Ropes

Poetry collection by Derrick Harriell, Ph.D. Based on the lives of several famous boxers, including Jack Johnson, Joe Louis, Joe Frazier, and Mike Tyson. ROPES uses a smart structure of four 'rounds,' staged in reverse chronological order, to embrace the spectacle of Mike Tyson and then to track the boxing tradition back to Jack Johnson, the first black heavyweight champion. Along the way, the collection interrogates the shapes of masculinity and violence in our society. Using the epistolary form, Harriell imagines exchanges between the boxing greats, as well as with cultural icons such as Lena Horne and Tupac Shakur; their intergenerational dialogues are filled with challenges, remembered hurts, and the tension of what W. E. B. Du Bois would term "double consciousness."