Kontemporary Amerikan Poetry

By John Murillo

John Murillo’s second book is a reflective look at the legacy of institutional, accepted violence against Blacks and Latinos and the personal and societal wreckage wrought by long histories of subjugation. A sparrow trapped in a car window evokes a mother battered by a father’s fists; a workout at an iron gym recalls a long-ago mentor who pushed the speaker “to become something unbreakable.” The presence of these and poetic forbears—Gil Scott-Heron, Yusef Komunyakaa—provide a context for strength in the face of danger and anger. At the heart of the book is a sonnet crown triggered by the shooting deaths of three Brooklyn men that becomes an extended meditation on the history of racial injustice and the notion of payback as a form of justice.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Four Way Books
• Release date: Mar 15, 2020
• ISBN: 9781945588570

Book preview

Also by John Murillo

Up Jump the Boogie

KONTEMPORARY AMERIKAN POETRY:POEMS

John Murillo

Four Way Books

Tribeca

for Nicole

and in loving memory

of Josefina Cervantes Murillo,

Francisco Morales Santiago,

and Philip Levine

Copyright © 2020 John Murillo

No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Murillo, John, author.

Title: Kontemporary Amerikan poetry / John Murillo.

Description: New York : Four Way Books, [2020]

Identifiers: LCCN 2019031752 | ISBN 9781945588471 (trade paperback)

Classification: LCC PS3613.U6945 A6 2020 | DDC 811/.6--dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019031752

This book is manufactured in the United States of America and printed on acid-free paper.

Four Way Books is a not-for-profit literary press. We are grateful for the assistance

we receive from individual donors, public arts agencies, and private foundations.

This publication is made possible with public funds from the National Endowment for the Arts

and from the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency,

We are a proud member of the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses.

ISBN-13: 978-1-945588-57-0 (electronic)

CONTENTS

On Confessionalism

I.

Variation on a Theme by Elizabeth Bishop

Upon Reading That Eric Dolphy Transcribed Even the Calls of Certain Species of Birds,

On Metaphor

Dolores, Maybe.

On Magical Realism

Poem Ending and Beginning on Lines by Larry Levis

Dear Yusef,

On Negative Capability

Mercy, Mercy Me

II.

A Refusal to Mourn the Deaths, by Gunfire, of Three Men in Brooklyn

III.

Contemporary American Poetry

On Epiphany

After the Dance

Variation on a Theme by Gil Scott-Heron

On Lyric Narrative

Distant Lover

On Prosody

Variation on a Theme by the Notorious B.I.G.

Notes

"I know this isn’t much.

But I wanted to explain this life to you, even if

I had to become, over the years, someone else to do it."

—Larry Levis

"‘You’re lying,’ said Memory.

‘You’re asleep,’ said Forgetfulness."

—Henry Dumas

ON CONFESSIONALISM

Not sleepwalking, but waking still,

   with my hand on a gun, and the gun

in a mouth, and the mouth

   on the face of a man on his knees.

Autumn of ’89, and I’m standing

   in a Section 8 apartment parking lot,

pistol cocked, and staring down

   at this man, then up into the mug

of an old woman staring, watering

   the single sad flower to the left

of her stoop, the flower also staring.

   My engine idling behind me, a slow

moaning bassline and the bark

   of a dead rapper nudging me on.

All to say, someone’s brokenhearted.

   And this man with the gun in his mouth—

this man who, like me, is really little

   more than a boy—may or may not

have something to do with it.

   May or may not have

Reviews for Kontemporary Amerikan Poetry

[Gabby Falcon · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I really enjoyed this book! Read it if you haven't already.