“And the syndrome goes on; this is only a poem, wondering when to our senses we will come home.”      ––T.J. Reddy (from A Poem About A Syndrome) Most of the more celebrated names among African-American authors, poets, and artists are known to the world because of their association with specific cultural arts movements. The recently-deceased  Amiri Baraka has been identified as a hero of both the late 1950s Beat Movement and the 1960s and 1970s Black Arts Movement. Poets such as Gwendolyn Brooks and Sterling Brown remain renowned for their link to the Harlem Renaissance. One of the more powerful qualities of such movements is that they often inspire more creative genius than the world takes time to recognize. Or sometimes they produce creative thinkers of a type that “others” tend to fear and consequently attempt to destroy. It is possible both these scenarios may be applied to the poet, visual artist, human rights advocate, and educator k...

                                1972 Associated Press photo of Amiri Baraka by Julian C. Wilson . This story was originally published as part 2 of "Two Literary Laureates Celebrated: Herta Muller and Amiri Baraka." It was written at the time in honor of the great Amiri Baraka's (1934-2014) 75th birthday. It is shared now upon the occasion of his passing : While his was not among the names short-listed for the Nobel Prize in Literature, Amiri Baraka has long been lionized for his tell-tale intellectually precise yet poetic analysis of U.S. culture and his fire-brand style of political truth-telling.   A playwright, novelist, poet, essayist, short-story writer and performance artist all wrapped into one, the Newark-born Baraka attended Rutgers and Howard Universities and is a veteran of the U.S. Air Force. He launched his writing career under the name LeRoi Jones with the 1958 play, A Good...