The Power of Poetry

and Ntozake Shange

February 25, 2023

Hello friends,

This week, as we near the end of Black History Month in the US, I’ve been re-reading some of my favorite Black poets.

Poetry has fed my heart, mind, and soul since I was a small child. As a teenager, I took refuge in poetry, scribbling my heart out into notebook after notebook. My best friend would drive me to Los Angeles art galleries and cafés so I could attend poetry readings and explore other spaces along the way.

I stood in front of large paintings and performed my poems out loud in front of a room filled with encouraging adults. Poetry gave my strange and awkward self a home.

One of the poets I’ve revisited this week is Ntozake Shange. I wrote an essay about her for my Patreon people. It’s posted on my blog today.

To Praise a Poet. image of two well loved poetry books

Here’s a snippet about my encounters with the poet as a young person in San Francisco, trying to make my way:

Shange’s words told me that poetry was important to the world, and I—a young person making minimum wage and barely able to afford a loaf of bread—believed her. I filled notebook after notebook, attended poetry readings, and read as much as I could.

I was a white person, raised in a working class, sometimes poor, family. I had dropped out of school. Shange was Black, raised upper middle class, and well educated. Our worlds were not the same, but the thread of poetry connected us somehow.

Such is the power of art.

I saw Shange in person twice…

If you want to read more about my encounters with this great and generous poet, please follow this link: In Praise of a Poet.

I wish you abundant creativity. I wish you good mentors, be they on the page or in person. And I wish you as much poetry as your heart can hold.

best wishes - Thorn

I’m pleased to announce I’ll be launching a Kickstarter for special omnibus print editions of my fan-favorite Witches of Portland series! Click the link to get notified as soon as it’s live!

The Witches of Portland. Three hardback books, one with a white, red haired witch, one with a Black witch with dreadlocks, one with a Latino witch with short salt and pepper hair and small beard.

 

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