Woman

Woman
CC: http://poefrika.blogspot.com/2007/03/woman-by-nikki-giovanni.html

Giovanni uses universal gender roles, the motif of "plants" and the motif of "want" to capture the female perspective of trying to achieve independence and liberation.  When one thinks of the title of the poem, Woman, one thinks that the poem will be in a feminist theory perspective. The tone of the poem is judgmental, which is Giovanni expressing her critical opinions about men and women and at times disdainful, which expresses Giovanni’s scornful attitude towards males. The style of the poem is organized in six stanzas, but free verse and occasionally couplets. To the reader, the speaker is Giovanni’s perception of the male and female. Giovanni conveys the tone of disdainful in the first stanza by stating, “she wanted to be a blade of grass amid the fields but he wouldn’t agree to be the dandelion.” Giovanni expresses that the female wanted to be a blade of grass amid the fields, which means she wanted to be the strength of the plant and the male wouldn’t agree to be a dandelion. When the one thinks of a plant, one thinks about growth and development. This suggests that since the male didn’t want to be the dandelion, he didn’t want to be seen as less dominate than the female who is the blade of grass amid. Giovanni shifts the tone from disdainful, to judgmental, when she says, “she spun herself into a web and     looking for a place to rest.” This suggest that the female is no longer free and instead is becoming submissive to the male and becomes trapped. In the end, this is what the male wanted. Giovanni also says, in the end, “she decided to become a woman and though he still refused to be a man she decided it was all right.” Giovanni declares that the female finally decided to not get married and instead become free and independent.

Fascinations

Fascinations 
CC: Well I don't have a hyperlink but I will type the poem below.

Fascinations ~ Nikki Giovanni

finding myself still fascinated

by the falls and rapids

i nonetheless prefer the streams

contained within the bountiful brown shoreline

i prefer the inland waters

to the salty seas

knowing that journeys end

as they begin

the sailor and his sail

the lover and her beloved

the light of day and night’s darkness

i walk the new york streets

the heat rising in waves

to singe my knees

my head is always down

for i no longer look for you

usually i am cold no matter

what the temperature

i hunch my hands in the pockets of my pants

hoping you will be home

when i get there

i know i’m on dangerous ground

i misread you smile all year

assured that you and therefore everything

was all right

i wade from the quiet

of your presence into the turbulence

of your emotions

i have now understood a calm day

does not preclude a stormy evening

con edison after all went out

why should you

and though it took longer than anyone thought

the lights did come back on

why shouldn’t yours

electricity is a product of the sea

as much as the air

coming from turbulence

as much as generators

if you were a pure bolt

of fire cutting the skies

i’d touch you risking my life

not because i’m brave or strong

but because i’m fascinated

by what the outcome will be

Giovanni uses the duality between the light of the day and the darkness of the night, the motif of “water” and emotion to capture her fascination in regards to life. As the reader, when one thinks of the title Fascination, one thinks of being intensely interested at whatever one is focusing on. To the reader, Giovanni is the speaker. The tone throughout the poem is lyrical, which expresses her emotional and inner feelings and reflective, which illustrates her innermost thoughts. The poet’s style is free-verse and not rhyme, but Giovanni does clearly provide five, organized stanzas. The motif of “water” was used to symbolize emotion. Giovanni constantly uses the motif of “water” to express her fascination with life and its jovial times, gloomy times and its trials. Giovanni opens with the first stanza with, “I nonetheless prefer the streams contained within the bountiful brown shoreline, I prefer the inland waters to the salty sea.” This expresses Giovanni’s reflective tone and highlights that she is constantly fascinated with nature. She also says “the sailor and his sail, the lover and her beloved the light of day and night’s darkness.” This again expresses Giovanni’s reflective tone and highlights the duality between the light of the day and the darkness of the night. The importance of the duality was to convey the light and dark merging together like the lover and her beloved and the sailor and his sail. Giovanni then shifts the tone from reflective to lyrical when she says, “I know I’m on dangerous ground, I misread your smile all year assured that you and therefore everything was all right.” This expresses her fascination with someone and not something and to also express her inner feelings for the person she is mostly fascinated about.  Throughout the poem, Giovanni’s message to the reader was to convey that one should always take risk and go through different experiences to know what life has to generate and the aftermath.

