Ten poems from Surveillance, the powerful new collection from Ashaki M. Jackson, which Cultural Weekly has been honored to serialized. Over the course of 10 weeks, we were able to feature one poem per week from this book that explores police killings of Blacks captured on video and the public’s consumption of these videos. Book is available here. …
The night is as black as skin It falls slowly publicly like an { Eric } Night hushes like { Jordan } Sky creeps like a Black body’s blood Sleepless birds enforce curfew The people are as broken and exposed as { Emmett } Aren’t we? Time drags like { James } Look how { …
SURVEILLANCE: Standard American Similes With Interchangeable Blacks Read More »
1. After the body falls back riddled with bullets do not expect it to respond to demands Lean into its irony—the dead Black body asked to defend its death and forgive 2. During autopsy the dead Black body unfurls its arms presses its pinched fingers against its wounds to extract taxpayers’ bullets The dead Black …
SURVEILLANCE: The Public Impresses Itself With Duplicity Read More »
Sometimes there is silence after a video is released You want to describe it as grief or disbelief or trauma. Yes (All of these) You wonder if there will be protests—stunts that take up so much public space You feel like a responsible person because you’re thinking of the immediate social impact …
SURVEILLANCE: The Public is Generally Self-Taught and Uninformed Read More »
We say King Watcher please guide us It opens its mouth and makes no sound Moves its godly eye in our direction and does not blink We expect it to provide safety with the certainty of the sun We praise it for keeping us alive We want eternity like King Watcher who has never …
SURVEILLANCE: The Speaker, Who is Black, Interjects the Black Conflict Read More »
Accountability (see m) 1. a measure of responsibility, The officer is accountable to the taxpayer; 2. quota; Officers are accountable for their body counts when the taxpayer is watching; 3. a measure of guilt Impunity (variation of imp) 1. forgivable childlike mischief; 2. permission Violence (from the color violet or dark red stain) 1. to …
SURVEILLANCE: The Speaker, Who is Black, Clarifies the Public’s Euphemisms Read More »
You sit in the violence Teeter into the video from your safety You are – each time – unsure of what you’re viewing: Videos of Black bodies crumbling so primitively it is convincing * You have long trusted your vision Can recall the arch of Bathsheba’s dark miracles from your palace roof …
SURVEILLANCE: The Public Confuses Death with Pornography Read More »
If you watch enough footage you grow comfortable with a narrative: the Black body will die You begin to see it coming certain as morning You become footage critic and note where zoom and panning would be helpful to the story You ask the screen why the Black body doesn’t get up These …
SURVEILLANCE: The Public Examines Black Resilience and is Dissatisfied Read More »
“We didn’t know anything about a chokehold or hands to the neck until the video came out,” said a former senior police official with direct knowledge of the investigation… “We found out when everyone else did.” – New York Times (June 13, 2015) An Arm-hook Sleeper an Anaconda Vise or an Arm Triangle …
1. Upon seeing her entire life drooped from a transparent noose, you consider the fulcrum, clean or crude, mechanical or flesh, working as a turn. You consider lynching mechanics and question which was raised first – the rope or the neck. You think of the ease with which dancers lift each other’s bodies at particular …
I went to a poetry reading at the bookstore in my town over the weekend. A white woman read a poem about a black UC Berkeley professor. The poem was about a lot of things, but the story of the black professor arranged and informed the poem. I met the poet, Sarah Sarai, in Brooklyn …
In the past week, we have seen a racist gunman take lives in a black church, a white woman claim black identity, and the Confederate flag fly full-staff while the US flag draped in half-mast sorrow. Our country is still fighting the Civil War. The question of blackness has long troubled American art, too. Now …
Like the invention of ‘the homosexual’ in the nineteenth century that Michel Foucault, David Halperin and others write about, the discursive production of an individual (‘racist’) shifts the focus from the act to the identity of the author. It is not so much a question of what one has done but an essence, an immutable …
The Vanessa Place Affair: Race, Poetry, Politics Read More »
The opening night program of Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion showcased four pieces from the repertory, and affirmed the company as America’s premiere dance troupe. Collectively entitled Power of Ailey, the evening featured Episodes with choreography by Ulysses S. Dove, Caught with choreography by David Parsons, Uprising with choreography by …
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