The Poetry of the Moment

“Self-isolation,” says Major Jackson, “is what writers, particularly poets, experience whenever they sit down to write a new poem.” Jackson, the Richard A. Dennis Professor of English and University Distinguished Professor, is ensuring that he and his students seize this opportunity to create meaning out of uncertainty. He says students are finding his classes to be a refuge in which they can reflect on the COVID-19 crisis and express themselves. “They know it’s the job of artists and writers to document this moment. It’s really exciting when young people realize that they do not have to be debilitated, but poetry can be a means by which they come to understand and test the ideas we are now faced with.” With nation-wide events to promote his latest book of poetry, The Absurd Man, on hold due to the coronavirus, Jackson has taken up a challenge from his wife, who is also a poet, to write one new poem each day. “We have always turned to poetry for occasions that mark life,” he says. “There is a kind of exaltedness and clarity to the language that allows us to have some sort of insight about our journey.” Jackson has said that he considers sharing his poetry a kind of spiritual service that gives others the language to understand and process this collective experience. To that end, he offers a poetic dispatch from self-isolation, a favorite of his daily scrawlings. “Invocation” is a prayer of sorts, Jackson’s hope that the inevitable changes born of this crisis will be positive ones.