Life Cycles

Life Cycles
CC: http://www.afropoets.net/nikkigiovanni13.html
Giovanni uses similes, repetition, the motif of dark and black and the motif of secrets to capture the gender role and racial role of a black female. Giovanni, to the reader is the speaker in Life Cycles. The title Life Cycles has the reader thinking that life is a cycle. Cycles repeat and have a series and sequence that people create for themselves. The tone expressed in the poem is gloom because it is a dark atmosphere. Giovanni begins the poem with, “she realized se wasn’t one of life’s winners when she wasn’t sure life to her was some dark dirty secret that like some unwanted child too lat for an abortion was to be borne alone.” Giovanni explains that the female that she is referring to isn’t lucky in life and that life is a struggle itself. The simile in the first stanza declares that the female that she is referring to has a child and she feels alone. The word alone is in one line of the first stanza to focus on the harsh reality of the black female that she is uncared for and unaided. Giovanni also uses the motif of black and dark by saying, “in the dark sadness is not an unusual state for the black woman or writers”. Giovanni expresses that sadness, gloom and depression is the normal state of the female black woman that she is referring to. She also expresses that life is cruel. Giovanni also declares the gender role of a female and the racial stereotype of a black female is to resist, fight and to always be miserable. In the end, Giovanni says, “she boxed her life like a special private seed planting it in her emotional garden to see what weeds would rise to strangle her.” Giovanni ends with declaring that the female put away her like a seed that needs plating. This means that her problems that need to be fixed, needs to blossom. The weeds represent the horrible people in her life or the trials in life.

Crutches

Crutches
CC: http://www.afropoets.net/nikkigiovanni18.html

Giovanni uses universal gender roles, descriptive words and problems to describe stereotypes. Since the title of the poem is Crutches, Giovanni suggest that the poem would mean supporting someone or that something is saving the targeted group of people of person. The tone of the poem, Crutches, is judgmental to express her critical opinion and sometimes shifts to condescension to express her feeling of superiority. As the reader, we would guess that Giovanni is the speaker, based on Giovanni's feminist perspective. The pattern of the poem is ironically perfect and organized stanzas. Giovanni still expresses her poems in free-verse format. Giovanni opens the poem with, "it's not the crutches we decry, it's the need to move forward, though we haven't the strength". Giovanni suggests that as a person or a group of people,  it is the need to advance and develop, but we lack strength and perseverance. Giovanni then shifts the tone of the poem as judgmental when she says, "women aren't suppose to be strong so they develop social smiles and secret drinking problems and female lovers whom they never touch except in dreams." Giovanni suggests that women are supposes to be gentle and not strong. This also suggests that women smile to hide their emotion. In society, the gender role of a woman is to be gentle and to basically be a perfect wife. To the reader, that stanza expresses the group of people are hurting themselves by trying to be accepted in the society by social stereotypes. Giovanni makes another stereotype about woman when she says, "and female lovers whom they never touch except in dreams". This expresses that women drink to hide their troubles and to tell themselves that they are inferior and less strong than men. Giovanni makes a judgmental remark when shifting the focus on another group of people, which are men. She says, "men are suppose to be strong, so they have heart attacks and develop other women who don't know their weaknesses and hide their fears behind male lovers." Giovanni suggest that men have heart attacks. Heart attacks are known to be a disease of the athletes or people who have a lot of stress like work, which is suggesting that men are over-achievers. This is because men are seen in society as strong and not weak. This also suggests that men might need comfort and support to lessen their heart form being strained. Giovanni ends with the poem to declare that each group of people should not want to conform in society.

Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day

Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day
CC: http://www.gather.com/viewArticle.action?articleId=281474976851315

Giovanni uses analogies to compare the era and elements of the 1970s, colors to reflect the emotion and a specific tone and repetition of the word change, the phrase "Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day" and loneliness. The tone conveyed through throughout the poem is reflective by describing the drastic change during the 1970s. The pattern of the poem is complete stanzas, but Giovanni never rhymes and instead writes as a free-verse. Giovanni, to the reader, is the speaker. Giovanni opens the poem with, "Don't look now/I'm fading away, Into the gray of my mornings/Or the blues of every night." Giovanni describes herself as vanishing into the color of morning and night. Giovanni uses the colors of gray and blue to shift the mood to gloomy. Giovanni then says, "It seems no matter how I try I become more difficult to hold, I am not an easy woman to want." She expresses her emotion and feminist theory perspective of the difficulty to be loved in a relationship sense. Giovanni provides her female perspective on how it is difficult to be in love or in a relationship. We as the reader notice that she capitalizes "I" when she begins to express her emotion or perception. This may suggest to the reader of her arrogance and self-pride. She then suggest to the reader in the next stanza that, "They have asked the psychiatrist    psychologist   politicians and social workers/What this decade will be known for/There is no doubt   it is loneliness." The allusion created is the jobs that change and help people create a thematic topic of hope and wisdom they will provide for the people. She ends the stanza with the allusion creating loneliness. Loneliness is constantly repeated to highlight that loneliness is having emptiness. This suggests that loneliness isn't new for whatever group of people Giovanni is targeting. Towards the end of the poem, Giovanni shifts the tone as optimistic about hope and change. Giovanni repeats the word change constantly throughout the 10th and 11th stanza. Change is used to promote the meaning of transformation and morph oneself into a different person. Giovanni says, "Or perhaps But whatever you do change /Something needs to change/Everything   some say    will change, I need a change of pace   face   attitude and life/Though I long for my loneliness." Giovanni suggest to the reader another theme of/one will have to change in order to grow and mature. In Giovanni's perspective, Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day highlights specific and alluding word to portray different parts of life. The title conveys a duality of sweet and happiness versus gloom. The cotton candy represents the sweet and happy times in your life while, the rainy day represents the miserable times of life.

A Very Simple Wish

A Very Simple Wish
CC: http://books.google.com/books?id=e9tpFY2cmCAC&pg=PA172&lpg=PA172&dq=a+very+simple+wish+nikki+giovanni&source=bl&ots=r-sUREUpRl&sig=tYJWAHk_VmvDRknatpbsHoxpNHc&hl=en&sa=X&ei=cQznUITBFpCE8AT634HYDA&ved=0CF8Q6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=a%20very%20simple%20wish%20nikki%20giovanni&f=false
Giovanni uses simile, repetition and many different expressions to covey the motif of "want" to capture the tone of reflective and fanciful. As the reader, we guess that Giovanni is the speaker, since it is describing what she personally wants. Giovanni's reflective tone highlights the poem as Giovanni illustrating her innermost thoughts and emotion when she introduces the poem with the first stanza. The beginning of the first stanza is, "i want to write an image, like a log-cabin quilt pattern and stretch it across all the lonely people who just don't fit in." Giovanni starts the poem with the motif of "want" and a simile to capture that she wants to create a picture or different image as dynamic as a quilt. Like a quilt and in life, we have panels that capture a different experience. Giovanni also declares that the misfits will be apart of her quit, alluding to the fact that the lonely people are never included in America. Giovanni's fanciful tone highlights the poem as Giovanni using her imagination to express her want for diversity, equality and peace. She uses the repetition of the phrase "if i do that", to end with what she described she would do to save the world in her perception. Giovanni must importantly describes in the fourth stanza that it is easier to touch by fighting or in violence than it is to use your touch for loving and respecting other people. In her perception, she wants to create a stew of diversity. With the leftover stew, she could probably end world hunger. Giovanni closely ends the poem with "i want to make a quilt of all the patches and find one one pole to lift it up". Giovanni still uses the motif of "want" to want to make a quilt that creates the picture and image of the strength of her people. She ends the poem with"want to play". Giovanni leaves the reader with an open-ended question. She asks the reader if they would like to join the "game" that is being played. The "game" can interpreted in different ways. In this case, the reader would interpret that Giovanni has an idealist mind to build a new world. She, in the end is asking the reader if they would like to join her movement into innovation.

