Visionary Vibes: A Blog by Aberjhani

Why Genocide in Ukraine Matters to A Black Poet in America (Pt. 2 of 2)

4/7/2022

Once underway, Russia’s “special military operation” immediately brought to mind all the most inhumane atrocities human beings have committed against other human beings. Mainstream media groaned about how nothing like it had been seen on the European continent since World War II. For me, the specific tools and strategy involved to carry out the slaughter were less significant than the intent to commit it.

(If you missed part 1 of this essay and wish to read it please click here.)

In how many forms over how many centuries have we seen the same barbaric inclination manifest with heartbreaking blood-drenched results? Ukrainians in particular will recall: there was once a neighboring country near the Black Sea called Circassia, but it no longer exists because Russia did to it (1830s-1870s) exactly what Russia is attempting to do to Ukraine at this historic 2022 moment.

They will remember in particular the Ukraine famine of 1932-1933 which ended the lives of almost 4 million people. They cannot forget the take-over of Crimea in 2014. When considering these things, it becomes easier to understand why they have opted overwhelmingly to die in battle rather than exist in a repressive autocracy proclaiming itself a democracy.

Some Useful Lessons

For humanity as a whole, it remains difficult to understand why we insist on duplicating the ignorance of the past instead of building upon whatever wisdom might be gleaned from it. If the enslavement of Africans and the eventual rejection of their chains had not been enough, then some kind of useful lessons should have been learned from: the Holocaust (1941-1945, approx. 11 million killed, including Jews, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Romas, Gays, and others); the Cambodian “Killing Fields” Genocide (17 April 1975- January 1979, nearly 2 million killed); and the Rwandan Genocide (7 April to 15 July 1994, approx. 800,000 killed).

From 2 to 6 million is a number often cited when calculating Black lives lost during the Transatlantic Slave Trade. Nobel laureate Toni Morrison put the figure at 60 million. The number of Black lives lost during the process of capturing Africans combined with that of Blacks who died in slavery throughout the resulting diaspora may very well be incalculable. What is certain is the documented assumptions of members of one population deciding they possessed the right––some convinced themselves it was an obligation––to destroy the cultural integrity of another population.

‘A Large-scale and Treacherous War’

Whether Russia’s ceaseless bombing of Ukraine may be properly defined as genocide is something scholars and politicians might debate but which Ukrainians cannot. Virtually addressing Israeli lawmakers on March 20, 2022, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy pointed out:

“This is a large-scale and treacherous war aimed at destroying our people. Destroying our children, our families. Our state. Our cities. Our communities. Our culture. And everything that makes Ukrainians Ukrainians. Everything that Russian troops are now destroying. Deliberately. In front of the whole world.”

For me, now a month and a half later, it has been too much like watching the proverbial oversized bully flanked by two Goliaths even larger than he taking turns punching a solitary 99-pound book-wormish classmate. Except the bully came armed with tanks, warplanes, and long-range missiles, and the bullies’ victim was not a solitary school boy.

The victim is a sovereign democratic nation which at the beginning of the war, on February 24, 2022, had a population estimated at 44.1 million. At this point, a quarter of Ukraine’s population has been displaced, including more than 4 million refugees fled to other countries. Videos of atrocities committed in Mariupol, Bucha, Borodyanka, Irpin, and elsewhere have left the international community stunned with disbelief.

Injustice Anywhere

At least three times each year--when honoring his birth, acknowledging the pain of his assassination, and commemorating the 1963 March on Washington, DC––people across the globe invoke the teachings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on nonviolence and human rights. One of his most memorable pronouncements states: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

Dr. King’s words clearly do not end with considerations of the social, political, or cultural battles undertaken by Black Americans and which have placed them among the foremost defenders of justice and democracy in the United States. The concept is easily applicable to the now famous blue and yellow shades of Ukraine’s enduring flag.

