Tag Archives: analysis

Lorde on Our Fury over Racial Killings

By Robin Bates | Published: November 23, 2021

Lorde has a poem examining her anger at Whites killing innocent Blacks. It’s a good caution as the Arbery trial nears its end.

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Langston Hughes on the Dignity of Work

By Robin Bates | Published: September 3, 2018

Langston Hughes understood working men and women as well as anyone, as his poem “Brass Spittoons” demonstrates.

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How Fantasy Keeps Us Human

By Robin Bates | Published: May 10, 2018

Neil Gaiman and the late Terry Pratchett are beloved fantasy writers because they stand up for our humanity in dehumanizing times.

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Islamic Philosophy vs. Muslim Fanatics

By Robin Bates | Published: April 29, 2018

In his fantasy novel “Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights,” Salman Rushdie engaged in a debate within Islam about Reason vs. Faith. Good and bad jinn weigh in on each side.

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“Sonny’s Blues,” Transcendent Moments

By Robin Bates | Published: March 8, 2018

In “Sonny’s Blues, art wars with the world’s darkness and promises momentary relief.

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God’s Prayer to Us: Live Kindly, Live

By Robin Bates | Published: November 12, 2017

James Richardson’s poem “Evening Prayer” urges us not to narrowly constrain God within rules but to see God as something greater.

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May We Sail without Giving into Our Fears

By Robin Bates | Published: October 1, 2017

A Noah’s Ark poem by the great Syrian poet Adonis can be applied to the Puerto Rico rescue effort, especially as certain people on the right attempt to inject race into the affair.

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Let Me Not Love Thee If I Love Thee Not

By Robin Bates | Published: July 23, 2017

George Herbert, never afraid to go toe-to-toe with God, grapples with his tormenting faith in “Affliction (1).”

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All Must Love the Human Form

By Robin Bates | Published: November 19, 2016

In “The Divine Image,” Blake gives us a poem for our time, a call to pray for mercy, pity, peace, and love and to recognize the human form in diversity. In “The Human Abstract” he adds that prayer is not enough. It must be accompanied by human justice.

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