The Future of Black: Afrofuturism, Black Comics, and Superhero Poetry

by Gary Jackson (Editor), Len Lawson (Editor), Cynthia Manick (Editor)

Overview

The expansion of Marvel and DC Comics’ characters such as Black Panther, Luke Cage, and Black Lightning in film and on television has created a proliferation of poetry in this genre—receiving wide literary and popular attention.

This groundbreaking collection highlights work from poets who have written verse within this growing tradition, including Terrance Hayes, Lucille Clifton, Gil Scott-Heron, A. Van Jordan, Glenis Redmond, Tracy K. Smith, Teri Ellen Cross Davis, Joshua Bennett, Douglas Kearney, Tara Betts, Frank X Walker, Tyree Daye, and others. In addition, the anthology will also feature the work of artists such as John Jennings and Najee Dorsey, showcasing their interpretations of superheroes, Black comic characters, Afrofuturistic images from the African diaspora.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781949467673
Publisher:	Blair
Publication date:	11/02/2021
Pages:	234
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Gary Jackson is the author of the poetry collection Missing You, Metropolis (Graywolf, 2010), which received the 2009 Cave Canem Poetry Prize. His poems have appeared in numerous literary journals including Callaloo, Tin House, Los Angeles Review of Books, and Crab Orchard Review.

Len Lawson is the author of Chime (Get Fresh Books, 2019), the chapbook Before the Night Wakes You (Finishing Line Press, 2017), and co-editor of Hand in Hand: Poets Respond to Race (Muddy Ford Press, 2017). He has received fellowships from Tin House, Callaloo, Vermont Studio Center, and Virginia Center for the Creative Arts. His website is www.lenlawson.co.

Cynthia Manick is the author of Blue Hallelujahs (Black Lawrence Press, 2016), which won the 2016 Lascaux Prize in Collected Poetry, and editor of Soul Sister Revue: A Poetry Compilation (Jamii Publishing, 2019). She has received fellowships from Cave Canem, Hedgebrook, and MacDowell Colony. Her website is www.cynthiamanick.com.

Read an Excerpt

final note to clark

by Lucille Clifton

they had it wrong,
the old comics.
you are only clark kent after all. oh,
mild mannered mister,
why did i think you could fix it?
how you must have wondered to see me taking chances,
dancing on the edge of words,
pointing out the bad guys,
dreaming your x-ray vision could see the beauty in me.
what did i expect? what did i hope for? we are who we are,
two faithful readers,
not wonder woman and not superman.

new note to clark kent
after Lucille Clifton

by Frank X Walker

even you are not hero enough to lift half this country out from under so much ignorance

not with fake news and alternate truths tweeted around the planet daily tongue-tying the daily planet.

you can beat batman, bare-handed, but because dark money be bigger

you powerless against the kryptonite of rich man and hate
Man

and if orange man was a comic character, if lex luthor had comb over hair he would be elected president and DC would immediately repeal marvel

while you and an army, all white, all male, all privileged fall out of the sky on sunday talk shows insisting the sky isnʼt falling

Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane No. 106
for Clif, using words from the comic book

by Ashley M. Jones

on this daily planet, my life is good luck, all supermen at my service—I should get the pulitzer prize on the backs of metropolis’ black community / wait / tenements perplex me—how can I break through this plague, their suspicious speech, these slick-mouthed babies and their knock-slam slang // homeless ghosts on this daily planet, what is the reason for their weary report / look how the sun shines sweet and pretty on their rat-infested slums // it’s okay, I’m right / I’m whitey, never forget // Little Africa is dejected, a neighborhood of frustration / I’ll step into this machine and transform, a startling switch / Black for a day only / the hum zoom of the world staring / the smoke of white fragility / its gloomy firetrap // Black is beautiful / have you met it before, reporter / the eternal struggle of life against death by darkness / a life of please, look me straight in the eye / the constant confrontation of being Black and alive in a white man’s world / a universal outsider // so alien, even Superman couldn’t risk loving you//

Dear Superman

by Cynthia Manick

Tell yourself what you will that you wait patiently to tip your Clark hat and jaw to every Sara, Lois, or bright haired Jane. Women with coiffed hair, pink lips, and cosmetics lightly placed. Delicate shades that blush so nicely on paper,
TV and high resolution film.
But I see how the animal of your body passes by the dark girls. Girls with names like Esther, Jaleesa, or Cantina
Rose. Girls who wear glasses and dresses with the slip showing.
Women of strong flavors—
hot peppers between their legs and a storm inside. Those girls secretly stir you from liver to toenail.
And they too crave strong arms—a cape to cradle inside, and have dreams of sleeping between stars.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