In his historic appeal to the U.S. Congress on March 16, 2022 , Ukraine President Zelenskyy cited King’s I Have a Dream speech and paraphrased his key refrain to emphasize:

“I can say, ‘I have a need: I need to protect our sky.’ I need your decision, your help, which means exactly the same, the same you feel when you hear the words ‘I have a dream.’”

Who, watching the reduction of Ukraine’s beautiful citizens and cities to piles of corpses and rubble, can doubt they are witnessing injustice in its most malevolent form? What could be more unjust than a sustained concentrated effort to erase an entire people’s culture, history, and presence from the earth? A day will come soon enough when onlookers denouncing the onslaught will have to decide whether efforts to help stem the rushing streams of blood have been meaningful in any significant life-saving way, or if they merely constituted an unintentional form of further enabling orchestrators of the butchery in Ukraine.

By Aberjhani
(© National Poetry Month 2022)
Author of Dreams of the Immortal City Savannah
and Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind
Creator of Original Silk-Featherbrush Artstyle

For more from Aberjhani on War in Ukraine 2022 please check out:
            Why Genocide in Ukraine Matters to a Black Poet in America Part 1
            Holiday Letter for a Poet Gone to War Poem with Video
           Volodymyr Zelensky and the Angel of Peace 2022
Ukraine, Russia, and the Art of Being Human
Angel of War and the Year 2022
Voices of Poets on War and Peace

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National Poetry Month 2022: Taking Flight on Wings of Early Morning Light

4/2/2022

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The late Luther E. Vann (Dec 2, 1937–April 6, 2016) and I worked as hard as we did to complete ELEMENTAL, The Power of Illuminated Love, because we hoped the end results would help inspire people to employ healing creative vision, rather than destructive violence, to resolve various forms of conflict. I’ve thought about that a lot since the beginning of Russia’s war in Ukraine. I thought about it further after seeing beloved actor Will Smith’s now forever-infamous assault upon comedian Chris Rock during the live broadcast of the 2022 Academy Awards. (Will Smith since then has reportedly resigned from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.)

The poem below, “Wings of Early Morning Light,” was published in ELEMENTAL and I am posting it at this time for several reasons. One is to celebrate National Poetry Month 2022. Another is to commemorate the sixth anniversary of Luther’s death. It is also to continue the Poems for Ukraine series begun with Angel of War and the Year 2022. And, finally, the fourth is to reaffirm at a time when the world can use such reaffirmations, ELEMENTAL’s major themes: creative problem-solving respectful of life as innately sacred, mindfulness strengthened by compassion, and coexistence anchored by the power of illuminated love.

The first public announcement that the late artist Luther E. Vann and author Aberjhani had begun working on ELEMENTAL, The Power of Illuminated Love, appeared in the former weekly Savannah College of Art & Design (SCAD) Newspaper called The Georgia Guardian on June 25, 1993.

Wings of Early Morning Light

Gliding above the ruins of the world’s broken soul
destruction and mutation speak in parables of the
ignoble history that dragged us here, and glittery
prophecies promising kingdoms and glories to come.

A man traveling on wings of early morning light
(this man, that man, the man that a woman is)
suddenly captivated by a group of children gathered
around a fire. Away from this circle an infant
pinned to an oak tree, knives and daggers crucifying
every possibility it managed to bring to this world.

“We’ve learned,” said an elder child,
“to rid ourselves of life before it can hurt us
too bad. That way we hurry up to the next existence
where beauty hopefully will join us.”

“But do you pray before you act? Or have you
taken barbarism for your imam and your prophet?”

“Prayer is a chasm of delusion for the hopeless.
Wouldn’t you agree our good wise brother?”

“No, I would not little brother.”

A volley of blades and arrows cripple his flight.
The man traveling on wings of early morning light
gathers into his soul visions of exultant sorrow
and sorrowful joy. From his spirit blood drops
like petals of night and bright crimson rapture.

