( "Tao of the Rainbow No. 12" graphic art-poem by Aberjhani ) Given the horrendous white-versus-black-motivated massacre in Charleston, S.C., on June 17, the jubilant rainbow celebrations that broke out following the U.S. Supreme Court’s historic ruling legalizing same-sex marriage nation-wide on June 26, and increasing calls to cease flying the Confederate flag on government properties, colors have commanded a lot of attention during these changing times. The hues celebrated the most of course on July 4 in the United States are red, white, and blue. Many like to believe they stand for freedom, justice, and the American way. Officially, however, according to the House of Representatives’ publication Our Flag , red stands for hardiness and valor, white represents purity and innocence, and blue symbolizes vigilance. But long before the founding of America’s democratic republic, visual and literary artists have used colors to create realistic images of external en...

Does the enigmatic figure of the Black Skylark  referenced in this blog title have anything to do with Edgar Allen Poe’s “The  Raven” (1845), with Walt Whitman’s “The Mystic Trumpeter” (1872), or Abram  Joseph Ryan’s “Song of the Deathless Voice” (1880)?  It shares with Poe’s classic poem the image of a dark mystical bird. On the other hand, the presence of an eerie beguiling melody establishes a strong link to Whitman’s and Ryan’s poems. The poem is set in the city of Savannah, Georgia, but its themes are universal.  Readers are hereby invited to decide for themselves how well it fits into the tradition of the American Halloween poem pioneered by Poe, Whitman, and Ryan: Song of the Black Skylark (poem) by Aberjhani on AuthorsDen by Aberjhani

        Presidents Dwight Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy greet poet Robert Frost. (photo by Reuters) During observations from November 16 - 22, 2013, of the 50th anniversary of the assassination of President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, various news commentators noted a history-changing event of a different kind involving the four-time Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Robert Frost. When invited by President Kennedy to become the United States’ first presidential inauguration poet, Mr. Frost dutifully composed for the occasion a 77-line poem frequently referred to as “Dedication” and now published in his collected works, The Poetry of Robert Frost , as: “For John F. Kennedy, His Inauguration, With Some Preliminary History in Rhyme.” However, when attempting to read the poem at the ceremony on January 20, 1961, the glare of sunlight reflecting off snow made it impossible and Frost instead famously recited from memory the much shorter 16-line poem titled “The Gift Ou...

Portrait of Jalal al-Din Rumi by Haydar Hatemi . “We are the mirror as well as the face in it. We are tasting the taste this minute of eternity. We are pain and what cures pain, both. We are the sweet cold water and the jar that pours.” --Jalal al-Din Rumi as interpreted by Coleman Barks in The Essential Rumi War is an addiction to chaos that shreds human souls into tattered rags of trauma.   In acknowledgement of Rumi’s 806th birthday, I’m all for Syria, Al Qaeda, Al Shabaab, and all other countries and organizations at war with each other to exchange their guns and bombs for poems by Mevlana. Replace tanks and drones with open mics and let everyone brave enough go at it. Whoever spits the most verses, quatrains, long poems, or quotes by Rumi wins the right to proclaim peace and throw a feast in honor of sanity, brotherhood, sisterhood, and childhood. Is that likely to happen? No, not very, but the ecstatic beauty and soulful grace of Rumi’s poetry inspires human hea...

                (art quotation graphic courtesy of Bright Skylark Literary Productions )  “ Now come the whispers bearing bouquets of moonbeams and sunlight tremblings.” --Aberjhani (from The River of Winged Dreams) Below is a list of a few links that have been shared with me and which fans of The River of Winged Dreams might appreciate as well. I found the Han Chinese translations of “Angel of Earth Days and Seasons” and “Angel of Peace” particularly interesting because other than a couple of poems in Spanish, these are the only ones I've seen anyone attempt to translate (note to foreign rights publishers: if you’re interested please email me). Equally worthy of attention are the poignantly, inspiringly, and humanly profound meditations by Shay MacKay in her blog post “Rising from the Ashes.” For the list and much more on Aberjhani's The River of Winged Dreams please click the link : A River of Winged Dreams   ...

( Feathers of Gold, Feathers of Silver art graphic courtesy of Bright Skylark Literary Productions ) In July 2006, I sat down to write a short simple thank you note to fellow @poets and +writers who had graciously wished me well on my birthday. To my surprise, the intended short simple note came out of my pen in the form of the following poem: ANGEL OF GRATITUDE Each, shaped from a heart divine—such is the nature of your humble wings. Love, Mercy, and Grace, sisters all, attend your wounds of silence and hope. You are the good twin and the bad. Not arrogant, but jubilant…sweet… With grief or without, your flight commands awareness of joy beyond pain.     Holy starbright of infinite heavens, for these tears––I do thank you.     Just the fact that it was a poem was the first big surprise. The second was the style in which it was written, a variation on the haiku that I had never used before. Had my muse taken...

