Amber Atiya’s new poem is one of the boldest formal possessions in contemporary poetry I know of. For those who have relied upon, or have had family members that relied upon on government assistance, we know too well the Kafka-like bureaucracy that somehow must manage, categorize, and interrogate human suffering through endless paperwork. The grimness of such “forms” is waylaid, exploded, circumscribed and yet transformed thanks to Atiya’s imagination and the speaker of her lyric/anti-lyric who hungers, literally, we sense, but also existentially for a world beyond the rampant poverty and structural racism that disproportionally afflicts people of color in America. Continuing in the radical innovative tradition of contemporary black poetics, it’s hard to think of a recent poem so despairing, brave yet diabolically ingenuous.
—Adam Fitzgerald, Poetry
Name i’m hungary hungry
SS# what this iz?
Address southside a union square park
Phone# no
Are you/have you ever been a drug abuser? sometimez to stop the hunger
Have you ever been convicted of a felony? yea but i only stole cuz i wuz
hungry
* Felony crimes are serious crimes that include burglary and
murder. Felons lose many of their civil rights: the right to run
for office, join the military, and vote can be taken away. Prospective
employers have the right to inquire about any felony convictions.
Many insurance companies will not insure convicted felons making
it difficult for felons to find work.
Are you working? no
What is your hourly wage/yearly income? no
Do you speak English as a second language? i’m hungry
If yes please list first language: xoxo
Please punctuate the following sentence:
According to The Huffington Post Ray Canterbury
a politician from West Virginia believes children
should work for their school lunch
(Your ability to punctuate this sentence will greatly
impact your eligibility for SSI/Food Stamps)
Are you Muslim? i’m hungry
Are you an illegal alien immigrant? i ain’t from across no outta space borderz
Please solve the following equation:
3f”( x ) + 5xf ( x ) = 11
(Your ability to solve this equation will greatly
impact your eligibility for SSI/Food Stamps)
Have you ever been diagnosed with a physical
disability/psychological disorder? yea
check all that apply:
AIDS/HIV ?
Bipolar Disorder ?
Cancer ?
(please list type) i still got my left titty & it
iz hungry
Chronic Heart Failure from hunger? ?
Diabetes ?
Dissociative Identity Disorder ?
(please list the names of your
multiple identities) florence, mary & diana
Epilepsy ?
PTSD iz this post trama slave disorder? ?
Schizophrenia ?
Are you hungry? i’m hungry
Do you need food stamp benefits right away? i’m very hungry
x hungry___________________________________________________
signature
FOOD STAMP BENEFITS (FS) PENALTY WARNING
Anyone who is fleeing to avoid prosecution, custody or confinement
for a felony, or who is violating a condition of probation or parole, is
not eligible to receive Food Stamp Benefits. If you get more Food Stamp
Benefits than you should have (overpayment), you must pay them back.
If your case is active, we will take back the amount of the overpayment
from future Food Stamp Benefits that you get. If your case is closed, you
may pay back the overpayment through any unused Food Stamp Benefits
remaining in your account, or you may pay cash.
Today is the 115th anniversary of Stephen Crane’s tragic early death from tuberculosis. Jynne Dilling Martin looks back at his verse, and discovers it reads as if written yesterday. The following are selections from The Black Riders by Stephen Crane (1871-1900).
III
In the desert
I saw a creature, naked, bestial,
who, squatting upon the ground,
Held his heart in his hands,
And ate of it.
I said, “Is it good, friend?”
“It is bitter – bitter,” he answered;
“But I like it
Because it is bitter,
And because it is my heart.”
XXIV
I saw a man pursuing the horizon;
Round and round they sped.
I was disturbed at this;
I accosted the man.
“It is futile,” I said,
“You can never –”
“You lie,” he cried,
And ran on.
XLII
I walked in a desert.
And I cried,
“Ah, God, take me from this place!”
A voice said, “It is no desert.”
I cried, “Well, but –
The sand, the heat, the vacant horizon.”
A voice said, “It is no desert.”
These radically modern excerpts are taken from The Black Riders, a book-length poem by Stephen Crane, who abhorred the stuffy verse of his day. Crane preferred his own work to be called “lines” rather than “poems,” protesting to a friend that “the word ‘poet’ continually reminds me of long-hair and seems to me a most detestable form of insult.” Perhaps his insistence on not being called a poet contributed to his current neglect in the poetic canon; perhaps his larger body of fiction (Red Badge of Courage, Maggie, etcetera) outweighed this one slender volume; perhaps, even, Stephen Crane became eclipsed by his more-famous surname holder, American poetry titan Hart (no relation).
Whatever the reason, despite not being remembered as a poet, the entirety of Crane’s Black Riders is as startling and black-humored as the excerpts above, and worth reading in full. A review in The Nation called Crane “a condensed Whitman or an amplified Dickinson,” and while he may share Whitman’s penchant for conversation and Dickinson’s talent for concision and image, Crane’s originality lies in his unorthodox voice and nihilistic sensibility. Walt and Emily dwelled in belief systems of their own making, finding comfort and hope in the thought of their soul’s immortality. Crane, though, expresses the cynicism of a century he never lived to experience, when tuberculosis took his life in 1900 at a mere 28 years of age. To Crane, death is the inevitable, isolating end to a life lived in futile struggle against nature’s indifferent and overpowering forces. No special self is sung of here.
This sounds bleak, but notice how Crane honors man’s dignity even in the face of this stark knowledge: “I like it because it is bitter, and because it is my heart.” These poems are Biblical parables for a secular age: instructions for how to press through what we may feel is a lonely, barren desert of a life with clear eyes, dignity and a sense of humor.
