E. Ethelbert Miller calls himself a “literary activist.” This Washington, D.C.-based poet, essayist, editor, short story and memoir author has been involved in all things literary for decades. He has been on the boards of organizations such as The Writers Center and the Humanities Council of Washington, D.C.
He has been awarded a Fulbright Fellowship, honorary degrees, the Stephen Henderson Poetry Award, and many other honors. Two cities—Washington, D.C. and Jackson, Tenn.—proclaimed E. Ethelbert Miller days. He has been the director of the African American Resource Center at Howard University since 1974. From hosting radio programs to organizing poetry readings series, Miller has done it.
Yes, very impressive. But put all that to the side when you read his poetry collection How We Sleep on the Nights We Don’t Make Love. These poems cover the full range of love: romantic relationships, parenting, religion, and culture to the human face of political issues. The poems exude a soft power, a whisper that can cause you to experience a paradigm shift.
Take, for instance, the poem “Rosa Parks dreams”: “Rosa Parks dreams about/ a bus in Jerusalem. A headless/ woman sits in her seat….” In a few words, Miller takes an American civil rights experience and transfers elements of it to the Middle East conflict. This theme carries through his poems about “Omar,” a boy who practices Islam in an American school.
Miller presents a stark description of materialism and the conflict in “A Middle Class Algerian Woman in Paris Talks about Fashion”: “I comb my hair while thinking of the news from home./ Small children and women are having their throats cut,/ and my nails need to be painted.”
His love of sports and jazz seems no more or less intimate than his missing lover in “May 26, 2002”: “I’m always touching your rim/ and slipping out. Maybe it’s my/ east coast style or John Coltrane/ playing ‘Too Young to Go Steady’ on his Ballads album….”
If that is not romantic enough for you, then read “Untitled,” “A Portrait in Nine Lines,” “XandO,” or “See”: “Seeing you/ is like seeing you/ for the first time/ and wanting to/ see you again.”
Throughout this book, there is a feeling of loving-kindness. Even when Miller might seem critical, he has the ability to see the humanity of his characters—perhaps a reflection of the poet himself. This is a poetry collection to get you past today’s headlines to the depths of emotional experience.
How We Sleep on the Nights We Don’t Make Love by E. Ethelbert Miller, Curbstone Press, publisher
