As it is a new semester, I have decided to move away from Sam Sax and his poems about his rather messed up life. I wanted to find a poem that was much more simple to read and also find an author that had many poems to choose from. I stumbled upon the poem titled “bullet points” by Jericho Brown and I was excited. I thought that the poem would be in bullet points which would make it really clear for me as someone who has a hard time with poetry. The poem was, in fact, not in bullet points yet I read it to understand what the title meant. I completely misinterpreted the word “bullet”.
The poem is instead about bullets being pointed at him. Just from the opening lines, it is clear that this man, who he refers to as himself, is suicidal. He talks about ending his life. It is rather violent, he says he won’t shoot himself, or suffocate himself but it is clear that he is not telling the truth. He says he would end his life, but not in the hands of the police. This poem was written just this last year during all the protests and it is clear that Jericho is very anti police. “I promise if you hear Of me dead anywhere near A cop, then that cop killed me.” He is okay with dying but wants to go out on his own terms and not via police. I’ve looked at a few other of Jericho’s poems and they don’t all share this same message and I am excited to dive into a different part of his life.
Not to make light of a dark topic, but I find it kind of funny how your goal was to find a simple and less depressing poem, yet when you thought you found the simplest poem in bullet points, it happened to be a complicated poem about yet again a depressing topic.
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