Black Art (poem)  

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-A poem such as "Black Art" (1965), according to [[Werner Sollors]], of [[Harvard University]], expressed his need to commit the violence required to "establish a Black World".<ref>Sollors, Werner (1978). ''Amiri Baraka / LeRoi Jones: The Quest for a "Populist Modernism".'' Columbia University Press.</ref>+"We want poems that kill", see [[aestheticization of violence]]
 +<hr>
 + We want poems
 + like fists beating niggers out of Jocks
 + or dagger poems in the slimy bellies
 + of the owner-jews. Black poems to
 + smear on girdlemamma mulatto bitches
 + whose brains are red jelly stuck
 + between [[Elizabeth Taylor|'lizabeth taylor]]'s toes. Stinking
 + Whores! We want "poems that kill."
 + Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
 + guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
 + and take their weapons leaving them dead
 + with tongues pulled out and sent to
 + Ireland. Knockoff
 + poems for dope selling wops or slick
 + halfwhite
 + politicians Airplane poems, rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
 + rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ... tuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuh
 + ... rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ... Setting fire and
 + death to
 + whities ass. Look at the Liberal
 + Spokesman for the jews clutch his throat
 + & puke himself into eternity ... rrrrrrrr
-Baraka even uses onomatopoeia in "Black Art" to express that need for violence: "rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr . . . tuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuht . . ." More specifically, lines in "Black Art" such as "Let there be no love poems written / until love can exist freely and cleanly" juxtaposed with "We want a black poem. / And a Black World" demonstrate Baraka's cry for political justice during a time when racial injustice was rampant, despite the Civil Rights Movement.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Nelson|first1=|title=Anthology of Modern American Poetry|date=2000|publisher=|location=|pages=998–999|accessdate=}}</ref>+ There's a negroleader pinned to
 + a bar stool in Sardi's eyeballs melting
 + in hot flame Another negroleader
 + on the steps of the white house one
 + kneeling between the sheriff's thighs
 + negotiating cooly for his people.
-"Black Art" quickly became the major poetic manifesto of the Black Arts Literary Movement and in it, Jones declaimed, "we want poems that kill," which coincided with the rise of armed self-defense and slogans such as "Arm yourself or harm yourself" that promoted confrontation with the white power structure.<ref name="Salaam, Kaluma 1997"/> Rather than use poetry as an escapist mechanism, Baraka saw poetry as a weapon of action.<ref name="Harris, William J 1985">Harris, William J. (1985). ''The Poetry and Poetics of Amiri Baraka: The Jazz Aesthetic''. University of Missouri Press.</ref>+ Agggh ... stumbles across the room ...
 + Put it on him, poem. Strip him naked
 + to the world! Another bad poem cracking
 + steel knuckles in a jewlady's mouth
 + Poem scream poison gas on beasts in
 + green berets
 +|}
 +{{Template}}
 +"[[Black Art (poem)|Black Art]]" (1965) is a poem by [[Amiri Baraka]]. The poem was set to music on the album ''[[Sonny's Time Now]]'' by Sunny Murray.
-In April 1965, Baraka's "A Poem for Black Hearts" was published as a direct response to Malcolm X's assassination, and it further exemplifies the poet's uses of poetry to generate anger and endorse rage against oppression.<ref>{{cite web|title=A Poem for Black Hearts|url=https://nmaahc.si.edu/object/nmaahc_2013.124.3|website=National Museum of African American History and Culture|publisher=Collection of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture|accessdate=May 10, 2017}}</ref> Like many of his poems, it showed no remorse in its use of raw emotion to convey its message.<ref>{{cite journal|last1=Sommers|first1=Ephraim Scott|title=The Poem of Anger: Amiri Baraka, Tory Dent, and Adrian C. Louis|journal=Cream City Review|date=2016|volume=20|issue=2 |pages=40–63}}</ref> It was published in the September issue of ''Negro Digest'', and so was one of the first responses to Malcolm's death which was exposed to the public.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Rambsy|first1=H|title=An early poem for Malcolm X|url=http://www.culturalfront.org/2015/09/an-early-poem-for-malcolm-x.html|website=Cultural Front|accessdate=May 10, 2017}}</ref> The poem is directed particularly at black men, and it scoldingly labels them "faggots" in order to challenge them to act and continue the fallen activists fight against the white establishment.