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ralowe's review
5.0
it's hard to think about impossibility from within it. but in the struggle to be one is impelled to think. this impossibility thinking itself takes the form of black women's poetry. cheryl clarke creates in invaluable resource for the margins, the intersections. someone at the department of building inspection, a black woman, told me i was "awesome" when i shared with her what the book was about. she was familiar with the gwendolyn brooks poem, "in the mecca," the title refers to. but why was i "awesome" for reading this? is it that big a deal for people to think about the poetry of black women? don't people do it all the time in popular culture? to insist upon a distinction between the black feminism of gwendolyn brooks, nikki giovanni and audre lorde on the one hand and beyonce or azealia banks on the other is but one of many contested circles one could draw, or fracture, or divide, and what's the point of that? maybe she was just applauding me for reading? maybe it was about black literacy? without really wanting to suggest contested circles of exclusion, and the attendant implications of value or hierarchy, one might note different ways of being with the thought of the impossible, the thought of black women. perhaps one could offer scales of consent to intimacy, in-your-face vs taking time to read quietly to oneself. perhaps she felt that i was "awesome" because i was taking the time to think about black women, rather than watching a music video; this is further allowing the idea that a music video is capable of offering any version of material congruity between itself and the lives of black women. a music video in its gratuity displays an excess of possibility. nothing like the patriarchy, capitalism and racism that work to destroy what could ever be a contested black woman subject. but maybe she wasn't thinking at all about any of that shit and just wanted to call another black person "awesome." caught off guard i responded awkwardly "so are you!"
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