WATCH: Why poetry scares authoritarians

We just talked live with Kevin Young, the poet, author, and New Yorker poetry editor, about his new volume of poems, Night Watch. A multitalented writer and scholar with a daunting resume, Young has never wanted to be anything but a poet, practicing the art that he feels can balance moment and metaphor, capture the most transcendent and the grittiest aspects of life, and provide what he calls “the most efficient mode of time travel” by putting readers directly in touch with the voices of the past and present. Young talked to us about:

• How the blues — its spirit of improvisation, its repetition, its engagement with grief — ennobles poetry as much as poetry ennobles the blues

• How, as an editor, he makes life-altering choices about the tens of thousands of poems he receives each year — and the sense of surprise that makes a great poem able to say the things readers can’t

• What’s so dangerous about poets and poetry that puts them at the top of the list of things authoritarians fear

Young left us with a prompt to get everyone started on their own poems:

You can start with an image, or with an idea, or with a phrase that catches you off guard.

And he mentioned a few phrases that had stuck with him to inspire his own poetry:

Will my hands never
come clean?

You can fall in love
in a museum

One should never be in love
when in a museum.

What phrases have stuck with you, poetic or otherwise? Use one as a starting point, and please share what you come up with in the comments for our Ink Book Club, first-ever poetry challenge.

You won’t want to miss any of this conversation. Just click on the video player above to watch the entire conversation. And click on the link below to purchase a copy of Night Watch.

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We’ll post questions — our discussion guide — every Sunday, and every other Wednesday we’ll meet for a discussion with the Club or a visit from an author or other special guest. Look out for posts with further details. We’ll also host chat threads to get your insight on key questions in advance of our meetings. We’ll be meeting again with Kevin Young on Wednesday, September 24, at 12:30 p.m. Eastern, and we hope to have you there with your thoughts and observations on his new volume, Night Watch.

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