                                President Barack Obama on the cover of TIME Magazine . “Beneath the armor of skin/and/bone/and/mind most of our colors are amazingly the same.” --from ELEMENTAL, The Power of Illuminated Love (Aberjhani) Despite the Associated Press’s recent gloomy poll on racial attitudes in the United States, most Americans would probably agree that race should not have played as powerful a role as it did in the 2012 presidential election campaign resulting in the ultimate re-election of Barack Obama . But there are at least two good reasons that it did. First, consider the approximately one million African-American men and women currently either imprisoned, on parole, or rushing blindly down a path likely to lead to prison. Too many of them grew up, during any given decade of the last half century, believing they were either destined to go to prison as some form of rite...

Reuters poll indicating viewer responses to the second 2012 presidential debate . “I really think that one of the profound decisions the American people have to make now is whether they want to be governed by a president, or a boss. And I mean a boss!”   ––Bravo Television’s James Lipton in conversation with Chis Matthews on MSNBC’s Hardball Show. Halloween is close enough to the date of the 2012 American presidential election that the idea of the country waking up to either a trick or a treat on November 7 serves as an appropriate metaphor for the intense anxiety that has characterized much of the current campaign for the White House’s Oval Office. Critics of Democrats have accused them of guerrilla decontextualization trickery in the form of a presidential administration that has delivered less that they believe it should have over the past four years. Likewise: critics of Republicans have charged them with attempting to force upon the country a potential l...

Cover of first edition of I MADE MY BOY OUT OF POETRY featuring original art by celebrated New Orleans and New York artist Gustave Blache III . Recently I found myself on the verge of crossing over from ambivalence into guilt due to the amount of time and creative energy devoted this year to online journalism and other forms of prose-writing as opposed to a more luxurious immersion into the rich flow of poem-making. There were actually at least two instances in 2012 when I managed to combine the genres: the first came in February when writing about the death of WhitneyHouston and the second came, ironically enough, in August when writing about the life of one Michael Joseph Jackson. Although the poems included with the stories can stand well enough on their own, the fact that they were generated by journalistic concerns instead of employed as an initial means to a necessary end in themselves made me feel somewhat negligent. After all, where journalism was concerned I had ...

                         C lassic silhouette of "King of Pop" Michael Jackson . (public domain) Assistant program director “Lady Grace" at Savannah State University’s WHCJ radio station (90.3 FM) pointed out during one of her shows at the beginning of June that June and August represented the station’s “Michael Jackson time.” By that, she meant listeners could expect to hear during these months an occasional extended broadcast of music by the late enduringly great Mr. Jackson . She then launched into an uninterrupted set that lasted for longer than I could stay tuned in to listen. The music spanned every period of the creative genius’s exceptionally prolific career and included a variety of samplers from innovative mixes by diverse musicians and producers. In contrast: I recalled a fellow author informing me that she was “burned out” on Michael Jackson and didn’t see the point of different people’s cont...

President Barack Obama toasting Queen Elizabeth II with actor Tom Hanks at 2011 celebration for the Queen . (photo by White House photographer Pete Souza) The British Prime Minister Winston Churchill during World War II reportedly quoted the great Harlem Renaissance poet Claude McKay’s poem “If We Must Die” when he addressed the joint houses of the U.S. Congress on the eve of America’s entry into the war. South African President Nelson Mandela recited “Invictus,” by William Ernest Henley, to fellow inmates while imprisoned on Robben Island and “The Child” by Ingrid Jonker when South Africa’s first democratic parliament opened in 1994. American presidents , governors, and mayors have often presented samples of some of the most luminous talents in modern literary history to provide moral and intellectual frameworks for their stated, even if not their actual, political intentions. Inauguration poets James Dickey, Maya Angelou, and Elizabeth Alexander are a few examples. H...

Award-winning author and poet Aberjhani blogs about his newest poem presented in honor of the 100 Thousand Poets for Change initiative. To read please click the link: How Poets and Words Burn Truth into Love | Aberjhani | Blog Post | Red Room

( Getty Image by Juan Barreto ) Throughout Black History Month 2011, websites and newspapers based in countries across the globe have featured stories on the United Nations’ and the Organization of American States’ passage of Resolution 64/169, which declared January 1 as the start of the 2011 International Year for People of African Descent. Continue reading please by clicking the following link: Report on 2011 International Year part 5: Haiti’s Poetics of Pain and Resilience - National African-American Art | Examiner.com

CTI News Room, Dec 2007--Within weeks of the release of his first novel, the controversial “Christmas When Music Almost Killed the World,” American author Aberjhani made a surprise move with the early-December release of a powerful collection of poetry titled “The Bridge of Silver Wings.” Both titles have been included in the Google Book Search Program. “These titles came out relatively late for the holiday shopping season because the original plans for their publication were changed at the last minute,” said Aberjhani. “So their inclusion in the Google Book Search Program in such a short period of time is kind of miraculous and very necessary because it gives readers worldwide an opportunity to preview the books before buying them.” In a recent interview posted on The Student Operated Press, poet Chase Von (author of YOUR CHANCE TO HEAR THE LAST PANTHER SPEAK) discussed with Aberjhani the sometimes controversial nature of his work. They also spoke about his prolific output, which incl...