The Way I Feel

The Way I Feel
CC: http://carresdeer.tripod.com/wayifeel.html
Giovanni uses sexual innuendos, emotion, simile and the motif of time to capture the way the speaker feels. As the reader, one could infer that Giovanni is the speaker. The tone throughout the poem seemed lyrical, which expresses her emotional, inner feelings and full of images when she expresses the way she feels in a moment in time. Giovanni also expresses the tone of jovial, which expresses her happiness when she around her lover. Giovanni says, "i've noticed i'm happier when i make love with you, and have enough left over to smile at my doorman." Giovanni declares that she feels jovial having relations with the male or female. Through the poem, one notices that she uses words that describe her emotion like happier, love, feel and the way I feel. Through the poem, Giovanni uses the similes like, "i've realized i'm fulfilled like a big fat cow" or "i'm as glad as mortar on a brick that knows another brick is coming" and "i feel like a note roberta flack is going to sing". The similes express her emotional connection with her lover and her imagination of how much joy she feels with her lover. The first simile is comparing how much she is fulfilled with her lover to how much a fat cow is fulfilled. Giovanni compares a fat cow to her satisfaction with being with her lover. In the second simile, Giovanni expresses that in a sense, she is the mortar, which binds and holds the bricks together and the bricks could represent her lover and can sense her lover coming into her presence. The last simile, Giovanni expresses her interaction with her lover and how she feels, like a note Roberta sings. Roberta was known for singing over exaggerated love songs. The last stanza conveys the motif of time and a sexual innuendo. Giovanni is thinking about her lover everyday out of the week. Giovanni also is highlighting the motif of time when she describes her imagination of a clock. In her mind, the person is the clock and she is the second hand the sweeps around that tells what time of the day it is. This expresses that she feels most comfortable with her lover during all types of love and not just sexually.

When I Die

When I Die
CC: http://sbacari.tripod.com/poetry/whenidie.htm  
Giovanni creates the tone and mood of death and darkness to highlight the duality of her death being in the light and happy. Giovanni creates this duality to recognizes to the reader that death isn't a horrible moment in life and should be used as a testimony in the end. To the reader, Giovanni is the speaker because she includes her son and what she would do after she died, like a "bucket list". The important thing is that, Giovanni leaves the reader with multiple lessons to learn and what she hopes for when she dies. Giovanni says, "when i die, i hope no one who ever hurt me cries and if they cry i hope their eyes fall out and a million maggots that had made up their brains crawl from the empty holes and devour the flesh that covered the evil that passed itself off as a person that i probably tried to love". this means that when she dies, she hopes the people who love her cry and the people didn't love her, don't. She hopes they cry so much that everything falls a part. Giovanni opens the poem with this stanza to highlight the affect of imagery creates to highlight hatred. Giovanni also hopes her black women will be rewarded and supported for the work they have done. Giovanni also hopes, when she dies, that only some black women read "nikki-rosa". Since the poem was about her childhood and enjoying the wonders of life, even though she didn't have a lot of resources. Giovanni probably wants the women to read this to understand that life is a struggle and maybe a drag, but one should try to be happy. While the people were busy hating her, she was busy being happy and living her life. This highlights a liberating moment for Giovanni because once one lets go the people that hate others, include them, one can live their own life and be free. Giovanni opens the fourth stanza with, "and as soon as i dies i hope everyone who loved me learns the meaning of my death which is a simple lesson don't do what you do very well very well and enjoy is, it scares white folk and makes black ones truly mad." Giovanni says this to declare that when one does something and enjoys it and does very well, it scares the oppressor and creates hate from black people. Giovanni ends the poem with, "and if ever i touched a life i hope that life knows that i know that touching was an still is and will always be the true revolution." Giovanni express that if she has ever inspired someone, she knows that she has done her job and fulfilled her purpose in life, which is speaking the truth. The last word she ends with is "revolution". Revolution is a fighting word and means war between two or more civilizations. She ends with revolution to say that life is always a revolution.

