Mon, 04 Sep 2006

Book of the Day: The Goddess of Gumbo by Kendra Hamilton

It's always a pleasure to discover a new poet when reading manuscripts, but I had a special sense of excitement when reading Kendra Hamilton's The Goddess of Gumbo.I found myself responding strongly to the musical grace of Hamilton's poem, but also their sharply etched character portraits: of women in love, of African-American life, of the Southern experience. The awareness of history is always present in Hamilton's poems, but they are decidedly contemporary in their concerns.

Here is an example of Hamilton's technique at work:

At the Ranger Station and Scenic Overlook

  Indians. I’ve been traveling the West six weeks,
crossing reservation lands—Yavapai, Hualapai, Pima
—seeing little but mesquite and mobile homes.
Here at last, I’ve found them. Indians. And I, who know
too well what it is to be stared at, I’m afraid to look.
They are selling crafts beside a Park Service
book kiosk—lovely soapstone bears, beadwork,
turquoise, arrowheads. I’m mortified. I have
too little cash to buy, too little nerve to ask a question.
  Then, too, there are the faces—far darker than my own
and craggy, alien.  They are Hopi. Dressed as Hopi.
In Arizona Diamondbacks T-shirts and jeans.
The deep-set eyes in those deep-brown faces look
at me, I think, with accusation. We know your kind,
they seem to say, though we know not what you do here.
Tossing their lampblack hair. Cliff cities in these hills
knew our kind eleven thousand years before yours
were dragged here, filthy, in chains. I think of Buffalo Soldiers.
Burn with shame. I snap a quick shot of the canyon,
slate clouds lowering over the red-breasted hills.
Using plastic at the bookstore, I buy a field guide.
Hop in my car and fly.

Describing the scenic view as a tourist trap, the poem registers a powerful ambivalence about its subject--the difficult experiences of Native and African-Americans. The speaker endures as much of the confrontation as she can and then flees. In this poem, Hamilton makes history into something that is intimately felt, and renders that feeling with striking, yet colloquial, music. Powerfully done.

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