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FREEDOMWAYS                 SECOND QUARTER 1980

   In the morning's radiance
   When we wake,
   She's unsure of my silence
   As she chats about the weather

   But all i want to talk about
   Would be unspeakable things   (from "Guilt")

   I found some of Thomas's longer poems to be impenetrable. While certain of their images are clear, too often the voice seems to lack focus - although my longing for a stronger sense of place and narrative may be merely a matter of personal taste. Interestingly, the focus that appears absent in the long poems flourishes in several remarkable essays on the contemporary black aesthetic scene which the author published in different journals recently. In the essays, his extensive knowledge of contemporary culture combines with his gift for revitalizing the ideas and spirit of the work he is assessing to produce incisive statements in which images, ironies and absurdities are securely tied together.
   To me, this probing, experimental poet's creed speaks of a faith in the value of the individual spirit's testimony, as in these lines from "Class Action":
   I'm left here to embarrass you by shouting
   That we must speak or be like patterns on a wall. . . .;
and of the necessity to penetrate cant, all that is false and senseless around us:
   We succumb to all mythologies of moments
   All so subtly disguised as loss of care
   Liquids that turn to film and film to powder
   Tripping, getting off
   Up till our lives are filled with minuses
   Or finally we cling to one alone,
   Everything is true but us about us.
                         * * *

   Quincy Troupe also speaks in surreal tones that are the perfect companions of his excellent descriptive sense. Troupe's virtue is his finely tuned sense of focus-not only does he have the language and imagination to convey the complex unreality of New York, but he is able to enrich and add depth to his descriptive power with his knowledge and love of history. Indeed, history is the dimension that lies beneath the portrait:

   & his fingernails   the color of tadpoles
   sought the origin of the 400-year-old itch

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