Midland: Poems [Paperback]

Kwame Dawes (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 14, 2001

Kwame Dawes is one of the premier reggae poets of our time. A musician, actor, scholar, and writer with roots in Ghana, the Caribbean, and Canada, Dawes is one of those rare artists who can move from lyrics to poetry in a single beat. In this new collection of poetry suffused with raw sensuality and a reggae aesthetic, Dawes presents a collision of sounds, tensions, and rhythms. Drawing deeply on his experiences in Africa, the Caribbean, Canada, England, and the American South, Dawes seeds his poems with questions of inheritance and “hieroglyphs of belonging.” His portrait of an old man on a tropical beach is shaded with memories of colder places. In the 11-page title poem, “a dialect of ire” unfolding like “the hung man dangling/from a live oak,” Dawes transforms the poetry of protest into a compassionate search for the “dusty graves” of his ancestors, insisting that his readers look beneath “affinities of skin, sin and suffering” to the roots of a brutal inheritance. In “Excursion to Port Royal,” he confronts the abject hunger of history. Like Dawes’s earlier work, the poems in Midland treat the mysteries of displacement, loss, and belonging. Now, he has added to this mix the slavery upon which the American South was built and which continues to haunt it today. Midland is Dawes’s seventh poetry collection and the first to be published simultaneously in Canada and the US. Prior to publication, it was awarded the Hollis Summers Poetry Prize from Ohio University Press.

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Editorial Reviews

From Library Journal

Reading the sensuous poetry of Dawes, one's first impression is of immersion in the atmosphere of the Caribbean, "the stench of wisteria crawling its pale purple/ path through a dying swamp." (Born in Ghana, Dawes grew up in Jamaica and now teaches at the University of South Carolina.) Ultimately, however, Midland takes the reader on an autobiographical journey to exile and self-discovery. Dawes is less concerned with reggae than with the need to speak the truth about "the generation that understood the smell/ of burning flesh." The 11-page title poem, "Midland," a "dialect of ire" unfolding like "the hung man dangling/ from a live oak," addresses the burden of "ash and tar of a Sumter lynching" with fortitude. In graphic language, he insists that one look beneath "affinities of skin, sin, and suffering" to the roots of a brutal inheritance. Awarded Ohio University's Hollis Summers Poetry Prize 2000, this book superimposes landscapes of Africa, Jamaica, and the United States, transforming the poetry of protest into a compassionate search for the "dusty graves" of his ancestors. These poems form "hieroglyphs of belonging" that help us come to terms with a complex heritage of intolerance and progress.DFrank Allen, Northampton Community Coll., Tannersville, PA
Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Dawes' redolent poems are seeded with questions of inheritance. For instance, he portrays an old man painting on a tropical island beach, watched by a skeptical younger man, pen and notebook in hand and memories of colder places in mind. Born in Ghana, raised in Jamaica, educated in Canada, and currently on the faculty of the University of South Carolina, Dawes is cued to the spirituality of place--its prayers and ghosts--and writes with both elegance and poignancy of a search for ancestors and "hieroglyphs of belonging." Musing on his desire for home and knack for adaptability, he sees himself as a "chameleon of suffering," but there is nothing superficial about Dawes' empathy as he confronts the inexplicableness of genocide and slavery. The anguish of the dead and the helpless and the guilt of the living shadow each sensuously beautiful poem, each a quest for contact with the past and a talisman for the future. Donna Seaman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 103 pages
• Publisher: Ohio University Press; 1 edition (February 14, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0821413562
• ISBN-13: 978-0821413562
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 6 x 3.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 6.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,096,432 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars brilliant, June 16, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Midland: Poems (Hardcover)

Simply - one of the best poetry books I have ever read. Wonderful, deep, brilliant craftsmanship - stunning imagery. A great new poetic voice.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A Wonderful Collection, March 10, 2001

By 

Charles M. Nobles (Tulsa, OK United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Midland: Poems (Paperback)

This book won the Hollis Summers Poetry Prize in 2000. Dawes was born in Ghanda but grew up and was educated in Jamaica and New Brunswick, Canada. This collection speaks to the landscape and the authors experience in South Carolina where he teaches English at the University of South Carolina. It also deals with the poet as an artist and has been hailed as "a powerful testament of the complexity, pain, and enrichment of inheritance." My favorite poem is "Love Oil" which deals with the meaning of home for the poet. This is first class poetry.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Truly, an inheritance!, June 22, 2002

By 

Geoffrey Philp (Miami, Florida) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Midland: Poems (Hardcover)

In Midland, Kwame Dawes describes journeys (geographical, spiritual and aesthetic) which ultimately leave us in state of grace contained in the title poem.
Dawes moves us easily between London, Jamaica, Africa and South Carolina as only someone of his intelligence, humour and talent could and creates a poetic tapestry as a true inheritor of the burden/glory of the African diaspora. Yet despite the shame of racism/slavery/alienation, Dawes keeps on moving with the music, "the reggae aesthetic" that buoys up even his most gut wrenching poems.
If you doubt me, read "Sun Strokes" and then tell me if this man is not a poet!