Tracy K. Smith Believes America Needs a Poetry Cure

I wish. (my answer to the subtitle). my, my, what a sound file excerpt, it makes me want to believe - and even to teach poetry. A slight bone to pick - because you can't possibly know this - that it's not just the "liberal academy" that views African-American literature as American literature- a hum-ho everyone knows that. It's been a done deal in my high school classroom and MANY others for over twenty years.

Wonderful story and so important in the real listening and pausing done in the use of words to draw people together. Terrific weaving of the poet and her work, the manner in which she thinks of her work and the power in it, the thoughts she brings forward via Franklin. Thanks and I look forward to reading ore of Smith's work.

Was there something wrong with the artist giving Smith the collages? Weren't the relationships between slaves and owners sometimes very close indeed? Perhaps, all considered themselves "family." (I hope everyone knows that freed blacks could and did own slaves.) Human ownership or perhaps obligation is complex. I don't even have the right word for it. Why are family relationships given legal privilege? (Why are family relationships more fraught with problems often than those with strangers?) Smith understands both the potential for complicaation and simplicity: African-American literature is American literature -- of course it is. Art generally transcends boudaries. How wonderful of Smith to put the show on the road. Che brava.

It would be great if poets starting raising awareness of the Article V Convention as a way to find common ground for amendment proposals.

Finishing being poet laureate of Napa County, I took to 3 school districts a project to take pictures with real cameras of student's land and write a poem to one of them. 130 Fifth and Six graders and teachers answered the call and now their work is on display at the county museum for a month. 34 even read their poem with audience on a stage at the local college with their photo on a big screen behind them--joining speaking in public to the other art forms. All made possible by a grant from the County Art Council. Visit, Beclee

Appreciate this insightful profile of an amazing artist. Powerful spoken as well as read. "Poetry makes those rooms in the world feel less tall and less filled with strangers.” Just lovely.

I love the idea of poets talking across the political divide, and it sounds like something Ms. Tracy could do. Paul Robeson sang across the lines of Republicans and Nationalists in Spain at the prelude of WW II. Fascists and the Allies all sang “Lili Marlene” and jazz was played by both sides during WW II. But where are the "conservative poets--the ones with the ideas represented by Trump now? The last one wound up in St. Elizabeth's after he was captured by the Allies in Italy. (T.S. Elliot might not have existed without him.) There were poets who spoke for the South during the Civil War— “the Poet Priest” comes to mind—just as Dunbar wrote for the North. There are Skinheads, Neo-Nazis and Alt-Right musicians but it’s mostly music not even all of them like. Even country western artists sing of an America that is more unified than divided. Merle was doing drugs even while his “Muskogian Oakie” was diss-ing LSD. Poetry is a harsh taskmaster and requires all the insight that historians, novelists and musicians have combined. Poets are indeed tough, but can our Poet Laureate venture into America’s dark corners and start a poetic “slam” with whomever dwells there? From the sound of her poetry, she might just be able to start the dialogue.

I listened to her read her poetry a few months ago at Princeton University campus and it was a breath of fresh air....

Respect her commitment to art but this new “no rhyme, no structure” poetry is increasingly looking like essayists claiming to be poets to skip all the structure and length issues attendant to that medium. Run on sentences and fragments without flow or pattern just don’t do it for me. Glad we have a poet laureate that’s relevant today though.

Personally, I don't understand why Bob Dylan was never declared a poet laureate. (Would prefer Leonard Cohen, but he was Canadian...) Or Bruce Springsteen, John Prine, Townes Van Zandt, or today's Jason Isbell.

Poetry is taking thoughts one step further.It helps to finish thoughts. What would I do without it?

