As long as I have music, I don’t ever feel like I’m solitary. It changes the air in the room. It’s the most consistent thing in my life. 

 

Today we’re going to get to work on the details

The two or three times I saw Lil Wayne
hanging out at the Praline Connection

in New Orleans he had a mouth full of bling
covered in forkfuls of greens or green beans

or white rice & red beans on a tongue
of strange lucrative grammar

The answer will be that which allows
the best possible future when the plaintiffs come

before the judge or the farmers
before the king it is not that which incurs unrest

When we asked Terrance Hayes to make a playlist for you, our readers, he wrote us a poem.

Terrance Hayes on Wanda Coleman, whose poems often record the mood of one who feels exiled, discounted, neglected.

We’re away until January 4, but we’re re-posting some of our favorite pieces from 2015. Please enjoy, and have a happy New Year!The elliptical life of Etheridge Knight.This piece is part of a lecture for the Bagley Wright Lecture Series, a nonprofit …

The elliptical life of Etheridge Knight.This piece is part of a lecture for the Bagley Wright Lecture Series, a nonprofit that provides poets with the opportunity to explore in-depth their own thinking on the subject of poetics. Terrance Hayes will d…