Mothers

Mothers
CC: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/177837

Giovanni creates the poem "Mothers" to highlight the appreciation she has for her mother and how one should never waste the precious moments one has with their mother. The tone created in this poem was very conversational, ease and very emotional. The importance of the word "Mother" is the person who brought one life into the world. A "Mother" is someone who also nurses their child, teach their child and also represents gentleness. Giovanni, to the reader, is the speaker because she describes her mother through imagery. The affect is imagery is highlighted to convey the setting and to understand the gentle atmosphere her mother creates. The reader also knows that Giovanni is the speaker because she includes her role as a mother to her son. Giovanni creates the imagery of the poem by setting the poem in her childhood and the role her mother played. She says, "that night i stumbled into the kitchen/ maybe because i've always been a night person or perhaps because i had wet the bed/ she was sitting on a chair, the room was bathed in moonlight diffused through those thousands of panes landlords who rented to people with children were prone to out in windows". This stanza discusses a flashbulb memory during her childhood. The importance was to highlight a moment of her mother during her childhood that created a warmth feeling about her mother. Giovanni then says, "she may have been smoking but maybe not her hair was three-quarters her height which made me a strong believer in the samson myth and very black." Samson was granted supernatural strength by God in order to combat his enemies and perform heroic feats. Samson loses his hair once his hair was cut. This discusses that hair is a motif of power and that since her mother has long hair, she believes that her hair is power. Giovanni uses personification when she says, "The moon sees me". She gives the moon human-like characteristics to represent the moon with sensory and perception like a human. This conveys that the moon looks and views her childhood or any other child to create an imagination. In the end, Giovanni speaks about the importance of life and emotions. She says, "to bear the pleasures as we have borne the pains". She is highlighting the fact that we must except the pleasures and pain of life.

Ego Tripping

Ego Tripping
CC: http://nikki-giovanni.com/page_51.shtml
Giovanni uses the Egyptian allusions and other African historical events, the female gender role and people to explain and reflect the meaning of the title. Ego means a self conception and obsession and pride with themselves or country. Tripping means acting out or freaking out in a situation. As the reader, one guesses that the speaker is Giovanni. But, the speaker really is unknown and is a soul of someone’s perception on their country, belief and land. The poem enters with a stanza, saying, “I was born in the congo/ I walked to the fertile crescent and built the sphinx/I designed a pyramid so tough that a star that only glows every one hundred years falls/into the center giving divine perfect light/ I am bad.” The speaker sets the poem in Africa, the first civilization. The speaker reflects upon the environment and architecture in Africa. The Fertile Crescent is a region of a shape of a fertile crescent that contains a moist climate and lane for farming. This is located in the North Africa, near the Nile River. The speaker also describes the sphinx, which is a lion with a human head structure in Egypt. The speaker most importantly points out the pyramids in Egypt, which represent the pyramids of Giza. Theses pyramids were built for pharaohs to live and rest in for their death. The speaker ends this stanza with “I am bad”. Bad in this sense means good and owns to the title of the poem Ego Tripping to convey that he/she is the paramount. The speaker then discusses more allusions Egypt and spiritualism by discussing the throne, nectar with Allah, Nefertiti and the Nile. The throne and the heir to the throne were, in this case pharaohs of Egypt. Allah is the higher power of Islamic faith. Nefertiti one of the first recognized queens’s of Egypt. The third stanza is where the speaker discusses biblical stories and historical stories. The speaker says, “I gave my son Hannibal an elephant/ He gave me Rome for mother’s day.” Hannibal was the North African Leader of Carthage. The Carthaginians fought the Romans in the Punic Wars. This important event is where they discovered elephants. In this case, Carthage defeated Rome and bought the land from them. The speaker then says, “My son Noah built new/ark”. The speaker highlights this event to suggest that her son is Noah who built the ark and helped him save civilization. The speaker creates the allusion and self-conception that she recreated herself into the creator. The style of the poem lacks rhythm, rhyme or a pattern. In the last couplet, there however is a sporadic rhyme. She says, “I am so perfect so divine so ethereal so surreal/ I cannot be comprehended except by my permission/ I mean…I…can fly like a bird in the sky..” The speaker ends with the poem by ending with the allusion that she can fly and has supernatural powers. Giovanni also promotes arrogance to suggest that the woman gave birth to the civilization and that she is in the higher supernatural power. In religion, one thinks of their divine belief as a male spirit, instead of acknowledging the woman who gave birth to the generation.She also suggest that she is perfect, divine, ethereal and surreal. In beliefs and faiths, the person with those characteristics is the higher power in religion. She suggest to the reader that she has supernatural powers to convey magical realism.  The title Ego Tripping was reflecting the spiritualism and a sense of nationalism for someone personal opinion about their country. The poem also highlights the perception of the out-spoken speaker’s perspective on their color, land, people, gender and faith.