Thank you, NYT editors and staff, (and an eloquent Ms. Franklin!) for publishing this truly insightful, thoughtful piece. Ms. Smith (and Ms. Franklin, as her interpreter), give a true voice to all that poetry is about--and ought to be about...This piece is really quite inspiring. I look forward to the day when poetry makes a much-needed return to our daily lives, and communities, just as it once did for the ancient Greeks, who listened to the Iliad and the Odyssey being sung to wide audiences....(Idealistic, I know, but the healing powers of poetry are amazing, indeed....) I am also so impressed with Ms. Smith's efforts to make a difference in our (currently) incredibly "divided" country....Perhaps her poems will help to bridge some of the gaps....I hope so!!! Thanks again!

Poetry is best when it it outside the academy, when it speaks from and to the heart. Much poetry today seems to be simply poets speaking to other poets. Bravo to Ms. Smith for using her position as Plotus to open up the world of poetry by taking it to the people.

I started reading this profile while allegedly "working", having every intention of skimming and then coming back to it later. But I didn't do that. Two paragraphs in, I went to the website for the Portland Public Library and put every title by Tracy K. Smith on hold. This is a beautiful piece -- the journalism as lovely and as touching as the subject itself -- and it is incredibly exciting and rewarding to see the NYT giving this kind of time and depth to a remarkable poet. Really, nothing more to say, except that my day has been made by this love letter to language, memory and the power of an honest and rich voice.

excerpt from.... "My God, It's Full of Stars" by Tracey K. Smith.... Sometimes, what I see is a library in a rural community. All the tall shelves in the big open room. And the pencils In a cup at Circulation, gnawed on by the entire population. The books have lived here all along, belonging For weeks at a time to one or another in the brief sequence Of family names, speaking (at night mostly) to a face, A pair of eyes. The most remarkable lies.

I do not know when poets abandoned the rhyme and structure of poetry that I knew and liked as a young person and memorized such poems as "Invictus" or read and re read some of the works by Frost and Wadsworth. But I find the ambling poems published in the New Yorker to be very unrewarding. And I even try. I just find them to be more like run on sentences than an attempt to craft a poignant piece that carries beauty as well as meaning. But I also wonder why no one seems to be able to write a decent symphony. I doubt Ms Smith will gain much ground with the examples of her work in the article.

It's National Poetry Month, the perfect time to trumpet the truth that African-American poetry _is_ American poetry, as the brilliant work of Tracy K. Smith exemplifies. This inspiring article is a breath of fresh air among the fetid winds coming out of you know where.

I wish her well. However, most people, regardless of the age or era in which they lived in, have not been interested in poetry...other than poems the teacher required them to read and analyze for a course for a grade.

YES YES YES! Whoever doesn't live in poetry cannot survive here on earth. Halldor Laxness

Poetry might indeed cure many a disturbed spirit. But it is a fickle panacea. Poetry was written by Nero, Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Ayatollah Khomeini and even Bin Ladden. Saddam Hussein wrote poetry up until his end. It is a tool which gives a voice. What that voice says is another matter.

I cannot begin to say enough good things about this article or about Tracy K. Smith. Ms. Smith is a breath of fresh air as it pertains to contemporary writing in 2018. Ms. Smith's active role in the dissemination of poetry to the often neglected rural areas in America is a wise choice. America's rural areas possess as much poetry as the streets of Brooklyn. As a writer of color myself, I can relate to the struggles Ms. Smith experienced early on in her life and writing career. I attended and graduated from East Tennessee State University and often the literary community there, although well meaning, tended to cling to the thought that writing that was superior or worth praising came exclusively from white men. Ms. Smith is shattering all sorts of stereotypes with her writing and with the work that is doing as poet laureate. The aspiring and the accomplish writers would do well to take a page from Ms. Smith playbook, and find new or different ways to value, share, and explore poetry. Ms. Franklin, in her coverage of Ms. Smith, excelled journalistic excellence. As most journalists are now falling prey to the new trend of incorporating themselves into more and more interviews, Ms. Franklin simply shared a story in which poet is making good with the poetry she is sharing with the world. I tip my fedora to Ms. Franklin and Ms. Smith.