The rocks below split like ancient wombs opening
to the language of an unwritten history, to the
lights and music of a city we’ve yet to create.
Six billion people shout one new soul into the universe.
Dawn opens the sky like prayers from a god just waking up.
(from ELEMENTAL, The Power of Illuminated Love)

Aberjhani
Author of Dreams of the Immortal City Savannah
and Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind
Creator of Original Silk-Featherbrush Artstyle

More from Aberjhani on National Poetry Month and War in Ukraine
Holiday Letter for a Poet Gone to War Poem with Video
Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the Angel of Peace 2022
Ukraine, Russia, and the Art of Being Human
Angel of War and the Year 2022
Voices of Poets on War and Peace

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5 Reasons Sympathy for Trumpsurrectionists in Short Supply

1/12/2021

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(“Freedom & Accountability” art by Aberjhani for Bright Skylark Literary Productions C2021)

Members of the U.S. Congress and millions of American citizens in general are finding it very hard to think in terms of compassion when it comes to participants in the Trumpsurrection of January 6, 2021, at Capitol Hill in Washington DC, USA. Here are five painful reasons why:

1) The country was already reeling from the crippling blow dealt by COVID-19, which during the week of the Trumpsurrection reportedly was averaging 2,700 deaths daily. On the day of the event, which itself may now be described as a super-spreader, the country hit a then record high of 3,964 deaths. The next day the number shot up to more than 4,000. With the virus itself having long been described as “the invisible enemy,” Trumpsurrectionists have become easily viewed as allies of the same.

2) According to repeated alerts issued by the FBI, the January 6 Trumpsurrection was only the first of a series of planned attacks veiled as protest demonstrations. More “armed protests” are scheduled to take place nationwide from January 16-20. Just as the initial domestic terrorist assault successfully replaced the victorious historical Senate elections of Rev. Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff in media headlines, the planned mayhem has already begun to disrupt news of annual Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebrations. Likewise, they are becoming a dominant point of focus over the inauguration of Joe Biden as the 46th president of the Unites States, and Kamala Harris as the first woman, and person of African and Indian descent, as the vice president.

3) The relative ease with which Trumpsurrectionists were able to breach Capitol defenses with seeming minimal opposition from “overwhelmed” law enforcement officials has magnified the issue of disparity when it comes to how predominantly White groups have been treated at protest events in DC under the current administration in sharp contrast to the way Black Lives Matter advocates have (not to mention the pile-up of bodies of Black bodies shot down by police throughout 2020). Whereas Blacks have been routinely met and halted in their tracks by a heavily-armed uniformed presence organized far in advance of announced BLM protests, Trumpsurrectionists were literally invited by POTUS to come to Capitol Hill and show their strength. One the shock of what had occurred began to lessen, officials did move to announce charges and make arrests.

4) For the first time in their collective memory, members of the U.S. Congress found their collective physical presence directly involved in the kind life-and-death situation which members of America’s armed forces have dealt with all the years of war in Afghanistan and elsewhere. People armed with assault guns, pipe bombs, restraint ties, and incredible disregard for the processes of democracy have a way of convincing lawmaker to rethink their sense of power and authority versus a suddenly-consuming awareness of individual mortality.

5) What once may have been considered the current POTUS’s bold charismatic style of leadership incorporating pragmatism and the manipulation of manufactured chaos (with disinformation and misinformation often-favored tools) is no longer viewed as such. It has been branded a high-level fascist threat to America’s security, the health of its citizens, and the future of its economy. An unprecedented second impeachment of a U.S. president in whom millions obviously believe very deeply is not something on which most leaders would prefer to spend time, energy, or resources while a pandemic continues to rage like a global wildfire. However, given the state of vulnerability and explosive violence into which said president has plunged America, the political disciplinarians who would see the country remain intact have to take at least one last cue from the POTUS and “be strong.” That has meant, in lieu of the attempt to convince Vice President Vice President to invoke the 25th amendment, moving ahead with that historic second impeachment.

