i don't want to write too much about the poem because the thing that happens over and over is that we devote a ton of intellectual labor into breaking down a racist poem so that by the end we've studied it like it's a masterpiece. i don't spend all day pondering trash i toss it

but one thing that frustrates me about a poem like this is that justifiably, people will think less of the publication, will not read the publication, and will, because of the publication's actions, abandon all the work by BIPOC in that publication. it invalidates ALL the work

it is not an independent bad decision, but a bad decision that hurts better poetry and better poets. It isn't JUST that this poet was paid for this work, and is prepared and rewarded, financially, to make more work like it

it isn't JUST that the money they were paid could have been split up and paid to other poets to reward THEIR work and support their ability to do it--poets who tend not to receive any institutional support at all.

it isn't JUST that the poem took up 30 pages of real-estate, which means up to 30 additional poets could have appeared with one page poems and had their first publication in a major outlet, which leads to further publication, residency, and grant opportunities in the future

it isn't JUST that reading work like this discourages black poets from submitting at all, discourages some poets from BEING POETS because of how they feel when they read vetted, supported work. or that this is the only journal some people read, so this IS poetry to some folks

it isn't JUST that this poem came out during protests against police brutality, and rather than have an issue that addresses that, or is comprised entirely of black artists, or even just feels totally divorced from this moment, we have an unneeded reminder of how casual racism is

and it isn't JUST that this poet did not need Poetry's support. that if he really felt like this was THE poem, he had plenty of other ways of getting it out there, and Poetry only made it easy for an easy message from someone with tons of access to reach a huge audience

it's that in addition to all that destruction, the poets who have already published, or who are published beside him, will have their work invalidated or overlooked or unread--many poets who write opposed to everything that poem represents

i just want to say that poem was lazy. and one of the ways that you can measure racism is by how destructive it is without hardly moving. i cannot imagine being moved by that poem, and yet look at the hole it's made in me

do better