Book

What noise against the cane

Bailey, Desiree C (author.). Phillips, Carl, 1959- (writer of foreword.).

Summary: What Noise Against the Cane is a lyric quest for belonging and freedom, weaving political resistance, Caribbean folklore, immigration and the realities of Black life in America. Desiree C. Bailey begins by reworking the epic in an oceanic narrative of bondage and liberation in the midst of the Haitian Revolution. The poems move into the contemporary Black diaspora, probing the mythologies of home, belief, nation and womanhood. Series judge Carl Phillips observes that Bailey's "poems argue for hope and faith equally. . . . These are powerful poems, indeed, and they make a persuasive argument for the transformative powers of steady defiance."

Record details

ISBN: 9780300256536
ISBN: 0300256531
ISBN: 9780300256543
ISBN: 030025654X
Physical Description: print
xiii, 78 pages ; 25 cm.
Publisher: New Haven : Yale University Press, [2021]
Copyright: ©2021

Content descriptions

Formatted Contents Note:

Chant for the waters and dirt and blade -- Guesswork -- Ma and the snake -- First American years -- La Divina Pastora, Mother of Miracles -- Extra virgin olive oil -- Woman in Dub -- Fleshed cartographies -- Harriet Jacobs grips the silence -- Malady -- Dancing at the shrine in Harlem -- It's risky to love in the season of hunters -- Island -- A retrograde -- Orfeu Negro / Black Orpheus -- Accent -- Ex(ile) -- Flowers pressed to my head -- Chant for the waters and dirt and blade (slight return).