"Stethoscope" and "Four Short Essays Personifying a Future in Which White Supremacy Has Ended"

"Stethoscope":

Is "Stethoscope" one long poem or seven short ones? (Notice how each poem/section is five stanzas long, the first four w/ 3 lines, the final two (a couplet).)

"Stethoscope" is in memory of poet and fiction writer, Denis Johnson. What do these poems/sections seem to say? Can they be read together? Do they speak to each other?

I find that, when confronted w/ a long poem, it helps to focus on specific lines and passages. So, for instance, what do you make of the end of "The Judgement After the Last":

...Go to the movies, do research,
be the Regulator forced to kill kill kill

and that's when we'll find out just who we are
or if there's anything like 'who' anymore.

Four Short Essays...

 Is "Four Short Essays..." essays or poetry and, if the later, then why is it called "essays"? Is 1 ("therefore,") either a poem or an essay or any kind of text? Essays, at least the kinds we write in college, are usually supposed to make an argument. Do these "essays" make an argument? If so, what?

What do they say about "white people"? What assumptions do you make about the speaker of this poem?

What do you think about these lines:

never to walk into a future

of unpersonable feelings
for to feel is to window

& to person is to people
a feeling, a future
in which

4.
this future walks...

(Can "person" and "people" be verbs as they are here?)

Finally, which is the easier of the poems to read? Or, conversely, which is the more complicated?

If we were in class together, I would bring in my magnet poetry for you guys to write your own poems. Since we're not, try it at home. You don't have to use all of the magnets, but your poem should only use the magnets that you're given. Here's mine:

(click on the image to see it larger)

Also, I think that long poems are very instructive to beginning poets. Often, we end our poems too soon--all of our texts b/c we're trying to get done. I'd like you to return to a poem or some other text that you submitted w/ your midterm and try to continue from where you ended. See if your original ending wasn't the "true" ending.

Reminders:

• Upload drafts on Blackboard at least by 2 pm on Thursday to get credit for this week's group crits. 
• Not everyone is making comments on their group members' drafts. You need to respond to their drafts, preferably by the end of the weekend. Even if your group members turned their draft in late, I urge you to make comments on it. I'll give you credit for it.
• Tomorrow during our regular class time, I'm going to hold a virtual class meeting to discuss the reading, our writing, and anything else we feel like talking about. This is completely optional. 
• As those who have been following the schedule know, we have nothing scheduled after this week until the week of 4/21 where we'll return to reading poetry in Pushcart. You can use that time to get caught up on your writing, reading, and blogging. If you're already caught up, awesome! You can use the time to get caught up in your other classes or, even better, recharge. I will be available over the break. Just write me. 
• Finally, most of you have begun the required essay on The Alchemist (see Collection assignment and Supplement to the Syllabus). I want to remind you of this requirement for this assignment:

That one of your genres is a reflective essay which describes your experience of reading and discussing Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist. For this essay, you are required to quote at least two of your classmates from the blog. 

Speaking of the blog, you guys did better this week, but too many of you are not making comments on your classmates' posts. Remember, along w/ your minimum two posts, you're required to make at least two comments per week on classmates' posts for the remainder of the term.

 

I hope everyone is staying safe.