• Sheree Reneé Thomas, “The Sun Burnt Up and Other Reasons to Riot”
• Introduction from the Editors

MAN OF STEEL
• Borelson, Unleashed
• Lucille Clifton, “if i should,” “further note to clark,” “final note to clark,” “note passed to superman”
• Frank X. Walker, “new note to clark kent”
• Turtel Onli, M10
• teri elam, “Superman Retires”
• Ashley M. Jones, “Superman’s Girlfriend Lois Lane No. 106”
• Cynthia Manick, “Dear Superman”

MORE SUPERHEROES
• John Jennings, Afrofuturism
• Gary Jackson, “Nightcrawler Buys a Woman a Drink”
• Yorli Huff, Superhero Huff
• A. Van Jordan, “The Flash Reverses Time”
• Keith S. Wilson, “Aubade on Bachelorhood and Never Becoming the Flash”
• Tony Medina, “Blue Dick Blue Balls”
• Loretta Diane Walker, "Princess Diana of Themyscira, Aka Wonder Woman"

BLACK SUPERHEROES
• Yorli Huff, Superhero Huff
• Steven Leyva, “Ode to Static”
• Derrick Weston Brown, “Bruuuuuh or When Brothers Debate Black Panther in a Safeway parking Lot.”
• Tara Betts, “Storm Writes to Black Panther,” “Oya Invites Storm to Tea”
• Sheree Reneé Thomas, “If There Is Darkness,”
• Grisel Acosta, “I of the Hurricane”
• Amanda Johnston, “Blade Speaks at Career Day”
• Borelson, Channeling the Energy
• Tim Seibles, “Blade, the Daywalker,” “Blade, Historical,” “Blade, Unplugged”
• Cynthia Manick, “Praise for Luke Cage’s Skin and Starshine”
• Gary Jackson, “Luke Cage Tells It Like It Is”

BLACK ANTIHEROES
• Wolly McNair, Raven
• Sheree Reneé Thomas, “Eartha Kitt Reflects On Cat Woman”
• Steven Leyva, “Ode to Lando Calrissian”
• Len Lawson, The Amanda Waller Suite “Episode 1: Amanda Waller Enters the War Room,” “Episode 2: Amanda Waller Attracts a Bat,” “Episode 3: Amanda Waller Has a Woman-to-Woman with Harley Quinn,” “Episode 4: Amanda Waller Assembles a Suicide Squad”
• John Jennings, Ajala
• Rodney Wilder, “Invocation”
• Cortney Lamar Charleston, “Elegy for Kilmonger With My Own Pain Entering Frame”
• Frank X. Walker, “New Rules for Crime Fighting”

BLACK POP CULTURE
• Najee Dorsey, Southern Futurist over Civil War Soil
• Saida Agostini, “the ending where queen and slim live”
• Derrick Weston Brown, “So Jon Snow and Colin Kaepernick are in a pub…”
• Alice Kandolo, Let's Party in Space
• Tara Betts, “Before Sasha Lights a Bonfire,” “To Lieutenant Nyota Uhura”
• Casey Rocheteau, “Sun Ra Speaks to Gucci Mane”
• TJ Anderson, “Space is the Place”
• Qunicy Scott Jones, “‘post-racial' as Samuel L. Jackson”

BLACK HISTORY
• Karo Duro, city upon a hill
• Joshua Bennett, “Frederick Douglass Is Dead”
• Quentin VerCetty, the new Queen's Gates
• Yona Harvey, "In Toni Morrison's Head"
• Keith S. Wilson, “uncanny emmett till”
• Yorli Huff, Agent Huff
• Ashley M. Jones, “Soul Power / James Brown Time Loop”
• Peter Schmidt, “Octavius V. Catto”
• avery r. young, “(((in my marvin gaye voice))) light year(s) / ahead friday (2020) – poem”
• Moriah S. Webster, “Harlem [3]”
• Joshua Bennett, “When Thy King Was a Boy”

VIDEO GAMES & FANTASY
• Karo Duro, Woman of sand and stone
• Trace DePass, “ode to pokemon trainer Red”
• Ashley Harris, “God Usopp,” “Majora’s Mask,” “Ode to Pinky and the Brain”
• Wolly McNair, Black Magic Is Only Bad in the Movies
• Rico Frederick, “Keep De Hacksaw on Mary Poppin's Throat”
• Cortney Lamar Charleston, “Grand Theft Auto III (2001)”
• Douglas Kearney, from “Over Deluxe AF,” “Maroon AF,” “But Black, It Can’t—"

