ARTISTS: Michael D. Harris

Michael D. Harris, Associate Professor Emeritus at Emory University, has taught full-time or as an adjunct at UNC Chapel Hill, Duke, Wellesley College, Spelman College, and Morehouse College and as a visiting professor at Dillard University in New Orleans. He works as a practicing artist and photographer and has been a member of artist collective, AfriCOBRA since 1979. His work is in many collections and he has exhibited internationally. Prof. Harris has worked as a curator or had exhibitions produced at the High Museum of Art, the Smithsonian National Museum of African Art, and for 9 years at the Harvey B. Gantt Center of African American Culture in Charlotte. His book, Colored Pictures: Race and Visual Representation, won two national awards. His latest scholarly book, Sanctuary: Conjuring and Africana Art Aesthetic, is under contract at Duke University Press.

Battling Atlanta 

In the routine cruelty of the South

biscuits filled with flour

buttermilk

ground up powder from slave teeth;

New words in old drawls

iced tea sweetened

with sugar and dried blood;

old trees from murder stories

cut down for cul-de-sacs and subdivisions;

integrated schools left bare behind

in dis-integrated cities with two-lane exits;

one for football, maybe basketball;

Magnolia trees and fingernails

pickup trucks

and whispered stories of dead relatives

torn from us;

railroad tracks in blue eyes

me on my side,

genteel smiles

white glove cruelty

with a powdered drawl;

conservative politicians doing

dog-whistle Dixiecrat work.

Fried chicken at Mary Mac’s,

adjacent tables,

proof of the New South,

if I mind my manners and keep the silence;

don’t break character in this cruel drama;

pretend to ignore the savage head start.

Presently a peace with grits

and shrimp

bacon gravy for everyone;

Atlanta overseen by a Stone Mountain

tribute to terrorist defenders

of a holocaust seen in glimpses and whispers

if at all.

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Hyphenated Identities :: Setu, August 2020