Kidnap Poem

Kidnap Poem
CC: http://www.tnellen.com/cybereng/poetry/kidnap.html
Giovanni uses the allusions of herself as a poet and the word "kidnap" to capture the reader into her poem. Giovanni introduces the poem with,” if i were a poet, i'd kidnap you put you in my phrases and meter". As the reader, Giovanni conveys the sense that she is the speaker, but not a poet. Instead of using "as the poet, I'd kidnap you", she says, "if I were the poet, I'd kidnap you". The allusions she creates are using the poetry terms like phrases and meter, poet, lyric, ode and lyre to represent the different genres and concepts in a poem. Giovanni also uses the motif of kidnap, put you in and wrap to represent capturing the reader to read the poem. Giovanni says, "ever been kidnapped by a poet, if i were a poet, i'd kidnap you put you in my phrases and meter". Giovanni uses the terms and allusions of a poem to grasp the reader to read the poem line by line. Giovanni also uses nature and places to highlight the poet taking the reader to places that one would image and vision the beauty of nature. Giovanni also uses the colors of Red, Black and Green together to discuss her reasons and themes behind her poetry. The colors Red, Black and Green are the colors of Pan-Africanism. Red is for the blood that was shed fro each struggling in the wars, movements, etc. Black is for the color of the people. Green is for the land, which in this case is Africa. Giovanni, as the speaker, wants to, in a sense; wrap the reader in her racial poetry about freedom for African- Americans. The importance of this poem is in contrast, the speaker could have been talking to a significant other. The speak could have been announcing her love to a person who he/she wants to write the person into the poem, thus, the title and repetition of the word kidnap. The speaker in a sense wants the person he/she is kidnapping to become a part of the poem and themselves. This poem could either express love in capturing their love interest into a poem or express grasping the reader into the poem.

No Reservations

No Reservations
CC: http://books.google.com/books?id=e9tpFY2cmCAC&pg=PA68&lpg=PA68&dq=no+reservations+nikki+giovanni&source=bl&ots=r-sURERpJk&sig=pfuQZJRiL8amEG0FtqnAiRIGcs4&hl=en&sa=X&ei=ZwDnUM7fOYaw8ATMioCABA&ved=0CFkQ6AEwBw#v=onepage&q=no%20reservations%20nikki%20giovanni&f=false

Giovanni introduces the allusions of war/ fighting words, colors and instruments to discuss that there are no reservations or celebrations for the revolution. As the reader, one assumes that the speaker is Giovanni. She opens with, “there are no reservations for the revolution”. Giovanni suggest that there isn’t a place fit for war. She then says, “No polite little clerk, to send notice, to your room, saying you are WANTED on the battlefield.” Giovanni creates the allusion of war and one actually being on the battle field. She capitalizes the word WANTED to ensure the reader that there aren’t nice people in war or people to look after each other in war. Wanted means one being searched for, hunted or sought after. She also capitalizes the word WANTED to tell the reader to watch or look after yourself in war because in war there is, “every man for themselves”. Giovanni then says, “There are no banners, to wave you forward, no blaring trumpets, not even a blues’ note moaning wailing lone blue not to the Yoruba drums saying, strike nowshoot, strike nowfire, strike nowrun.” She creates the allusion of war by using the motifs of instruments in a parade or band. Giovanni suggest that in war, there is a parade to play in honor of the war. In this case, there isn’t a celebration for war. She also creates the allusion of a parade by the motif of instruments. The instruments like trumpets and drums mean that there aren’t instruments to play to uplift one in war. Giovanni also creates the tone of gloom by the motifs of colors. The color blue is used to create the tone of gloom and despair and to reflect that in war, there aren’t sad notes played. Giovanni ends the stanza with a repetition of strike now, but ending the phrase with war-like and destructive words like, shoot, fire and run. The speaker says this phrase with a pause in between each war-like word to reflect upon the war signals and actions in the revolution. She also creates imagery to highlight the impact of want war creates. The importance of this poem was to reflect that in the war and revolutions in history, there are usually parades and celebrations to applaud for killing a civilization. In this case, in the poem she suggest that there aren’t celebrations and initiations for war, but there is a reservation for peace and freedom.