In Conclusion

The events we tag as history have a way of derailing planned intentions, good or otherwise, and revising stories already in progress. That clearly became the case for every American with the domestic terrorist attack, referred to herein as the Trumpsurrection, on January 6, 2021. It was the same for millions of non-American with various business, political, or family ties to the country, who experienced excruciating disruptions of their lives altered.

Different individual leanings and cultural or political persuasions are always going to stir disagreements regarding issues as minor as what to watch on TV, or as major who should receive COVID-19 vaccinations first. Does that mean they can only be resolved, after all these centuries of evolving and supposedly learning better, through violent conflict? If ours was still an era in which we still used clubs or spears as major instruments of survival and we had not developed to a point where we can communicate proficiently through multiple mediums, the preceding question might not be considered rhetorical. What baffles so many at this bizarre moment in history, following a year in which the coronavirus forced communities worldwide to realize how truly inextricably interwoven our lives are, is why such a question has to be posed with any intention whatsoever.

Aberjhani
Co-author of Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance
Author of Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind

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Reflecting on the Year 2016 and stepping not-too-boldly into 2017 (part 2 of 2)

12/13/2016

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Reflecting on Years 2016 & 2017 Postered Poetics with essay by Aberjhani.

If you missed part 1 of this article you can check it out here: Reflecting on the Year 2016 & stepping not-too-boldly into 2017 part 1. Part 2 begins now:

Increasing tensions between law enforcement agencies and African-American communities, the twin scourges of terrorism and war, and off-the-chain “natural disasters” too often rearranged priorities in 2016 whether we wanted them to or not.

The massacres in Orlando (Florida, USA) on June 12, in Bagdad (Iraq) on July 3, Nice (France) July 14, the shocker in Munich (Germany) on July 22, as well as too many others that followed, provided additional support for the theory that more and more people are becoming as addicted to insanityas millions are to heroine and prescription pain drugs. And all of this in addition to the ongoing slaughter in Syria.
Acknowledging the hurtful issues that drive destructive behavior on different levels is the first important step to resolving them.

Confronting the Unimaginable in Aleppo, Syria

On Bullets and Beauty Queens

One of the most unsettling trends of the past year has been different kinds of retaliatory violence. Lessons previously learned about the futility of an “eye-for-an-eye” mentality seem to have been forgotten and led to one of President Barack Obama’s most moving eulogies on July 12, 2016, in Dallas, Texas. Unfortunately, at the same time Barack Obama sought to convince Americans their highly-publicized “racial divide” is not as terrible as many believe, former Miss Alabama beauty queen Kalyn Chapman James, an African-American, found herself under fire for describing the killer of the policemen Mr. Obama was eulogizing in terms which her employers felt inappropriate.

The president’s remarks––whether one agrees or disagrees with them––drew responses ranging from pained silence to enthusiastic applause. Ms. Chapman’s remarks earned her a suspension from her job and made her the target of vehement verbal attacks across social media and pockets of mainstream news media.

What may be most disturbing about the violent responses to James’ comments are the way they demonstrate why initiatives such as Black Lives Matter and other humanitarian enterprises are needed at this moment in history: to defend and preserve the essence of humanity common to us all.

Ms. James’ did not advocate violence of any kind. Nor did she promote a hate-inspired belief or conviction. Her emotional reaction should have indicated nothing more than that she, like anyone else, possesses a capacity for legitimate feelings that are an important part of what makes all of us human. Why should she be any less entitled to experiencing and articulating them than anyone else?

Moreover, that feeling was obviously the same one of bewildering agony which millions experienced following the killing of officers: Lorne Ahrens, Michael Krol, Michael Smith, Patrick Zamarripa, and Brent Thompson; and after the violent deaths of Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Philando Castile of St. Paul, Minnesota. Why should any human being have been expected to express flawless articulation in such an overheated moment of infamous history?

