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There is no metaphor for how white poets, secretly pining for, envious of & ergo scorning the success of a POC, younger than them in age if not beauty, rush toward the immediate lecturer’s position the second they perceive the POC has made a mistake in “their” field. #whitesplain
I saw 2 white women and a white man do it of the names Redkal, Christie & Zapruder. No doubt they see themselves as nice, white, only liberal ppl—exactly the issue. Would that they uncover the implicit biases in their kneejerk impulses, postures & tones. This tweet is an alarm.
Pedantry gets, individually, very little—but it has gotten the empire of grammar & white supremacy much: the whole world and the history of its telling. Esp. when the post in question was a IG story, meant to disappear, and not Harvard’s William E. Massey, Sr., Lectures; esp...
...especially since the original poster in question, Vuong, does not even have a twitter account—all this should embarrass y’all. Here’s one idea: instead of debating metaphor, why not go write half a memorable as this ridiculous “scandal” will be? This tweet is a prompt.
You know this reminds me of a friend, a black woman and a trained opera singer: she told me a brief history of the “German fach system” in which singers are classified by “range, weigh, color.” This is where we get the idea of soprano vs mezzo-sop., even coloratura vs spinto etc.
You see, white folks LOVE to categorize things: from voices to analogues to human capital. It turns them on, I guess, this grammatical hammer on the world. Never mind a black voice comes and can sing ALL the fachs—Le Faucon. 
My literal 2 cents: Analogue is the shortest, quickest, unit of argument. They exist to persuade that one thing compares, part or totally, to another thing, & the best make each thing seem anew. Simile, thru “like,” merely reveals this argument; metaphor, thru “is”, conceals it.
Dat’s it. If someone comes to ME asking me my thoughts, that’s what I’m finna say secure in the knowledge my degrees and my published books are analogous to yours. Obviously we may disagree on definitions, since our very goddamn metaphors disagree, no? We don’t write the same.
Obviously we may disagree on definitions, since our very goddamn metaphors disagree, no? We don’t write the same.
Now what possibly angers you beneath the epidermis is that folks ARE coming to me, to us, asking our opinion—but I shan’t speculate. But know this whole ordeal done given your colors away. It’s all feeling VERY Helen Vendler vs Rita Dove circa 2011. But which was has a Pulitzer?
I shall conclude w/a series of links related to that last controversy for folks not be abreast of their contemporary US poetry history. & it is important you stay abreast because all history does is repeat itself. It is a circle, Toni Morrison once lectured. This thread is done.
