Sunday Inspiration: Lucille Clifton
“hag riding”
why
is what i ask myself
maybe it is the afrikan in me
still trying to get home
after all these years
but when i wake to the heat of morning
galloping down the highway of my life
something hopeful rises in me
rises and runs me out into the road
and i lob my fierce thigh high
over the rump of the day and honey
i ride i ride
–Lucille Clifton, in The Terrible Stories
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Biographical Notes: Lucille Clifton published Good Times, her first book of poetry, in 1969. Since that time she has published 30 more volumes, including several collections of poetry, two memoirs, and more than 20 children’s books. Clifton has won a number of awards including, most recently, the National Book Award for the year 2000, for Blessing the Boats. Clifton has held poet-in-residence and faculty posts at a number of colleges and universities, including Coppin State College in Baltimore, Columbia University, George Washington University, University California – Santa Cruz, St. Mary’s College of Maryland, and Dartmouth College. In 1979 she was appointed Poet Laureate of Maryland. She held that post until 1985.
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Posted by Ajuan Mance
Posted in Academia, African Americans
May 13th, 2009 at 7:36 am
She is a great one. I’ve featured her a number of times on my blog daddyBstrong.blogspot.com.She’s a poet we all should know.