Records

Records
CC: Well I don't have the hyperlink, but I did provide the peom typed below!

Records ~ Nikki Giovanni

it’s so important to record

i sit here trying to record

 trying to find a new profound

way to say

johnson is the vilest

germiest beast

the world has ever

known

in the alleged civilized

times

trying to record

how i feel about a

family

being wiped out

trying to explain

that they have nothing

against bobby

he’s a white

millionaire

several hundred times over

so it must be me

they are killing

trying to record

the feeling of shame

haven’t yet

committed a

major assassination

which very desperately

must be

done

trying to record the

ignorance of the

voices

 that say

i’m glad a negro

didn’t do it

a negro needs to kill

something

trying to record

that this country must be

destroyed

if we are to live

must be destroyed if we are to live

must be destroyed if we are to live

Giovanni uses the importance of documentation, proof of history and unethical behavior of life from each civilization. Records mean “A thing constituting a piece of evidence about the past, esp. an account of an act or occurrence kept in writing or some other permanent”. The repetition of records is to constantly remind the reader that there is always evidence of history and to always document events. Giovanni says, “It’s so important to record, I sit here trying to record, trying to find a new profound way to say Johnson is the vilest germiest beast the world has ever known in the alleged civilized times”. This hyperbole Giovanni uses is to describe Johnson, the president that succeed Kennedy as a germiest beast because even though he signed the Voters Rights Act, in her emotion, she was unhappy that Kennedy was killed. Giovanni also uses imagery to convey empathy for a family being wiped out. The importance of this is to highlight the emotional connection Giovanni has for the people who are struggling, but in contrast showing apathy who are millionaires that do not share the wealth. Giovanni also says, ‘They are killing trying to record the feeling of shame that we Black people haven’t yet committed a major assassination”. Giovanni explains that the white people have committed huge assassinations like genocides and revolutions to oppress Black people. Thus the name of the poem Records; Giovanni suggests that the whites are trying to document their rage of the Black people not starting a revolution. Giovanni ends the poem with the imagery of stupidity and struggle. The white people will not live until the Black people commit a massacre so they have something to blame the Black people for. The importance of this poem is to leave the reader with the significance of history, which is it is always in the perception and observation of someone else. The truth of history is in the records, but different perceptions of history will always be told from different point of views.

The Great Pax Whitie

The Great Pax Whitie

CC: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/177829

Giovanni expresses the evolutionary of the oppressor always creating the war and oppressing people of color by highlighting historical events of war and biblical phrases. Giovanni uses the book of genesis to open with The Great Pax White. “The book of Genesis” was the explanation, creation and origin of life. The Book of genesis reflects a narration of God who says that he is the creator of life and appoints man and woman to his substitute. Later in the narration, man and woman show naughtiness and defiance and later God destroys the world. It represents destruction and darkness by not following God’s way of life. Giovanni uses repetition of “peace be still” to always say even though the wars and the destruction of the people killed the people of culture, pride and land, peace be still. When Jesus sailed with his disciples and the storm happened and everyone feared the storm, Jesus said “peace be still”. Essentially, through the storm of life, no matter how horrible, you must never ever give up because one day one will be free. Peace is within if you can connect to the higher power of the mist of the storm of struggle. Giovanni uses the painting of the Black Madonna to describe the Virgin Mary is because in historical and biblical content, she is described for representing the strong, black and maternal woman. The painting also has a golden ring around her and Jesus. Because she gave birth to Christ, she represents golden, pure, wisdom and prosperity. Giovanni uses various historical events like the Carthaginians and the Moors to create the imagery of war, oppression and destruction to highlight a revolution and the emotion behind a war. The Carthaginians were from North Africa and fought Rome in the Punic Wars. The war was for territory and economy. In the end, the Romans killed the Africans and colonized them. They took all of their resources and stripped them of their culture, pride and land. The Moors were North African who migrated to Italy. The term Moor came from Europe for people who were Arab or African descent. Giovanni writes about major wars fought against Africans and the Europeans to discuss the struggle of the Africans for freedom and land. Giovanni says, “The great emancipator was a bigot ain’t they got no shame” to discuss how and why Lincoln wrote the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. Even though the goal was to free the slaves, another argument was that the Proclamation did not cover all the slaves. In the end, the Proclamation ended slavery, but did not promise equal rights for African- Americans. Lastly, she alludes to the murders of Martin Luther King, John Kennedy and Malcolm X by stating, “So the great white prince, Was shot like a nigger in texas / And our Black, shining prince was murdered /Like that thug in his cathedral /While our nigger in memphis /Was shot like their prince in dallas.” The importance of this poem is to highlight that even though the massacres of the blacks were caused by The Great Pax of the White people, peace be still and know that liberation and life will one day come.