NEW ORIGINS
• Alex Kandolo, Galaxy Woman
• Dexter Booth, “Jim Crow’s Dirge”
• Glenis Redmond, “How to Become Your Own Supershero”
• Joshua Bennett, “The Book of Mycah”
• Najee Dorsey, B4-Rosa—Here I Stand
• Teri Ellen Cross David, “Origin Story”
• Cagen Luse, Generations
• Tony Medina, “Five Chanclas of Death,” “The Original”
• Terrance Hayes, “Shafro,” “American Sonnet for My Past and Future Assassin”
• Douglas Kearney, “I Imagine I Been Science Fiction Always”
• Saida Agostini, “speculative fiction: apocalypse”
• Derrick Weston Brown, “Derrick Weston Brown Sonsplains AfroFuturist/Speculative Social Science to his Mother, a therapist who is also a longtime member of The National Association of Black Social Workers”

NEW FAITH CONSTRUCTS
• Karo Duro, The oracle
• Richard Garcia, “Black Jesus”
• Khalif Thompson, Toyin Salau
• Rico Frederick, “A Better Savior”
• Bianca X, “Creation Myth”
• Natalie J. Graham, “The Origin of Moths”
• Craig Stevens, “As It Is in Heaven”

BLACK WOMEN NARRATIVES
• Nikki Giovanni, “Ego Tripping (there may be a reason why)”
• Teri Ellen Cross Davis, “The Goddess of Anger”
• Ashley M. Jones, “Friendly Skies, or Black Woman Speaks Herself into God”
• Kevin Johnson, Looking for Hope
• Tim Fab-Eme, “Mitochondrial Eve”
• Kevin Johnson, Resolving Sorrow
• Terese Mason Pierre, “La Diablesse”
• Maurya Kerr, “Sonnet I”
• Karo Duro, Arch Angel
• Tony Medina, “Well, You Needn’t”
• Les James, “Why Black Women Write Horror Stories:”
• Yona Harvey, "Dark & Lovely after Take-Off (A Future)"

AFROFUTURISM & SPECULATIVE POETRY
• Jamal A. Michel, FATE: Fight for Idriss
• Saida Agostini, “the moongazer speaks on longing”
• Cagen Luse, Afronaut
• Tyree Daye, “give them the moon—here”
• Tracy K. Smith, “Sci-Fi,” “My God, It’s Full of Stars,” “The Universe: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack”
• A. Van Jordan, “Einstein Defining Special Relativity”
• Gil Scott-Herron, “Whitey on the Moon”
• Ashley Harris, “Fireworks”
• Joshua Bennett, "In Defense of Passing"
• John Jennings, Black Kirby
• Steven Leyva, “The Silver Screen Asks, ‘What’s Up Danger?’ After We Enter”
• John Jennings, Octavia Butler (73rd Birthday)
• Tony Medina, “Banner day”
• Keith S. Wilson, “Heliocentric”
• Quincy Scott Jones, “Untitled”
• upfromsumdirt, “SPACESHIP FOR SALE,” “Fair Gabbro Travels Time To View The End Of Days”
• Rashida James-Saadiya, “One day the sky began to weep and did so for 300 days”
• Anastacia Renee, “III.,” “apocalypse (400)”
• Nikia Chaney, “Untitled,” “spinnerman spinnerman”
• Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon, “excerpt from FUGUE: THE SIGHT”
• Yvonne McBride, “By the Blood Moon Bridge”
• Dexter Booth, “The Coon Show”
• Yona Harvey, "Q."
• Tim Seibles, “Something Like We Did”

• Contributors
  
• Afrofuturism Syllabus Resources
  

Editorial Reviews

"A formidable collection of talent...The Future of Black is a necessary compendium of early 21st-century Afrofuturistic verse and thought."—Los Angeles Review of Books

"Superstars of poetry have created work around both real-life and fictional superheroes in this innovative collection of poetry and art... This unique volume is a wonderful addition to library collections invested in the celebration of Black voices and Black visual art."—Booklist

"The Future of Black is a marvel. Some of the best Black voices out there deconstructing subjects we've all come to know intimately. But not like this. Superheroes and superheroism, pop-culture and genre media are transmuted into poetry that is sharp and staggering. Pick this book up and savor it. You won't regret it."—Cadwell Turnbull, No Gods, No Monsters and The Lesson

From the Publisher