American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
Page 5
These poems owe tremendous gratitude to the great Wanda Coleman (1946–2013). When asked in an interview with Paul E. Nelson how she’d give an assignment for writing an American Sonnet she said:
First I would explain my process. Then I would invite my students to try it, overlaying their specific 1) issues (what the sonnet is about) 2) rhythms (places and devices often have them) 3) tones (shadings of attitude) 4) musical taste/preference (rock, classical, blues, etc.)—how to develop the minimal language to simultaneously encapsulate and signal each.
When asked for a definition she called the poems jazz sonnets “with certain properties—progression, improvisation, mimicry, etc.” and concluded, “I decided to have fun—to blow my soul.” American Sonnets Interview with Wanda Coleman—Global Voices Radio, Paul E. Nelson. www.globalvoicesradio.org/American_Sonnets_Wanda_interview.
KATHY RYAN
TERRANCE HAYES is the author of Lighthead, winner of the 2010 National Book Award and finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. His other books are Wind in a Box, Hip Logic, and Muscular Music. His honors include a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a 2014 MacArthur Fellowship. How to Be Drawn, his most recent collection of poems, was a finalist for the 2015 National Book Award and received the 2016 NAACP Image Award for Poetry.
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