Yard Show

by Janice N. Harrington

Black history, cultural expression, and the natural world fuse in Janice N. Harrington’s Yard Show to investigate how Black Americans have shaped a sense of belonging and place within the Midwestern United States. As seen through the documentation of objects found within yard shows, this collection of descriptive, lyrical, and experimental poems speaks to the Black American Imagination in all its multiplicity.

Harrington’s speaker is a chronicler of yesterdays, using the events of the past to center and advocate for a future that celebrates pleasure and self-fulfillment within Black communities. 

Genres: Poetry

107 pages, Hardcover

Published October 15, 2024

About the author

Harrington’s writing reflects her beginnings in rural Alabama and her life in the Midwest. A former librarian and professional storyteller, Harrington now teaches creative writing in the Department of English at the University of Illinois.

-from janiceharrington.com

Reviews

[Ags · Rating 5 out of 5]

"This lesson: that attention
makes belonging, makes place."

As an Illinois resident, this collection especially pulled me in because of its focus not just on Midwestern and prairie place/sense of place, but on Illinois in particular. Loved the central through-line of understanding/unpacking the Midwest's geographic and social sense of place, with attention to Black midwesterners' history and art. Whether that be about prairie grasses, yard shows/yard art, particular Illinois towns, and/or food, this was a really cool focus on the Midwest.

What was really special about this reading experience was that this collection felt simultaneously academic/explicitly in conversation with other academics AND poetic/lyrical/with attention to form and craft. I liked the use of epigraphs for each section, and the quotes and borrowed lines within individual poems. Very cool. As a collection, too, this is cohesive and feels like a complete book. It has a lot of dense information, but still reads quickly - which, I think, is a testament to the lyrical skill, decisions on form, and ordering of the poems.

Relatedly, I wasn't familiar with all of the citations/references, whether they be explicit quotes or more subtle call-backs, but/and I still felt like I could read this without stopping to look up everything. Maybe that's an error on my part, though. The notes section in the back of the book helped me appreciate how many more references there were than I caught on my own.

[Jen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Harrington is an African American woman who has lived in Alabama, Nebraska, and Illinois, and she is taking us on a Heritage tour in this book of poetry. She celebrates the grasslands she has known and revisits. She explores the liminal space of yards and porches as modes of expression and assertions of ownership. This book devotes four poems to the poor rural community of Pembroke Township, Illinois, that include snippets of oral history, observations and reflections. Along the way she questions how we perceive poverty. Other poems meditate on clouds and apple peeling but mostly on memory and place. There’s a quiet theme of disruption and questions of belonging and not belonging.

She brings along other thinkers in the form of quotes from Roland Barthes, Carl Phillips, and Martin Luther King, Jr., among many others, both well known and little known, weaving the history of thought through her poetry. This book includes an ample poem-by-poem notes section for reference. Despite having read all of the notes, I feel that there are nuances that I’ve missed on the first read, which is not uncommon in a book of poetry.

Her poems vary from the lyrical to direct observation, from lined poetry to numbered short paragraphs, from left aligned poems to more inventive forms of expression. Though it’s not strictly necessary to read this book from beginning to end, the final poems do feel like they have grown out of the experience of the earlier ones.

I was rather surprised when I came to the end of this book (was reading an ebook) and wished there had been more. In fact, I’d say my only criticism of this book is that it needed to be longer.

[Mya Matteo · Rating 5 out of 5]

“A funnel-weaving spider /
lowered into the aorta of the human heart /
will weave a web appropriate for space.”

technically skilled, really beautiful meditations on pastoral poetry (and the place of Blackness within them), prairie landscapes, the yards & lawns of Black folks, what does it mean to witness as a Black woman, how does it change what is being witnessed etc. just gorgeous throughout.

[Aether · Rating 4 out of 5]

a book of poems about the black experience of living in the midwest interspersed with the beauty of midwest nature. absolutely melancholy and dazzling and incredible metaphors and descriptions. i didnt want this book to be over when i finished it

[Angry.Sad.Motivated · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful.

[Helen · Rating 5 out of 5]

really lovely. if i understood poetry more this would have been even better

[Mr. Davies · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great reminder of why we should all read more poetry.

[Hannah Notess · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oh, I loved these - absolutely transformative for how I look at Midwest yards and the natural spaces of redlined predominately Black neighborhoods in our Midwest cities

[Colleen Kowalski · Rating 4 out of 5]

I don’t usually read poetry so I do not feel adept to provide an accurate star rating. So 4/5 for a non poetry reader.

I read this because it won the Anisfield-Wolf Book Award for poetry in 2025.

I enjoyed the varying styles of poems in this collection and am excited to meet Janice N. Harrington during the awards celebrations.

Update: I met Janice Harrington and she is such a cool, funny, and kind poet and it was incredible hearing her read these poems aloud!