Running Man: A Personal Review of Cornelius Eadys Poetry - Essay Example

of 25 May Running Man: A Personal Review of Cornelius Eady’s Poetry Art is a powerful tool in touching the heart of its beholder. Beyond creating art for art’s sake, Cornelius Eady’s play “Brutal Imagination” is one literary piece that had more goal than just to entertain. Set to break the barriers of racism in a bigoted society, he chose the setting of America in the 1930’s to 1950’s for the second part of his book that contained the “Running Man”, a poem that I chose to look closely at. Set at a time when African-Americans barely had any voice in society, the poem was written from the point of view of a departed black man’s persona. As Eady himself was born in the late part of the 1950’s during the African-American Civil rights Movement when respect was hard to for black people. (William G. Thomas III, University of Virginia 2004) The first part of the book are a series of poems that make up a play that was based from a real gothic crime that happened 1994 in South Carolina, as a disgruntled mother Susan Smith murders her two children and went to television and “told the world that a mysterious African-American carjacker had abducted her kids.” (Winters www.TheaterMania.com) I will be concentrating on the second part of the book, which had a series of poems that lamented strong external influences that break the spirit of a black family. “Running Man’s” relevance and connection to the entire piece cannot be ignored as Eady managed to identify the stereotypes and the perceptions of every white and black American at the time. Though “Running Man” was set in the 1930’s, that same stereotype that dampens the image of the black society still managed to creep back into 1994, the time of Susan Smith’s crime that caused a national uproar. At our present time when black people have a voice in society, and where people of color do hold office in the government and in the corporate world, blaming things to the black man still makes a believable story when creating alibi for crime. Furthermore, the poem that I chose expresses the angst of a black person who has a brilliant mind who gets caught in the whole sphere or racism. It is about a plea of an individual who feels that color becomes a hindrance for people’s judgments and more importantly, becomes a petty reason for missed opportunities. Interpreting a poem from a reviewer’s point of viewer has always been one pleasure that readers are allowed to have when enjoying a well-written piece of literature. Cornelius Eady’s poems have always possessed a certain elegance without being showy or parading a line-up of complicated words in his texts. He wrote in a form that fits his time in contemporary culture where his prose can almost be a narration in a movie montage or a passage in some song. This is why the author chose to interpret the poem “Running Man” from the assigned book “Brutal Imagination” Cornelius Eady’s Narrative Style. Eady’s free-verse lines hardly rhyme and yet still maintain a lyricism that could almost be narrated next to a jazz song, a form lyrical imagery that is popular in poetry readings that Eady himself engages on like his collaborations for musical theater with jazz composer Deirdre Murray . The tone of his verses in Running Man give a voice to a brilliant yet rather surrendered individual who could no longer defy sociological definitions and stereotypes. He uses language simple enough to be absorbed by the reader and his ironies are very powerful which makes his prose stay in the reader’s memory for a long time. In the poem, he bitterly declares “God made me pretty, God made me smart, God made me black, Which only proves God infinite sense of humor.” (132) As angry as his tone was, one can also clearly see the humor he injects when narrating his parody. Tone and Style. The tone of the poem gave a voice to a black man living at a time of racism and bigotry. It also spoke about the impossibility to break through the barrier or race. The poem’s setting is America in the 1930-2 till the 1950’s when black people have been strongly looked down at as second-class citizens. This was before Martin Luther king’s revolutionary breakthroughs in American politics. ² Where we now live in a world where opportunity is open to anyone, where the president of the United States is of color, and music icons such as Jay Z and Beyonce earn 100 millions dollars, Eady wrote “Running Man” and set it in a less kinder time in America in the 1930’s when society worked so much against the success of a black person. At a lot of times in his prose, Eady talked about bigotry from both white and black people that makes intellect and talent futile. Eady seems to inhabit a lot of his character – a gifted young individual living in a society that would rather look at one’s color and status rather than one’s talent. As his lines say things like “Where I live the neighbors say, “He’s so bright But mean He’s so white” (134) Further down he declares “Where I came from, a smart black boy is like being a cat with a duck’s bill” (133). In terms of form, he cuts the line to emphasize an odd continuity as seen from this verse that flows more like a song. That reflects his style as he makes music the central theme of his work. The lines lengths as always short and again, staggered like in a song, and he only uses punctuation marks when closing a sentence. As per the previous verse, he used lines instead of commas to break his verses. “Running Man” in Relation to the Entire Piece. As the first cycle of the book told a story about a black man who killed two children. The eerie twist at the end is that the black man never existed, but was just imagined by a white woman who was looking for an escape goat to run away from her crime. But it also goes to show how a white person could bring herself inside the head of a black man. As “My Heart”, one of the poems in the book sadly narrates, “Susan Smith invented me because Nobody else in town will do what She needs me to do.” (Eady 34) Eady goes back to the popular notion of a black man as he described in “Running Man”. He described how a common black man can get ostracized or labeled as a criminal, and how he labeled himself as a “useless miracle” in the poem. In spite of his gift and talent, he denoted that society still viewed him as intellectually inferior. The Social Message. He tells his stories in his poem as it is – bitter, but never too plaintive. Sad, but not overly sentimental. He wanted so badly to break free from stereotypes in order to feed his gift of intellect. He portrayed himself in “Running Man” as an individual who is fending off the set opinions of both his black people and the all-white society. He also has the capability to look at both sides. Not just siding with the black community, as he implies that being “so white”, at that time, denoted being more intellectual or possessing a sophistication that a typical African-American in the first half of the 20th century barely possessed. As Ben Winters expresses that Eady’s poetry’s message will someday be obsolete, this is poem is set to a greater mission, that is to make the present ever more open to reward opportunities to whoever deserves it – where being color blind is a good thing, it also celebrates a future where every kind of talents will flourish and people no longer use color to mock their fellowmen. Resources: Eady, Cornelius. Brutal Imagination. G.P. Putnan’s Sons, Penguin Putnam Inc. New York, 2001. Print. Affirmative Action: A History of an Era. www.lib.berkeley.edu. Web. 42 May. 2010 “Brutal Imagination”. www.TheatreMania. 2002. Web. 24 May. 2010. Cornelius Eady. www.poetryfoundation.org. 2010. Web. 24 May. 2010 Creative Writing Faculty: Cornelius Eady. 2010. www.nd.edu.com 2010. Web. 24 May. 2010 Cornelius Eady. www.poets.org Read More