Dear John, Dear Coltrane: Poems

by Michael S. Harper

       "Harper's is a poetry of classically unadorned statement, a direct,
        unflinching record of a man alive in his time. When he is at his best,
        in both his public and his private voice, he creates a language humming
        with emotion and ennobled by a deeply felt human dignity."
        -- Virginia Quarterly Review
      ". . . one of the finest poets of our time."
        -- San Francisco Examiner & Chronicle
     
Stephen Henderson Award, African American Literature and Culture Society (AALCS), 2013. Author is recipient of the Frost Medal for Lifetime Achievement, Poetry Society of America, 2008.

Genres: Poetry, Music

88 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1970

Reviews

[Eddie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Michael S Harper's first book is suffused with pain, but also with joy and love and sex. A poet of both the intimate and the global. Beautiful.

[Loocuh Frayshure · Rating 4 out of 5]

I’m super picky with poetry collections, so take any collection I give a 4 star or higher to very seriously. This one has some real heavy hitters—heaviest of which is probably the sudden saga of multiple poems in a row near the end that detail the loss of two babies that Harper and his wife suffered. Man, that was so painful. Really loved some of the jazz poems though and overall appreciate the artistry here that fuses sometimes anger, sometimes pain, sometimes eroticism, with that personal note of skill.

[Marvin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic collection of poems focusing on jazz and musicians, marriage and the loss of a child, and race and civil rights. At their best in pieces like "Near Colorado," The Waterbowl," "Crisis in the Midlands: St. Louis, Missouri," and "Echoes II," when Harper builds images crystalline and heart-wrenching.

[Jeff Crompton · Rating 4 out of 5]

It didn't actually take me five months to read this slim volume of poetry - or I guess it did, in a way. I read a poem or two at time, with long breaks in between. These poems, "about" music, race, relationships, and personal tragedy, are denser and more enigmatic than I expected. I'm still not exactly sure what I think about the book, except that I want to read it again. And I guess that's saying something.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’m very glad I read it. Reading these poems both before and after the killing of nine African-American people at their church is both instructive and damning. The poet helps me see the world in a way that I am often too blind to see. These poems, though pretty old, speak as clearly today as they did when they were written. Powerful stuff.

[Hugh · Rating 5 out of 5]

<3: the echoes and moon women

[Keith · Rating 5 out of 5]

Michael Harper's first book. It's a classic. The poem he wrote for Miles Davis sets the tempo for this great book of poems. If you are a lover of poems this is a must have.

[Joe Grantham · Rating 5 out of 5]

“You pick up the horn
with some will and blow
into the freezing night:
a love supreme, a love supreme—“