Each Other鈥檚 Keepers: Review of听Worldly Things听by Michael Kleber-Diggs听
by Tryphena Yeboah
搁别惫颈别飞别诲:听Worldly Things听Michael Kleber-Diggs听(Milkweed Editions, 2021).
Michael Kleber-Diggs鈥檚听Worldly Things听follows the murders of Black American men in America and interrogates the assumptions of what it means to be black in this country. The poems grapple with the complexities of being unseen in the black body, having a skin color that acts as a veil from oneself, and at the same time what it means to be identified by a look鈥攖o have an invisibility that is only addressed when one can be studied under a fixed description. In this way, to exist is to be in constant contention with a world that refuses to trust that you are; a world that, in its pursuit of keeping you flat on the ground, ruins itself with indifference, numbs itself with its own blindness.
This tension and divide as well as the state of feeling so trapped that one retreats into the self鈥攖he only refuge and shelter that can be trusted鈥攊s represented in this moving collection: there is witnessing of a world turning against itself, there are elegies to men who have died and the weight of their absence, ode to mothers and wives who grieve their loss, and there鈥檚 a compelling summoning for the reader to join in this witnessing, to face and question oppression and to consider a better world.
The events in 鈥淢y Ultimate Thought is This鈥� are striking: when the speaker鈥檚 friend, a former prison guard calls all convicts 鈥渇eral beasts,鈥� the poem, which is very economical for what it conveys, unfolds into what is at first a mental processing of what has just been uttered and then, what Kleber-Diggs describes as a surrender of faith when the speaker, unbounded, pounces on this man for what he鈥檚 said. What we observe first is how familiarity is used as a license, creating the impression that the speaker鈥檚 friend could make such a statement to the speaker because they 鈥渟aw it fit.鈥� And the reaction that this statement produces is so strong the speaker losses all restraint and attacks the belief. It is worth mentioning that it is the belief that is attacked,听not听the person. After pinning the man down and baring their teeth, the speaker resumes:
听 听 听 听 听 Chewing on the cheek of his claim, the next
听 听 听 听 听 to last thought to enter my head was this:
听 听 听 听 听听only a beast thinks a man is a beast.
In encountering an interaction of this kind, we鈥檙e made to see, at first glance, the cruel association between man and a savage, and what it must have taken for one to accept this as a reality and even more, be so at ease to express the thought. The ending, of course, is where Kleber-Diggs points to a message that is richly layered in the entire collection: we are each other鈥檚 keepers; the moment we stop to see each other, the very moment we lose sight of each other鈥檚 humanness, we face the highest risk of indifference, of death. Kleber-Diggs鈥檚 writing is poignant and courageously speaks to the times we鈥檙e in; with these poems it is impossible to look away from injustice and the deadly perceptions we carry with us; and even more, the damage it creates within us.
A poem that is unafraid to deal with the complexities of human relations and strip down everything to reveal our connection and responsibility to each other is 鈥淭he Grove.鈥� With stunning imagery and lyrical prose, Kleber-Diggs breaks down our constructed differences and draws attention to what lies underneath the surface. The poem is successful in provoking the reader鈥檚 imagination to perceive the human race as a grove and urging us to resee what we may be so quick to neglect鈥攐ur collectiveness. Rather than embrace our twisted roots, we choose alienation: 鈥淏ut we are strange trees, reluctant in this/ forest鈥攚e oak and ash, we pine鈥�/ the same the same no different.鈥�
Kleber-Diggs seamlessly alternates between depicting the brutalities of the present and steps into a future of hope, reconciliation, unity鈥攁ll of which seem heavily grounded in the urgent work of recognition and of paying attention.
Sometimes the speaker鈥檚 lungs are compressed like George Floyd and other times they plead that America鈥檚 loving them to death with 鈥渄estroyed brown bodies, dismantled homes.鈥� Sometimes the speaker assures the reader that he is not a threat but rather, the nicest man on earth and he desires for us to 鈥渃arry the weight of the day together, lighten/ it.鈥澨�Worldly Things听brings together the isolated self and the detached world and while highlighting the terror and rage that exist between and within the two, the poems also offer a vision of people reaching toward each other, doubling their joys, pushing past every inch of invisibility to touch the other, tenderly.
听is the author of the chapbook听A Mouthful of Home, selected by the African Poetry Book Fund. Her stories have appeared in听Narrative Magazine听and听Commonwealth Writers, among others. She lives in Lincoln, Nebraska, where she鈥檚 teaching and pursuing a doctorate in English with a focus on creative writing.