Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley door pickup 10am - 7pm 3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611

  • Open Daily: 10am - 10pm
    Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm

    3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
    612-822-4611

Open Daily: 10am - 10pm | Alley-side Pickup: 10am - 7pm
3038 Hennepin Ave Minneapolis, MN
612-822-4611
Playhouse: Poems

Playhouse: Poems

Watkins, Jorrell

Paperback

General Poetry

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ISBN10: 0810147130
ISBN13: 9780810147133
Publisher: Curbstone Press
Published: Apr 15 2024
Pages: 96
Weight: 0.30
Height: 0.39 Width: 5.91 Depth: 8.82
Language: English
Poems on Black joy, masculinity, and the music that transforms a space into a home

Jorrell Watkins's debut poetry collection is a polyvocal, musically charged disruption of the United States's fixation on drug and gun culture. The poems in PlayHouse embody many identities, including son, brother, fugitive, bluesman, karate practitioner, and witness. Throughout, Watkins inflects a Black/trap vernacular that defamiliarizes the urban Southern landscape. Across three sections of poetry scored by hip-hop, blues, and trap, Watkins considers how music is a dwelling and wonders which histories, memories, and people haunt each home. Past figures such as John Coltrane, Billie Holiday, and the short-lived 1940s trio Day, Dawn & Dusk intermingle with Migos, the Watkins family, childhood friends, and loved ones both parted and departed. At its core, PlayHouse reckons with the truths and failures of masculinity for Black boys and men, all the while documenting moments of triumphant Black joy and love.

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