week 2

For the past week, we had a couple of readings. We were to read Riverbank Blues by Sterling Brown, The Weary Blues by Langston Hughes and also an anthology on Bessie Smith. The poems by Brown and Hughes was very enjoyable for some reason. I was able to really focus on what was going on through the poem and decipher what was actually going on. Brown’s poem was basically about a man sitting on a riverbank and the riverbank basically spoke to him. That is what I got out of the poem. In the poem from Langston Hughes, my interpretation was that the author seen a man singing a song of hardship and being weary. I really liked that poem. I didn’t get a chance to read the anthology on Bessie Smith because I couldn’t find it actually and I wasn’t around a computer to email my teacher about it’s whereabouts.

This week’s assignment is to write a poem in blues style and to be quite honest I am a little scared. I even asked my boyfriend for his help because I don’t think that I necessary have it in me to be that creative. I can get some reference from a movie called Love Jones but even then that is a lot to live up to especially when I’m in a class full of talented people. I believe it’s almost a little sad because I like blues style poetry, I think. I mean if I am getting my style of poetry right and it’s authors that fall into that category. What I think I am going to write this poem about is lost love that has gone bad. That seems like a great idea to me seeing how I blues style is about love, heartache and hardships.

This week’s lesson for me has really been creativity. I have to learn to have enough confidence in myself and my abilities to know that I am capable of doing good pieces. I guess what I am afraid of is judgment and not doing good enough. I guess now that I know that it is really up to me to make sure that I give this class and it’s assignments the best of my abilities. I refuse to not at least try do the right thing with this class. It may get hard and I may be frustrated but I got this. I mean it’s not necessarily hard so I know that it’s doable. I basically have to buckle down and maybe conduct some research on this particular poetry style.