+It serves as one of his most controversial, yet poetically profound supplements to the [[Black Arts Movement]]. In this piece, Baraka merges [[politics with art]], criticizing poems that are not useful to or adequately representative of the Black struggle. First published in 1966, a period particularly known for the [[Civil Rights Movement]], the political aspect of this piece underscores the need for a concrete and artistic approach to the realistic nature involving racism and injustice. Serving as the recognized artistic component to and having roots in the Civil Rights Movement, the Black Arts Movement aims to grant a political voice to black artists (including poets, dramatists, writers, musicians, etc.). Playing a vital role in this movement, Baraka calls out what he considers to be unproductive and assimilatory actions shown by political leaders during the Civil Rights Movement.
- +
-Baraka also promoted theatre as a training for the "real revolution" yet to come, with the arts being a way to forecast the future as he saw it. In "The Revolutionary Theatre," Baraka wrote, "We will scream and cry, murder, run through the streets in agony, if it means some soul will be moved." <ref name=Norton542>{{Cite book|title = The Norton Anthology of African American Literature|last = Gates|first = |publisher = |year = 2014|isbn = |location =|pages = 542}}</ref> In opposition to the peaceful protests inspired by Martin Luther King Jr., Baraka believed that a physical uprising must follow the literary one.+
- +
-Baraka's decision to leave Greenwich Village in 1965 was an outgrowth of his response to the debate about the future of black liberation.<ref name="Miller 1986" />+
- +
-===1966–80===+
-In 1966, Baraka married his second wife, Sylvia Robinson, who later adopted the name Amina Baraka.<ref>See back cover of his book ''Funk Lore''.</ref> The two would open a facility in Newark known as Spirit House, a combination playhouse and artists’ residence.<ref name="amiri 1">{{cite web|title=Amiri Baraka, legendary poet who never abandoned Newark, dead at 79|url=http://www.nj.com/essex/index.ssf/2014/01/hold_hold_hold_amiri_baraka_dead_at_79.html|website=nj.com|accessdate=18 June 2016|date=January 9, 2014}}</ref> In 1967, he lectured at [[San Francisco State University]]. The year after, he was arrested in Newark for having allegedly carried an illegal weapon and resisting arrest during the [[1967 Newark riots]], and was subsequently sentenced to three years in prison. His poem "Black People", published in the [[Evergreen Review]] in December 1967, was read by the judge in court,<ref>Watts, Jerry, "Amiri Baraka: The Politics and Art of a Black Intellectual", p. 299.</ref> including the memorable phrase: ''"All the stores will open if you say the magic words. The magic words are: "Up against the wall motherfucker this is a stick up!"''<ref>A phrase co-opted by the [[Up Against the Wall Motherfuckers]] and used as a slogan by other radical groups.</ref> Shortly afterward an appeals court reversed the sentence based on his defense by attorney [[Raymond A. Brown]].<ref>Berger, Joseph, [https://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/12/nyregion/12brown.html "Raymond A. Brown, Civil Rights Lawyer, Dies at 94"], ''The New York Times'', October 11, 2009. Accessed October 12, 2009.</ref> He later joked that he was charged with holding "two revolvers and two poems".<ref name=Norton542 />+
- +
-Not long after the 1967 riots, Baraka generated controversy when he went on the radio with a Newark police captain and Anthony Imperiale, a politician and private business owner, and the three of them blamed the riots on "white-led, so-called radical groups" and "Communists and the [[Trotskyite]] persons."<ref>Ronald Porambo, ''No Cause for Indictment; An Autopsy of Newark'', New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1971.</ref> That same year his second book of jazz criticism, ''Black Music'', came out, a collection of previously published [[music journalism]], including the seminal ''Apple Cores'' columns from ''[[Down Beat]]'' magazine. Around this time he also formed a record label called Jihad, which produced and issued only three LPs, all released in 1968:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.birkajazz.com/archive/variousUS_2.htm|title=Various US labels (2) - jazz album covers|publisher=Birkajazz.com|accessdate=December 14, 2014}}</ref> ''Sonny's Time Now'' with [[Sunny Murray]], [[Albert Ayler]], [[Don Cherry]], Louis Worrell, [[Henry Grimes]], and Baraka; ''A Black Mass'', featuring [[Sun Ra]]; and ''Black & Beautiful – Soul & Madness'' by the Spirit House Movers, on which Baraka reads his poetry.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.dustygroove.com/item/500409|title=Spirit House Movers (Jihad) : Black & Beautiful – Soul & Madness (CD)|author=Spirit House Movers (Jihad)|work=Dusty Groove|accessdate=December 14, 2014}}</ref><ref>[http://ajbenjamin2beta.blogspot.co.uk/2008/11/jihad-records.html "Jihad Records"], Nothing Is V2.0, November 24, 2008.</ref>+
