In 2013, the Poetry Society of America's national series, Yet Do I Marvel: Black Iconic Poets of the 20th Century, celebrated the work of a wide range of distinguished poets from James Weldon Johnson, Paul Laurence Dunbar, Sterling Brown, Countee Cullen, and Langston Hughes to Margaret Walker, Gwendolyn Brooks, Robert Hayden, June Jordan, Etheridge Knight, and Audre Lorde. Our events took place across the country—in Boston, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Washington, D. C.—with the culminating celebration held in New York City at Cooper Union's Great Hall. Star Black took the photographs below of that event. Click the images to enlarge.
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In addition to these events, the Poetry Society of America asked a group of contemporary African American poets to revise a question posed over a decade ago, at a Poetry Society of America panel featuring Elizabeth Alexander, Cornelius Eady, Tracie Morris, and Harryette Mullen, moderated by Kevin Young: "What's African American about African American Poetry." The earlier conversation was reprinted and can be read in Fence magazine. The current responses to that question can be read below.