Rita Dove: “Playlist for the Apocalypse”

The US Poet Laureate from ’93 to ’95, winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, honored with both the National Humanities Medal and the National Medal of Arts—readers, it’s been too long since Rita Dove has blessed us with her writing. She speaks about relearning how to write after her multiple sclerosis diagnosis. And her experiences with racism as a Black woman wherever she goes. She says “Playlist for the Apocalypse” echoes what’s going on in the world, from many different historical and personal directions, while meaning to comfort the reader.

Excerpt from Playlist for the Apocalypse by Rita Dove.

Bellringer

I am as true to that bell as to my God.

I was given a name, it came out of a book—​

more than two men in a room means the third

can be ignored, as I was when they spoke

I listen in on the lectures whenever I can,

and freckles and not-​quite-​Negro eyes

then continue on my way through darkness

keeping time. Up here, molten glory

my name flies free.

Excerpted from Playlist for the Apocalypse © 2021 Rita Dove. Reprinted with permission of the publisher, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. All rights reserved.