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Largo
Sport climber
The Big Wide Open Face
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Topic Author's Original Post - Oct 15, 2011 - 07:20pm PT
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http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/langston-hughes
Sweet Flypaper of Life has to be one of the best picture-narrative books out there, roundly booed in it's day, as was Hughes himself (or "hisself," as he would have written it).
In Hughes's own words, his poetry is about "workers, roustabouts, and singers, and job hunters on Lenox Avenue in New York, or Seventh Street in Washington or South State in Chicago—people up today and down tomorrow, working this week and fired the next, beaten and baffled, but determined not to be wholly beaten, buying furniture on the installment plan, filling the house with roomers to help pay the rent, hoping to get a new suit for Easter—and pawning that suit before the Fourth of July."
Dude! Sound familiar . . .
JL
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Urmas
Social climber
Sierra Eastside
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Oct 15, 2011 - 08:13pm PT
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This is where the mountain and urban cultures intersect - on class identification. The dirtbag climber and urban roustabout would seem to be miles apart, yet share an outlook on life - and pecuniary predicament!
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fosburg
climber
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Oct 15, 2011 - 08:50pm PT
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Well put, Urmas!
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SteveW
Trad climber
The state of confusion
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Oct 15, 2011 - 11:01pm PT
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A great literary mind!!!!
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scooter
climber
fist clamp
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Oct 15, 2011 - 11:17pm PT
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Lawrence KS
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Nohea
Trad climber
Living Outside the Statist Quo
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Oct 15, 2011 - 11:25pm PT
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Big fan, my students read a few his poems each year, my only problem is picking just a few.
Aloha,
will
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wack-N-dangle
Gym climber
the ground up
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Oct 16, 2011 - 12:30am PT
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It seems a shame that most of the poetry I will probably ever read, I consumed as a awkward kid, sitting in a fluorescent box, waiting for the drone of electric clock to pause then chime 3. It took me a while to think about history too. A light came on when I realized that it was made by people, from the grist of their hopes, prejudices, suffering, and small victories. What they showed me in the books was something else.
It seems that if they are going to teach poetry in high school, why not take the kids to a bar where they are holding a poetry slam. Maybe find some city park where the "crazies" gather to flash their cardboard signs with misshapen letters, at anyone who passes by a little too close. Either that or an underground rap concert if those aren't already too antiquated. Maybe end their trip by sharing some fortified wine with the anonymous neighbors we pass daily on the street. Maybe as the kids get older, there would a few less Republicans in the world.
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| Messages 1 - 7 of total 7 in this topic |
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