Nikki-Rosa

Nikki-Rosa

CC: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/177827

Giovanni writes as the speaker to provide a description of herself as the Nikki-Rosa. Nikki-Rosa expresses the fundamentals and the essence of a black childhood. Giovanni opens the poem with, “childhood remembrances are always a drag”. She opens the poem with her observation of her childhood and suggests that the childhood of a Black child is a struggle and encumbrance to succeed and to be happy. Giovanni says this to express her childhood and growing up in the 1960s. During the 1960s, the Civil Rights Movement occurred with the Jim Crow Laws that expresses the ideology of ‘separate but equal’. This meant that the blacks were treated unequal to the whites and were hindered from receiving an education, freedom, equal income and jobs. Giovanni uses the motif of emotion to highlight her perception of growing up. Through the majority of the poem, Nikki-Rosa, Giovanni uses imagery to reflect the empathy of pain, memories of happiness and the impact of being Black. She presents that even though being Black means having a childhood full of encumbrance, being poor didn’t concern Giovanni, happiness did. Giovanni presents the analogy of “Black love is Black wealth”. This means that black love equates to the true meaning of wealth of love and not money and materialism. In one case, Giovanni presents the holiday of Christmas that actually brought her family together and happy. Even though the family lacked resources, they were still happy together. The importance of this poem is even though her family struggled and lacked resources; they fought for liberation and conserved their happiness. Nikki-Rosa was the roots of Giovanni of where she came from and even though she had a hard childhood, the most important aspect of her life was to be happy.

 

Poem for Black Boys

Poem for Black Boys
CC: http://www.aaregistry.org/poetry/view/poem-black-boys-nikki-giovanni 

Giovanni writes about her perception of the African-American boy to highlight their lives as a game and a revolution. She includes colors like White, Brown and Black to describe the dynamic of how the world perceives each character. White in this case symbolizes superior, brown symbolizes neutral and black symbolizes inferior. Giovanni says, "Where ar your heroes, my little Black ones, You are the Indian you so disdainfully shoot". Giovanni desribes the game of Cowboys and Indians. Since the Balck Boys are playing the game of Cowboys and Indians and playing hte Indian, you are playing Black on Black crime. Giovanni also uses the motif of leaders that the Black boys should follow and protect. Giovanni uses mother to symbolize the provider and the matriarch of their children. Giovanni also uses the mother in Poem for Black Boys because as it is their job to protect their son, it is also important to teach them how to treat others. In contrast, the job of the son is to defend and shelter their mothers. Giovanni also uses Santa to provide the reader with always wishing for a supply of things by a surreal figure, but their mother is the one who will work hard to buy them a gift. The last leader provided through the poem is the Lying Leader. Giovanni uses the Lying Leader because in the life of a Black Boy, there is always a liar trying to hinder them from success . She most importantly shows sarcasm and is trying to say that sociey wants you to not sit in the sit ins, burn and destroy your community and not support the positive leaders and instead whats you to support the Lying Leader. She positivily says that you must follow the real leaders like Martin Luther King. Giovanni uses slave games to capture the essence of Black Boys’ lives. The essence of their lives is since birth, they were treated as such to play run-away-slave or Mau Mau. The reason was playing run-away-slave and Mau Mau means their lives will end in defeat because these are the games of unpredictable and lucky card games and being hunted by the slave master. The only game they can win is Ask for CULLARD instead if Monopoly. This suggests that Black Boys can’t win Monopoly which is a game of having money and wealth, but instead can win asking for hand-outs. The importance of Poem for Black Boys is to highlight her hatred for the stereotype of Black Boys. Another importance was to teach Black boys how to be men and to have self-acceptance from the society.