- +
-In 1967, Baraka (still Leroi Jones) visited [[Maulana Karenga]] in Los Angeles and became an advocate of his philosophy of [[Kawaida]], a multifaceted, categorized activist philosophy that produced the "Nguzo Saba," [[Kwanzaa]], and an emphasis on African names.<ref name="Salaam, Kaluma 1997"/> It was at this time that he adopted the name ''Imamu Amear Baraka''.<ref name="ShawAmearName2013" /> ''Imamu'' is a [[Swahili culture|Swahili]] title for "spiritual leader", derived from the Arabic word ''Imam'' (إمام). According to Shaw, he dropped the honorific ''Imamu'' and eventually changed ''Amear'' (which means "Prince") to ''Amiri''.<ref name="ShawAmearName2013" /> +
-''Baraka'' means "blessing, in the sense of divine favor."<ref name="ShawAmearName2013" />+
- +
-In 1970 he strongly supported [[Kenneth A. Gibson]]'s candidacy for mayor of Newark; Gibson was elected the city's first African-American Mayor.+
- +
-In the late 1960s and early 1970s, Baraka courted controversy by penning some strongly [[Anti-Semitism|anti-Jewish]] poems and articles, similar to the stance at that time of the [[Nation of Islam]]. +
-Historian Melani McAlister points to an example of this writing "In the case of Baraka, and in many of the pronouncements of the NOI [Nation of Islam], there is a profound difference, both qualitative and quantitative, in the ways that white ethnicities were targeted. For example, in one well-known poem, ''Black Arts'' [originally published in ''The Liberator'' January 1966], Baraka made offhand remarks about several groups, commenting in the violent rhetoric that was often typical of him, that ideal poems would 'knockoff ... dope selling wops' and suggesting that cops should be killed and have their 'tongues pulled out and sent to Ireland.' But as Baraka himself later admitted [in his piece ''I was an AntiSemite'' published by ''[[The Village Voice]]'' on December 20, 1980 vol 1], he held a specific animosity for Jews, as was apparent in the different intensity and viciousness of his call in the same poem for 'dagger poems' to stab the 'slimy bellies of the ownerjews' and for poems that crack 'steel knuckles in a jewlady's mouth.'"<ref>{{cite journal|title=One Black Allah: The Middle East in the Cultural Politics of African American Liberation, 1955-1970|author=Melani McAlister|journal=American Quarterly|volume=51| number=3|page=646|publisher=The Johns Hopkins University Press|date=September 1999}}</ref>+
- +
-Prior to this time, Baraka prided himself on being a forceful advocate of black cultural nationalism; however, by the mid-1970s, he began finding its racial individuality confining.<ref name=Cary /> Baraka's separation from the Black Arts Movement began because he saw certain black writers – capitulationists, as he called them – countering the Black Arts Movement that he created. He believed that the groundbreakers in the Black Arts Movement were doing something that was new, needed, useful, and black, and those who did not want to see a promotion of black expression were "appointed" to the scene to damage the movement.<ref name="Martin, Reginald 1995"/>{{Template}}+
- +
-|}+
-[[Amiri Baraka]]'s "[[Black Art (poem)]]" serves as one of his most controversial, yet poetically profound supplements to the Black Arts Movement. In this piece, Baraka merges politics with art, criticizing poems that are not useful to or adequately representative of the Black struggle. First published in 1966, a period particularly known for the Civil Rights Movement, the political aspect of this piece underscores the need for a concrete and artistic approach to the realistic nature involving racism and injustice. Serving as the recognized artistic component to and having roots in the Civil Rights Movement, the Black Arts Movement aims to grant a political voice to black artists (including poets, dramatists, writers, musicians, etc.). Playing a vital role in this movement, Baraka calls out what he considers to be unproductive and assimilatory actions shown by political leaders during the Civil Rights Movement. He describes prominent Black leaders as being "on the steps of the white house...kneeling between the sheriff's thighs negotiating coolly for his people." Baraka also presents issues of euro-centric mentality, by referring to Elizabeth Taylor as a prototypical model in a society that influences perceptions of beauty, emphasizing its influence on individuals of white and black ancestry. Baraka aims his message toward the Black community, with the purpose of coalescing African Americans into a unified movement, devoid of white influences. "Black Art" serves as a medium for expression meant to strengthen that solidarity and creativity, in terms of the Black Aesthetic. Baraka believes poems should "shoot…come at you, love what you are" and not succumb to mainstream desires.+According to [[Werner Sollors]] of [[Harvard University]], the poem expressed Baraka's need to commit the violence required to "establish a Black World".
