Episode #087 REBROADCAST: How To Keep It Down - Justin Phillip Reed

REBROADCAST! In honor of Black History Month and because it's primary season and this incredible poem touches on presidential themes, we are rebroadcasting our episode about "How to Keep It Down / Throw It Off / Defer Until Asleep" by National Book Award winner Justin Phillip Reed. Content Warning: Suicidality Connor and Jack discuss a poem by this year's National Book Award winner for Poetry: Justin Phillip Reed. The poem, "How to Keep it Down / Throw It off / Defer Until Asleep," is from that award-winning collection, Indecency, published by Coffee House Press. We talk about the effects of the poem's shifting POV, the intersection of mental illness and white supremacy, and get to maybe two or three of the poem's nearly infinite layers on layers. Plus, Al Pacino makes a surprise cameo! Read the poem below. More on Justin Phillip Reed: www.justinphillipreed.com/ Check out his collection, Indecency, where this poem comes from: coffeehousepress.org/collections/po…ucts/indecency Find us on facebook at: facebook.com/closetalking
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You can always send us an e-mail with thoughts on this or any of our previous podcasts, as well as suggestions for future shows, at closetalkingpoetry@gmail.com. How to Keep it Down / Throw It off / Defer Until Asleep by Justin Phillip Reed My stomach imagines itself as an injury. I steep ginger-mint tea in the inauguration memorabilia mug from Momma, monument-white but for Obama. Between self-harm and my hand, I’ve rigged a list of reliable illusions. This is the first gesture. I am a gentle fist. My body has been deboned of its irony. My life wants to be proven to. I didn’t check the list of Black church dead in Charleston for friend or cousin because this morning it was Thursday. Work was quiet after I asked a white girl if she could quit whispering—the hissing hit his reddest venous notes until a droning rain applauded. His ears ring full of answers to his own knocking when he’s home alone—i.e., almost always. Pacing the apartment for