Triptych
By Joseph Ross
Two Men Raised, Right Panel
for James Byrd and Barack Obama
A man raised
his hand
to protect his face
from the rocks
on the Texas road where
they were dragging him.
He was tied with chains
to a pick-up truck
and dragged by
five centuries of blind men
who could only see
what they feared.
A man raised
his hand
on a January morning
to swear in public
that he could see
things he did not fear
and that the road
he would walk upon
had rocks
but no chains.
Two Men Raised, Left Panel
for Tommie Smith and John Carlos
In a summer of snipers
some men raised their hands
with fingers pressed
to triggers
trying to squeeze away
a generation’s hope.
But you lifted your hands
to conduct a choir
just learning to sing
anthems of a victory
not yet won.
The world watched you,
standing shoeless,
like so many others,
with no protection
from the earth itself,
its bullets, its boundaries
real as a waiting noose,
a lynching tree,
and a gathering crowd.
You raised your hands,
gloved and black
and held us all
for just a moment
where no rope
could reach.
Two Men Raised, Center Panel
for Martin Luther King, Jr, and Malcolm X
One of you is round
like water,
the other, angular
like water falling.
Both of you searched
for the house
where love could rest.
One had to walk
across a bruising bridge,
into a bombed out church,
where four little girls
stood silent.
The other walked out
of a burning house,
into a smoking prison
the size of a nation
only to end up kneeling
in a mosque the size
of the world.
One raised his hands
insisting on roses
while the other
insisted on the truth
of sand.
Joseph Ross lives in Silver Spring, Maryland and teaches part-time at American University in Washington, D.C., and is the interim poetry and lectures coordinator at the Folger Shakespeare Library. He’s been involved in the Washington, D.C., poetry community for about 10 years.
Great poem Joseph Ross. The first two were my favorite. I especially liked the poem to Tommie Smith and John Carlos. “You raised your hands, gloved and black and held us all for just a moment where no rope could reach”, is a powerful line. Great work.
Without addressing the poem as a whole, I do question the style of line breaks, which has become a bad habit in so much of contemporary poetry. What is the point of the break between “A man raised” and “his hand”? In this case there is no particular surprise offered by the predicate, that would justify the unnatural pause, oral or conceptual, that such a break suggests. It’s not as if we were expecting “A man raised / a cake.” Neither is there any consistent prosody, even a visual prosody, that justifies this. In a word, such a break is superfluous, and adds an unwelcome note of self-consciousness, artificial emphasis, and a forced and unearned sublimity.
I would read that as a slight break or pause in oral performance, and it feels appropriate to me; the lack of a line break in later uses of the same phrase feels similarly appropriate when reading them out loud.
The normal reading of prose is filled with small breaks, or large breaks, that are a natural part of the progression of thought, or the sequence of grammatical units. Promoting such pauses to the status of line breaks does violence to the sense, to the grammar, and to taste, and diminishes the power of other line breaks which have much greater justification.
As you wish.
Powerful work Joseph. My hands are raised in gratitude for these poems, and for the blessing of your spirit.
Thanks to all of your for your comments. I appreciate them. I will think more about the line breaks though they are all quite intentional. Thanks for making comments. I’m always grateful for the dialogue which art begins.
Thanks Joseph. I care a lot about line breaks, especially in non-metrical poetry, when it’s the main thing marking it as verse. Every one should be earned.
I agree and I appreciate your comments. I’m glad you would tkae the time to look into the mechanics deeply. I work at them too– thinking more about the line itself and within that, how the break creates the line. One can always revisit and look more deeply at them. Thank you.
I love your line breaks and your spare use of language. It’s all part of your powerful style.
Thanks, Yvette. I appreciate your words as I know the strength of your poetry too.