-He ties this approach into the emergence of hip-hop, which he paints as a movement that presents "live words…and live flesh and coursing blood." Baraka's cathartic structure and aggressive tone are comparable to the beginnings of hip-hop music, which created controversy in the realm of mainstream acceptance, because of its "authentic, un-distilled, unmediated forms of contemporary black urban music." Baraka believes that integration inherently takes away from the legitimacy of having a Black identity and Aesthetic in an anti-Black world. Through pure and unapologetic blackness, and with the absence of white influences, Baraka believes a black world can be achieved. Though hip-hop has been serving as a recognized salient musical form of the Black Aesthetic, a history of unproductive integration is seen across the spectrum of music, beginning with the emergence of a newly formed narrative in mainstream appeal in the 1950s. Much of Baraka's cynical disillusionment with unproductive integration can be drawn from the 50s, a period of rock and roll, in which "record labels actively sought to have white artists "cover" songs that were popular on the rhythm-and-blues charts" originally performed by African American artists. The problematic nature of unproductive integration is also exemplified by Run-DMC, an American Hip-Hop group founded in 1981, who became widely accepted after a calculated collaboration with the rock group Aerosmith on a remake of the latter's "Walk This Way" took place in 1986, evidently appealing to young white audiences. Hip-Hop emerged as an evolving genre of music that continuously challenged mainstream acceptance, most notably with the development of rap in the 1990s. A significant and modern example of this is Ice Cube, a well-known American rapper, songwriter, and actor, who introduced subgenre of hip-hop known as "gangsta rap," merged social consciousness and political expression with music. With the 1960s serving as a more blatantly racist period of time, Baraka notes the revolutionary nature of hip-hop, grounded in the unmodified expression through art. This method of expression in music parallels significantly with Baraka's ideals presented in "Black Art," focusing on poetry that is also productively and politically driven.+Baraka even uses onomatopoeia in "Black Art" to express that need for violence: "rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr . . . tuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuht . . ." More specifically, lines in "Black Art" such as "Let there be no love poems written / until love can exist freely and cleanly" juxtaposed with "We want a black poem. / And a Black World" demonstrate Baraka's cry for political justice during a time when racial injustice was rampant, despite the [[Civil Rights Movement]].
 +"Black Art" quickly became the major poetic manifesto of the Black Arts Literary Movement and in it, Jones declaimed, "we want poems that kill," which coincided with the rise of armed self-defense and slogans such as "Arm yourself or harm yourself" that promoted confrontation with the white power structure. Rather than use poetry as an escapist mechanism, Baraka saw poetry as a weapon of action.
 +Historian Melani McAlister points to an example of this writing "In the case of Baraka, and in many of the pronouncements of the [[NOI]] [Nation of Islam], there is a profound difference, both qualitative and quantitative, in the ways that white ethnicities were targeted. For example, in one well-known poem, ''[[Black Art]]'' [originally published in ''[[Liberator (1961-71)|Liberator]]'' January 1966], Baraka made offhand remarks about several groups, commenting in the violent rhetoric that was often typical of him, that ideal poems would 'knockoff ... dope selling wops' and suggesting that cops should be killed and have their 'tongues pulled out and sent to Ireland.' But as Baraka himself later admitted [in his piece ''I was an AntiSemite'' published by ''[[The Village Voice]]'' on December 20, 1980 vol 1], he held a specific animosity for Jews, as was apparent in the different intensity and viciousness of his call in the same poem for 'dagger poems' to stab the 'slimy bellies of the ownerjews' and for poems that crack 'steel knuckles in a jewlady's mouth.'"
{{GFDL}} {{GFDL}}