Shaped by Different Experiences

At the very core of what has made the existence of so-called radical or militant groups inevitable in the United States has been the tendency of too many to dismiss the validity of one demographic group’s feelings, or values or customs or needs, over that of another. Nor has the inclination to restrict such liberties as an individual’s “freedom of speech” or their right to equal opportunities helped solidify the unity so many are calling for at this troubled hour. President Obama questioned this tendency when he asked during the eulogy in Dallas, “Can we see in each other a common humanity and a shared dignity, and recognize how our different experiences have shaped us?”

While some may not like the way America’s president-elect utilized knowledge of those different experiences, it has become obvious that he tapped into assumptions and xenophobia associated with them to win his place in the White House and in history.

Actor and Advocate Jesse Williams' Stirring Declaration on Why Black Lives Matter

Something to Think About

Consider the noted inclination to dismiss the fear experienced by some in contrast to how various Stand Your Ground Laws virtually canonize the emotion for “others.” In the name of fear the statute gives law enforcement officials and gun owners in general the right to end lives––be they Black, White, Yellow, Red, Brown, or neutral–– based on fear. More than one study has shown that the deleted life in such instances, more often than not, is of a person of color.

Many of the challenges before us as individuals, nations, and as a species, can be either as complex or simple as we choose to make them. So can potential solutions.

Andra Day: A Powerful Voice of Hope Emerges in 2016 and Soars into 2017

As we bid farewell to the year 2016 and step not-too-boldly into the New Year 2017, one of the most often-repeated refrains from the Obama administration begins to increase in volume: We still have a lot of work to do. Moreover, we should have learned enough from 2016 to give ourselves a better chance at succeeding in 2017.

Aberjhani
Bright Skylark Literary Productions
©Dec 2016/January 2017

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Sustaining the Sweet Joyful Howl of Poetry in the 21st Century

4/3/2016

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“Individuals often turn to poetry, not only to glean strength and perspective from the words of others, but to give birth to their own poetic voices and to hold history accountable for the catastrophes rearranging their lives.” --Aberjhani from Splendid Literarium: A Treasury of Stories, Aphorisms, Poems, and Essays. ©Postered Poetics based on original poetry Spencerian calligraphy art by G.A. Gaskell. #NPM16 #PocketPoem

The launch of National Poetry Month, sponsored by the Academy of American Poets, in April 1996, came just three years after the debut issue of the Savannah Literary Journal in 1993. In addition to 49 poems by 35 brilliant writers with regional and national reputations, the 1996 edition of the journal featured six works of fiction and three pieces of creative nonfiction.

My contribution to the journal that year was a personal essay but the title of it, Angels and Shakespeare (later published in I Made My Boy Out of Poetry), revealed the central place verse has always held in my life. So did this epigraph borrowed from the Chilean poet Pablo Neruda:

“For this reason Monday burns like
oil... and it howls in passing like a
wounded wheel...”

(Pablo Neruda, from Walking Around)

Both National Poetry Month and the publication of the journal (up until 2001) could be considered as invitations to readers, writers, and publishers to explore a more deeply intimate relationship with language. These invitations coaxed them as well to experience the different levels of power words can wield when endowing our lives with either newly-claimed or wholly-unexpected meaning.

The responses, now 20 years down the timeline, have mushroomed into a worldwide cultural mainstay where National Poetry Month (NPM) is concerned. In regard to the Savannah Literary Journal, published by the former Savannah Writers Workshop, it has confirmed the value of one of the city’s most prized artistic legacies.

Of Bloggers and Nobel Laureates

But what should we say of poetry as a whole during the last two decades when life as so many once knew it shape-shifted into a spinning mass of digital signals, globalized communities unbounded by geographic borders, and astounding varieties of terror clashing head-on with determined demands for liberty?

