When Joanne Gabbin organizes a Black poetry gathering

Joanne Gabbin, Houston A. Baker, Jr., and Jerry W. Ward, Jr., September 2004, James Madison University

"When Ma Rainey / Comes to town," writes Sterling Brown. "Folks from anyplace / Miles aroun’,/ From Cape Girardeau,/ Poplar Bluff,/ Flocks in to hear/ Ma do her stuff."

We could apply a remix of that for one of our greatest Black poetry organizers. 

When Joanna Gabbin 

Organizes a poetry gathering

Folks from anyplace

Miles around

From here and there and everywhere 

Flock in to hear.

Well, I'm not a poet, but you get the picture. 

First in 1994, then in 2004, and again in 2014, and with the torch passed in 2024, James Madison University became the site of epic gatherings of Black poets--each one shaped by the vision of Joanne Gabbin and her Furious Flower poetry events. 

Gabbin was fresh off her most recent gathering in 2015 when she joined the NEH institute Black Poetry After the Black Arts Movement at the University of Kansas. Beyond the landmark conferences every ten years, she also founded the Furious Flower Poetry Center at James Madison University. The center, in its own words, "is committed to ensuring the visibility, inclusion, and critical consideration of Black poets in American letters, as well as in the whole range of educational curricula."

Through those major conferences and smaller seminars focused on key poets, Gabbin addressed a crucial challenge: how to bring large numbers of poets and educators into the same rooms. We have academic conferences for scholars and educators, and we have festivals that showcase creative writers. But bringing both communities together in distinct and purposeful ways is one of Gabbin’s great, yet often underdiscussed, contributions.

While Black poetry remains one of the most densely populated art forms, it continues to be neglected in scholarly discourse. Part of the reason is that poets and educators don’t always communicate enough. There’s too often a gap between those who write the poetry and those who teach it. With her gatherings, both conferences and seminars, Gabbin quietly and powerfully addressed those issues.

No wonder Maryemma Graham called on Gabbin to participate in those NEH institutes. Graham knew, as we all do, that special things happen when Joanna Gabbin comes to town.

Related: 

• Black Poetry After the Black Arts Movement: Reflections