Current revision

"We want poems that kill", see aestheticization of violence


We want poems
like fists beating niggers out of Jocks
or dagger poems in the slimy bellies
of the owner-jews. Black poems to
smear on girdlemamma mulatto bitches
whose brains are red jelly stuck
between 'lizabeth taylor's toes. Stinking
Whores! We want "poems that kill."
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
with tongues pulled out and sent to
Ireland. Knockoff
poems for dope selling wops or slick
halfwhite
politicians Airplane poems, rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
rrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ... tuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuh
... rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ... Setting fire and
death to
whities ass. Look at the Liberal
Spokesman for the jews clutch his throat
& puke himself into eternity ... rrrrrrrr
There's a negroleader pinned to
a bar stool in Sardi's eyeballs melting
in hot flame Another negroleader
on the steps of the white house one
kneeling between the sheriff's thighs
negotiating cooly for his people.
Agggh ... stumbles across the room ...
Put it on him, poem. Strip him naked
to the world! Another bad poem cracking
steel knuckles in a jewlady's mouth
Poem scream poison gas on beasts in
green berets

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"Black Art" (1965) is a poem by Amiri Baraka. The poem was set to music on the album Sonny's Time Now by Sunny Murray.

It serves as one of his most controversial, yet poetically profound supplements to the Black Arts Movement. In this piece, Baraka merges politics with art, criticizing poems that are not useful to or adequately representative of the Black struggle. First published in 1966, a period particularly known for the Civil Rights Movement, the political aspect of this piece underscores the need for a concrete and artistic approach to the realistic nature involving racism and injustice. Serving as the recognized artistic component to and having roots in the Civil Rights Movement, the Black Arts Movement aims to grant a political voice to black artists (including poets, dramatists, writers, musicians, etc.). Playing a vital role in this movement, Baraka calls out what he considers to be unproductive and assimilatory actions shown by political leaders during the Civil Rights Movement.

According to Werner Sollors of Harvard University, the poem expressed Baraka's need to commit the violence required to "establish a Black World".

Baraka even uses onomatopoeia in "Black Art" to express that need for violence: "rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr . . . tuhtuhtuhtuhtuhtuht . . ." More specifically, lines in "Black Art" such as "Let there be no love poems written / until love can exist freely and cleanly" juxtaposed with "We want a black poem. / And a Black World" demonstrate Baraka's cry for political justice during a time when racial injustice was rampant, despite the Civil Rights Movement.

"Black Art" quickly became the major poetic manifesto of the Black Arts Literary Movement and in it, Jones declaimed, "we want poems that kill," which coincided with the rise of armed self-defense and slogans such as "Arm yourself or harm yourself" that promoted confrontation with the white power structure. Rather than use poetry as an escapist mechanism, Baraka saw poetry as a weapon of action.

Historian Melani McAlister points to an example of this writing "In the case of Baraka, and in many of the pronouncements of the NOI [Nation of Islam], there is a profound difference, both qualitative and quantitative, in the ways that white ethnicities were targeted. For example, in one well-known poem, Black Art [originally published in Liberator January 1966], Baraka made offhand remarks about several groups, commenting in the violent rhetoric that was often typical of him, that ideal poems would 'knockoff ... dope selling wops' and suggesting that cops should be killed and have their 'tongues pulled out and sent to Ireland.' But as Baraka himself later admitted [in his piece I was an AntiSemite published by The Village Voice on December 20, 1980 vol 1], he held a specific animosity for Jews, as was apparent in the different intensity and viciousness of his call in the same poem for 'dagger poems' to stab the 'slimy bellies of the ownerjews' and for poems that crack 'steel knuckles in a jewlady's mouth.'"




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