Former Poetry Society of Georgia member Gerald Chan Sieg (1909-2005) receiving the Savannah Literary Journal Irene Tromble McAlister Literary Prize from editor Robert Keber in 1999. (photo Bright Skylark Literary Productions Collection)

That now populous demographic of humanity known as bloggers did not exist in 1996 and programmer Peter Merholz would not condense the term “weblog” to invent the word “blog” until 1999. Nevertheless, poetically-inclined bloggers during the first and second decades of this 21st century have done a great deal to ensure poetry occupies a prominent position within the global imagination and humanity’s collective ethical consciousness.

Moreover, the ever-mindful Nobel Prize Committee actually saw fit in 1996 to award the Nobel Prize in Literature to Polish poet Wislawa Szymborska (1923-2012) "for poetry that with ironic precision allows the historical and biological context to come to light in fragments of human reality." And in 2011 it bestowed that same honor upon Sweden’s Tomas Tranströmer , "because, through his condensed, translucent images, he gives us fresh access to reality."

A Movement Designed to Inspire

Obviously the Academy of American Poets’ commitment to recognizing, honoring, and documenting literary excellence within the work of American Poets did not begin with the establishment of NPM. That happened back in 1934 when founder Marie Bullock surveyed America’s literary landscape and came to a certain conclusion.

Despite the quietly-evolving cultural canonization at the time of such poets as Langston Hughes (1902-1967), Jean Toomer (1894-1967), Carl Sandburg (1878–1967), William Carlos Williams (1883-1963), E.E. Cummings (1894-1962), T.S. Eliot (1888-1965), and other American quill-masters of the period, it became apparent that more needed to be done to place poetry on some level of esteem comparable to what it stirred in the literary capitals—such as Paris, London, and Dublin––of Europe.

National Poetry Month more than half a century later represented a game-changing upgrade from previous efforts. Since its start, affiliated programs each successive year have helped observations to grow in scope and influence. Initiatives such as Poem in Your Pocket Day (observed this year on April 21), the Dear Poet Project, and Poem-A-Day (via email) contribute immensely to sustaining the sweet joyful howl of poetry in these new millennial times. The key words and hashtags that dominate social media every April––like #npm16, #pocketpoem, #jazzpoetry, #celebratingpoetry, and the tagged names of favorite poets––denote only one small measure of how successful the campaign has become.

Cover of Academy of American Poets Journal Vol 50 NPM16. “Greens, Biopsy 2” Digital C Print 2007 by artist Yedda Morrison.

It also did not hurt when citizens of the United States elected a lover and writer of poetry, Barack H. Obama, as their first African-American president in 2008. The following is from a 2009 essay written to commemorate both NPM and Jazz Appreciation Month:

…The birth of the Academy meant the birth of a movement designed to inspire, cultivate, and preserve the voice of American poets. And although it likely was not his intention to do so, President Barack Obama extended that movement not only by bearing the “stigma” of being an accomplished wordsmith but by inviting Elizabeth Alexander––an author of several books but of whom many had never heard until Obama spoke her name––to serve as his Inauguration Day poet.

(Aberjhani, from All that National Poetry Month Jazz)

If there is one thing populations of the world have needed, and received, from poetry for the past two decades, it has been inspiration. But not only inspiration in that classic form which reaffirms the value of faith.

Poetry in our post 9/11 era provides the kind of inspiration that defiantly raises poets’ voices against the brutalities of war, the insanities of terrorism, and the indignities of oppression in all its toxic forms. It empowers the simplest of lives to confront the most extreme sorrows with courage, and motivates the mightiest of offices to humbly heed lessons in compassion.

