mr. west
MR. WEST
sarah blake
WESLEYAN UNIVERSITY PRESS MIDDLETOWN, CONNECTICUT
WESLEYAN POETRY
Wesleyan University Press
Middletown CT 06459
www.wesleyan.edu/wespress 2015 © Sarah Blake All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America
Wesleyan University Press is a member of the Green Press Initiative. The paper used in this book meets their minimum requirement for recycled paper.
This is a creative and original work of poetry about the poet’s life and her experience of Kanye West’s work and public persona. Kanye West does not authorize, endorse or approve of any of the material contained in this book.
Excerpt in “Gaze” on pp. 89–91 from Catie Rosemurgy, “Variorum,” in The Stranger Manual. Copyright © 2010 by Catie Rosemurgy. Reprinted with the permission of The Permissions Company, Inc., on behalf of Graywolf Press, Minneapolis, Minnesota, www.graywolfpress.org.
Excerpts in “The Fallible Face” on pp. 28–30 from Emmanuel Levinas, Ethics and Infinity (Pittsburgh, PA: Duquesne University Press, 1995), 86, 92; and Totality and Infinity (Pittsburgh, PA: Duquesne University Press, 1969), 75, 178, 199. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Blake, Sarah (Poet)
[Poems. Selections]
Mr. West / Sarah Blake.
pages cm. — (Wesleyan Poetry series)
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978-0-8195-7517-3 (cloth: alk. paper) —
ISBN 978-0-8195-7518-0 (ebook)
I. Title.
Ps3602.l3485a6 2015
811’.6—dc23
2014035803
5 4 3 2 1
This project is supported in part by an award from the National Endowment for the Arts.
Cover image: Relief of the falcon god Horus at the Temple of Edfu in Egypt. Photograph © Olaf Tausch, from Wikimedia Commons.
FOR kanne AND FOR noah
CONTENTS
“Runaway” Premieres in Los Angeles on October 18, 2010
The Week Kanye Joined Twitter
16
Kanye’s Digestive System
17
Seeing Kanye
20
THE FALLIBLE FACE
Mythic
23
God Created Night and It Was Night
24
Kanye’s Skeletal System
26
The Fallible Face
28
This Is Not the First Time I’ve Wondered
31
In Song
32
So Kanye Transformed Himself, Producer to Superstar
34
DEAR DONDA
Adventures
39
Kanye’s Circulatory System
42
I Want a House to Raise My Son In
44
On November 10th, 2007, Donda West Died
49
Dear Donda
51
Runaway
53
AFTERMATH
Three Months, to the Day, before Taylor Turned Twenty, but Kanye
57
Aftermath
58