Here’s to 7 out of the tons of African Americans who made magic with ink and paper.  Seven poets who represent a multitude of artists, thinkers, and feelers.  Here’s to long nights of feeling so deeply that only that art of writing could capture the essence of what spills from the soul.  Here’s to those who are uncomfortable yet find comfort in allowing their own vulnerability to reach those who are not as courageous or are most unwilling to allow theirs to rage through the universe like the mighty Mississippi.  For hope and fear and love and hate and joy and sadness and admiration and anger and peace and anxiety and celebration and condemnation and, well, everything.  For the eras in life during which only written manuscript is able to convey what the mouth cannot speak.  For nonsense and comedy and seriousness and social justice.  For a love so painful it hurts to smile so all you’re able to do is write.  For a thirst for freedom so deeply rooted that you have to shout your written words-your FREEDOM words-from the mountaintops.  For all of these things, we salute 7 of the most talented and beautiful souls that have often been forgotten or disregarded because of the times.  

For the love of poetry.  Langston Hughes, Maya Angelou, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Nikki Giovanni, Alice Walker, Ntozake Shange, and Gil Scott-Heron: we thank you for your service to art and for being vulnerable with us.

Langston Hughes (1902-1967)

James Mercer Langston Hughes was born in 1902 in Joplin Missouri.  After being raised by his grandmother until he was thirteen years old, he moved to Lincoln, Illinois with his mother and stepfather and began to write poetry.  He would go on to study at Columbia University and Lincoln University in Pennsylvania.  He published his first book of poetry “The Weary Blues” in Washington, D.C., 1926.  His very first novel “Not Without Laughter” was published in 1930.  Hughes has been noted to see his writing and poetry as a combination of his personal and that of his African-American counterparts’ cultural experiences.  He has written countless literary works, including “Montage of a Dream Deferred”, “Fields of Wonder”, “Shakespeare in Harlem”, and “Tambourines to Glory”.  Hughes passed away of complications from prostate cancer in 1967, yet his legacy and literary influence transcends time.  

Info Source: (n.d.). Retrieved October 28, 2015, from https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/langston-hughes

Maya Angelou (1928-2014)

Maya Angelou, born as Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri in 1928.  She grew up there and Stamps, Arkansas where she endured racial brutality and discrimination as was the time of America.  Maya was raised by her grandmother, Mrs. Annie Henderson, an entrepreneur who owned a grocery store in Stamps and taught Maya Christian principles and the value of honest work.  Maya moved to San Francisco at the age of fourteen as she was awarded a scholarship to study dance and drama at San Francisco’s Labor School.  After having her son, Guy, a few weeks after her high school graduation, Maya quickly moved from waitressing to support her young family to pursuing her passions for the arts full time.  Maya Angelou’s experience as one of the greatest poets and artists in United States history is one riddled with the racially discriminatory and oppressive landscape of America.  However, she never let her adversities stop the caged bird from singing.  She joined the writer’s guild in the 1950s and was guided by her dear friend James Baldwin to begin work on “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings”, which would go on to become a best seller and written into literary syllabi across the world.  Angelou toured Europe with the broadway production of “Porgy and Bess”, studied dance in Harlem’s world renowned Alvin and Ailey Dance Co., and recorded musical albums-the first: “Calypso Lady”.  With a catalogue of 36 books, several musical albums, several broadway productions that she either wrote and/or performed, and a poetry collection that rivals many, Maya Angelou’s legacy has and will live well past her untimely death in 2014.  

Info Source: 27. (2015). Retrieved October 27, 2015, from http://www.mayaangelou.com/biography/

Paul Laurence Dunbar (1872-1906)

Born in 1872, Paul Laurence Dunbar is revered as one of the most influential African-American poets to ever touch the art.  As a young high school student, his literary aspirations and intelligence began to shine early.  He was the only African-American student in his class in Dayton, Ohio, and soon became the Class President and Class Poet.  Dunbar published poems in the Dayton Herald and was editor of the Dayton Tattler before even completing high school.  While hoping to pursue law after high school, Dunbar was forced into labor as an elevator operator because his widowed mother had little financial means to send him to law school.  Dunbar, however, continued writing and wrote pieces of prose, poems, and articles.  It was also during this time that he developed the style of black dialect in his writing that would achieve him critical acclaim and fame later on in his career.  Dunbar, with the help of a black man by the name of Orville Wright-one of the inventors of the airplane, published his first piece of collected literary works called “Oak and Ivy” in 1892.  Paul encountered an attorney by the name of Charles Thatcher after the publication of “Oak and Ivy” who offered to sponsor his law school education.  However, Dunbar believed in the success of his recently published work and turned Charles down in order to pursue his career in writing.  Boy is the world ever so grateful and blessed that he did.  Dunbar would go on to have a elaborate career and would publish countless poems and short stories. Dunbar wrote up until his death in 1906.  Respected and named as the first great black poet, Paul Laurence Dunbar is a royal poet whose legacy will always be cherished. 

