Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib's The Crown Ain’t Worth Much Elevates the Terrain

The "stunning debut collection" from Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib, The Crown Ain’t Worth Much (Button Press, 2017), is "written in blood," says Candace Williams in her review of the book at The Fanzine. "I imagined blood seeping through the pages and forming Rorschach blots on the table. Hanif Willis-Abdurraquib is testing us. He knows we haven’t been paying attention. He knows we’re running out of time." More (about the ends):

I don’t want to quote the last lines of poems in this review but I will mention that many of the poems end on a remarkable note because of the control Willis-Abdurraqib wields over the last image and breath of each work. “September, Just East of the Johnson Park Courts,” “Dispatches from the Black Barbershop, Tony’s Chair. 1996.,” “Windsor Terrace, 1990,” and “I Mean Maybe None of Us Are Actually From Here” are examples of how a final line can make a poem go on forever.

Willis-Abdurraquib references many pieces of black art and culture, including rappers, R&B singers, songs, films, and fashion trends. Many characters in the poems are ancestors speaking from the grave. These references elevate the terrain from the speaker and their particular situation in Columbus to issues faced by many generations of black diaspora. In “Ode to Kanye West in Two Parts, Ending in a Chain of Mothers Rising from the River,” the speaker hears his ancestors speaking:

you know we ain’t
rupture this country’s spine and unearth all its gold for you people to cocoon
your teeth in it

The Kanye West reference, coupled with the appearance of ancestors in the first half of the poem, as well as the depiction of the speaker’s grief in the second half, conveys the complexity of black pain and the things black people consume in an effort to overcome pain and take control of a situation. Most of the time, the media depicts black people buying gold and wearing kicks as childish consumers rather than thoughtful patrons. In this poem, there are multiple black perspectives explored.

Read on, dear reader!