Although the last edition (to date) of the Savannah Literary Journal was published in 2001, its legacy continues to stand as a richly inspiring one. Many of the poets, essayists, fiction writers, and creative nonfiction writers featured in its pages have since gone on to win national and international acclaim in various fields. These are but a few listed in no particular order: Janice Daugharty, Linda Rocheleau, Darryl Lorenzo Wellington, David C. Hightower, Susan Johnson, Lily Keber, Ja A. Jahannes (1942 -2015), Errol Miller, Kathleen Thompson, Toussaint St. Negritude, Dufflyn Lammers, Anis Mojgani, and Vaughnette Goode-Walker. Again, these represent only a few.

Most would probably tell you their greatest contributions to the literary arts thus far have not been particular poems or stories or books. They have instead been the relationships cultivated with the hearts and souls who heard what they had to say and then drew from that hearing enough motivation to speak their own truths to power and pain and joy.

Despite the Cacophony

Whether through contributors to literary journals, the sustained dedicated efforts of members of the Academy of American Poets, or bloggers content just to have a platform where they could post lines at will, poetry has maintained a dynamic living breathing presence in the world.

Despite the cacophony of bombs and bullets which so often drown out the music of laughter (or possibly because of them) poetry at this point in history may very well be more commanding than any other previous time. There are many reasons to believe its potency, and its beauty, shall grow even stronger in the future.

Aberjhani
© National Poetry Month 2016
Bright Skylark Literary Productions

2016 National Poetry Month poster featuring a florilegium with text excerpted from poems by diverse classic and contemporary poets. The poster was designed by Debbie Millman and produced by Emily Weiland. NPM16

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Why Genocide in Ukraine Matters to A Black Poet in America (Pt. 2 of 2)

Some Useful Lessons

‘A Large-scale and Treacherous War’

Injustice Anywhere

Contact Aberjhani at Bright Skylark Literary Productions

National Poetry Month 2022: Taking Flight on Wings of Early Morning Light

Wings of Early Morning Light

Contact Aberjhani at Bright Skylark Literary Productions

5 Reasons Sympathy for Trumpsurrectionists in Short Supply

In Conclusion

Aberjhani
Co-author of Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance
Author of Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind

Reflecting on the Year 2016 and stepping not-too-boldly into 2017 (part 2 of 2)

Confronting the Unimaginable in Aleppo, Syria

On Bullets and Beauty Queens

Shaped by Different Experiences

Actor and Advocate Jesse Williams' Stirring Declaration on Why Black Lives Matter

Something to Think About

Andra Day: A Powerful Voice of Hope Emerges in 2016 and Soars into 2017

Sustaining the Sweet Joyful Howl of Poetry in the 21st Century

Of Bloggers and Nobel Laureates

A Movement Designed to Inspire

Despite the Cacophony

Aberjhani

Archives

Categories

Why Genocide in Ukraine Matters to A Black Poet in America (Pt. 2 of 2)

Some Useful Lessons

‘A Large-scale and Treacherous War’

Injustice Anywhere

Contact Aberjhani at Bright Skylark Literary Productions

National Poetry Month 2022: Taking Flight on Wings of Early Morning Light

​Wings of Early Morning Light

Contact Aberjhani at Bright Skylark Literary Productions

5 Reasons Sympathy for Trumpsurrectionists in Short Supply

In Conclusion

AberjhaniCo-author of Encyclopedia of the Harlem RenaissanceAuthor of Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind

Reflecting on the Year 2016 and stepping not-too-boldly into 2017 (part 2 of 2)

Confronting the Unimaginable in Aleppo, Syria

On Bullets and Beauty Queens

Shaped by Different Experiences

Actor and Advocate Jesse Williams' Stirring Declaration on Why Black Lives Matter

Something to Think About

Andra Day: A Powerful Voice of Hope Emerges in 2016 and Soars into 2017

Sustaining the Sweet Joyful Howl of Poetry in the 21st Century

Of Bloggers and Nobel Laureates

A Movement Designed to Inspire

Despite the Cacophony

Aberjhani

Archives

Categories

Wings of Early Morning Light

Aberjhani
Co-author of Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance
Author of Greeting Flannery O’Connor at the Back Door of My Mind