Reading Response

David Henderson was a black poet, who infused Jazz in his writings. Most of his poems take place in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. He discusses many of the issues that blacks would go through during his time. For example he mentions in one poem that one of his characters got stopped and searched him for no reason. The man had no one and nowhere to go. Its funny how these poems were written a long time ago but the same issue of being racially profiled by the police is still very much present. Most of his characters were also black.

            In his poems he is very specific with his descriptions and the descriptions of his surroundings. The second poem along with some of the others seems to tell a story. To me it seemed that the attitudes of the characters were portrayed in the way he was writing them. They seemed a bit blah boring, and he showed this in his writing by using short and concise sentences. He also seemed to use colors to describe different things. For example I got the feel that he connects the color red to something strong or fierce. He uses this color to describe one of his characters hair color.

            Sometimes he uses opposites such as “we talk of war// then make love.” He also uses play on words and has a different structure of writing. He randomly puts extra spaces between words, or italicizes things or doesn’t capitalize.

           

His poems were mostly about different situations that his different characters go through. I also noticed that most of his poems had a sad tone to them, sort of sad and depressing.

            One line that stood out to me was "Jass they play// you hear at it// it be a part of you// alive." He personifies the idea of music and jazz. I also found it interesting that he misspelled the word jazz. Music is a consistent theme in most of his poems and is often brought up even in small ways. Such as someone dancing or simply knowing who’s music was playing from just listening to the beginning.

Poems are not high in list of interest but these poems weren’t so bad. They are very descriptive and almost straightforward, which makes them easier to understand. His poems seem more like song lyrics than anything else. They flow together and transition well. By the way that they are written you can add a a rhythm and melody to them.