Author: Alessandra

This poem was created from the lyrics of the song “Breathin”, by popular singer Ariana Grande. The song is based on anxiety. Being in the public spotlight due to her fame, Ariana Grande must face high levels of pressure and anxiety on a daily basis. I personally resonate strongly with this song as It has been difficult for me to find strategies to manage my own anxiety.

I repurposed the song lyrics to express some of the feelings that anxiety can bring up. At some moments it feels as if you can’t catch a breath. Breathing is one of the most common ways that is used to try to take control of your mind when feeling anxious. The song also represents how being medicated is usually a quick fix when trying to seek medical help for anxiety but many of these medications that are commonly prescribed can have consequences. I personally resonated with this aspect of the song a lot because I have tried to focus on breathing to reset my nervous system while I’m  anxious.

The poem is meant to be hard to make sense of and understand. This is because just like the poem anxiety in itself can be very difficult to understand. Breathing is also a repeated word in my poem. It is seen to be broken up into letters as well as just the word “breathe”. This is to show how anxiety can feel as if you can’t breathe or can’t get a full complete breath. 

M. NourbeSe Philip’s book, ‘Zong!’, Includes works of found poetry symbolizing the destruction of slaves lives through the unfathomably vague text. Philip leaves the reader with no context of the events occurring. This unknowingness represents the lack of knowledge of one being thrown into slavery, experiencing horrific things with little to no understanding of their experiences. The simplicity and vagueness throughout the poems often dismiss the magnitude of the lives lost and the merciless acts against them. This symbolizes the dehumanization of African Americans across generations. Buried away by a corrupt system, over one-hundred forty slaves were thrown overboard. A Massacre somehow justified that has been overlooked and hidden in American history.

Gregson V. Gilbert, also known as “The Zong Case”, was the document that Philip picked apart to form the poems we see throughout the book. “I mutilate the text as the fabric of African life and the lives of these men, women and children were mutilated”(p.193). The broken wording and incomprehensive format of the text gives the readers a sense that the poems are not complete, as if they are missing something. The formatting demonstrates that the text has been manipulated or destroyed as if it held no meaning to begin with. This mirrors the deaths of many that were stripped of their identity, unable to be remembered. “The African men, women, and children on board the Zong were stripped of all specificity, including their names. Their financial value, however, was recorded and preserved for insurance purposes, each being valued at 30 pounds sterling” (p.194). 

The randomization and disorganization in the structure of the poems can be viewed as a representation of the random picking of African slaves. The owners wanted slaves to work with each other assuming this is because it seemed to be more meaningful and productive. Philip makes the correlation in her poetry. “My urge to make sense must be resisted” (p.193). She expresses that grammar is the “force” that makes her words work together, without grammar they don’t.

Discussion Questions

1. In what way(s) did you find the organization and randomized structure of the text significant?
2. Philip’s emphasizes the need to fight the urge to “make sense”. Do you agree with this mechanism in her poetry and its textual motives?

Citation

Philip, M. NourbeSe. Zong! Wesleyan University Press, 2008.

My name is Ally Manicone and I am a sophomore here at SUNY Cortland. I am currently majoring in communications and can’t wait to see where it leads me. I am from Syracuse, New York so I don’t live far from here. I was not sure what I was getting into before joining the class as it was last minute, but it seemed like something I would be interested to learn more about. I have always loved writing and reading poetry. I recently have began to enjoy reading when I have some time to myself. I am super excited to get to know all of you over the semester!