M-A-C-N-O-L-I-A Book

This was a book that I purchased for a poetry writing class that we then never bothered to reference or read, so it's been sitting in my "to read" pile for a number of years, tucked away in a storage bin that I'm finally going through.

It certainly is an interesting piece, all the works included revolve around the life and times of MacNolia Cox, a young black girl who won her local, state-wide spelling bee, only to be sucker punched by the white judge at the National Bee, giving her a word that was not on the approved list and breaking her spirit. The entries do not follow any exact time frame, jumping around to different points in her life. In fact, most of the information regarding her spelling champ days isn't until the end of the book, though it was a much earlier part of her life.

Several poems in this collection are written in a hybrid screenplay form, making them very visually striking. There are also poems in the form of dictionary entries and those written in more long form style.

One of my favorite works in this book is "The Night Richard Pryor Met Mudbone," an amazing poem that details the moment Richard Pryor went from a decent comic mimicking Bill Cosby to the Pryor who would be considered a comedy trailblazer. It's such a powerful piece. I love it.