Info Source: (2015). Retrieved October 27, 2015, from http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/paul-laurence-dunbar;

Nikki Giovanni (1943-   )

Born in 1943 in Knoxville, Tennessee, Nikki Giovanni always new the path to her greatness and untapped talent would be through writing poetry.  She quietly states in her biography that she wasn’t “talented like [her] big sister” but knew that she could make an impact on the world discovering things that no one else had.  In order to do so, she used her writing.  Nikki has spent time in several universities, including Columbia, but has not received a degree from either due to much debate concerning her racially charged poetry and her ability to complete her mandated book in 1.5 years instead of the required 2.  Nikki alwaysunderstood the value of education being born to two college graduates but has yet to receive the degrees she has earned.  Nonetheless, Giovanni made a significant impact while at Fisk University as the editor of a student literary journal.  In 1968, Nikki published her first volume of poetry “Black Feel, Black Talk”.  Still alive and kicking, Nikki Goivanni’s works encompass that of the heart of little black girls in America.  She continues to write and publish poetry as well as being a University Distinguished Professor at Virginia Tech.  Having been already honored numerous times by the NAACP, the Grammys and the National Book Award, we are sure that Nikki Giovanni will continue to reap the rewards of the words that she has sown.  

Info Source: Giovanni, N. (2014). Biography. Retrieved October 27, 2015, from http://www.nikki-giovanni.com/bio.php

Alice Walker (1944-   )

Alice Walker, born on February 9, 1944 in Eatonton, Georgia, and most famous for penning the novel “The Color Purple” is a living poetry legend.  Born as the youngest in a family of sharecroppers in the south, Alice suffered a serious injury that left scar tissue in her right eye.  Her injury caused her to feel unattractive, which lead to her secluding herself and turning to reading and writing poetry.  Her newly found passion would take her to new heights as she began school at Superman College after graduating from high school.  Walker would soon transfer to Sarah Lawrence, study abroad in Africa,  and publish a short story.  Alice would graduate and go on to be a teacher, social worker, civil rights activist, novelist, poet, and black feminist.  She is the mother to one daughter and still writing and fighting for social justice in the Black Lives Matter movement to this day.  We are thankful that Alice Walker continues to use her platform to further the movement towards freedom. 

Info Source: (2015). Alice Walker- Biography. bio.Retrieved October 27, 2015, from http://www.biography.com/people/alice-walker-9521939#recent-works

Ntozake Shange (1948-  )

Ntozake Shange, born Paulette Williams to an Air Force surgeon and psychiatric social worker, has never been a stranger to black royalty.  Dizzy Gillespie, Miles Davis, and W.E.B. Dubois visited her home regularly.  Earning a both a Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in American studies from Barnard College and UCLA, Shange dealt with emotional turmoil during her college years and attempted suicide after separating from her husband.  She then turned her attention to writing, took on her African name Ntozake, and fought against societies mandates and restrictions on women.  Most famous for her choreopoem (and one of my all time favorite poems) “For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf”, Ntozake has never been afraid to publish and shed light on the outcry of “colored girls” in American and the subjugation that we endure by both White Supremacy and our very own black men.  With poems like “Nappy Edges”, novels like “Sassafrass, Cypress, and Indigo”, and another choreopoem “The Love Space Demands”, Ntozake as solidified her position as an African American poet unafraid to be an unapolagetically beautiful colored girl.  Salute to a queen who loves her blackness: Ntozake Shange. 

Info Source: (2010). Ntozake Shange. Poetry Foundation. Retrieved October 27, 2015, from http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/ntozake-shange

Gil Scott-Heron (1949-2011)

Gil Scott-Heron.  A revolutionary poet and musician most famous for his ever so true exclamation, “The revolution will not be televised.”, is noted by allmusic.com as “one of the most important progenitors of rap music”.  Gil was born in Chicago and transplanted to Tennessee to live with his grandmother after his parents’ divorce and where he would write his first collection of poems.  He then moved to the Bronx, NY to live with his mother for most of his high school years and experienced most of the life changing circumstances that would translate into his songwriting and poetry.  He penned his first novel “The Vulture” after dropping out of college in Pennsylvania to pursue his writing career full time.  We’re forever grateful for this decision.  He began recording music in the 1960s and continued a musical career that would span several decades.  His music was always poetry and his poetry always music.  He took a very pointed stance against racial discrimination and white supremacy.  Though his untimely death in a New York hospital in 2011 would take one of the greatest songwriters away from the culture, his legacy will live on.  “The revolution will not be televised”.-Gil Scott-Heron

Info Source: Bush J. (2015). AllMusic. Retrieved October 27, 2015, from http://www.allmusic.com/artist/gil-scott-heron-mn0000658346/biography