An Absent Mother, he gives us grand images and comic relief. Welcome to the world of Curtis Brown.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Oct 14, 2011
• ISBN: 9781462055142

James B. Golden

James B. Golden was born and raised in Salinas, California, and received his MPA and BA in English and Pan-African studies arts and literature from California State University–Northridge. His articles have appeared in such periodicals as VIBE, Clutch Magazine, Jazz Times, and Our Weekly. He is the author of Afro Clouds & Nappy Rain, winner of the 2012 NAACP Image Award, and Sweet Potato Pie Underneath the Sun’s Broiler, winner of the Langston Hughes Award. He currently lives in Los Angeles where he is a freelance music and pop culture journalist.

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