Ahmos Zu-Bolton

"There is a cure for the Blues [...] A white cabbie says there ain’t never been no/great colored poets [...] and I think to myself man this cat is hip/ smooth, there’s truth in his meter, so I sez to him I say, hey man, how come a professor like you is driving a cab?" -Ahmos Zu-Bolton, from "Taxicab Blues".

Ahmos Zu-Bolton II (October 21, 1948, - March 8, 2005 ) was an activist, poet and playwright also known for his editing and publishing endeavors on behalf of African-American culture.

Life
Born in Poplarville, Mississippi, Zu-Bolton grew up in DeRidder, Louisiana, near the Texas border.

In 1965 he was one of several black students who integrated Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.The Mississippi Writers Page, Ahmos Zu-Bolton II. After serving in the U.S. Army in Vietnam, Zu-Bolton founded Hoo-Doo, a magazine devoted to African-American activism and arts, published A Niggered Amen: Poems, and coedited Synergy D.C. Anthology, in 1975. He also opened the Copestetic Bookstore on Marigny Street in New Orleans, LA.

While living in New Orleans he taught English, African-American Studies, and Creative Writing classes at Xavier University, Tulane University and Delgado Community College. He was Visiting Writer in Residence at University of Missouri.Lynita F. Jones, "Candelight Vigil for Ahmos Zu-Bolton", ChickenBones: A Journal.

"'...His work is his version of history. He knew his life and experience were too important to leave to other people. He created worlds and populated them with people to act out the blood and pulse of being black in America.' -Grace Cavalieri"

His book Ain’t No Spring Chicken is a selection of poems published by the Voice Foundation in 1998.

He died March 8, 2005, in Washington, D.C., of cancer.

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Poet In Residence
"I linger here for the mountains the waters, and the shadows only … this tribe ain’t mine." -Ahmos Zu-Bolton

Ahmos Zu-Bolton was an African-American Beat poet of the 1970s who touched lives as a “poet” in the classrooms of Virginia, Georgia and Texas. He was instrumental to college campuses adding new bodies of thought about poetry and color, writer of poetry collections such as Fishpond Australia, Ain't No Spring Chicken, Hoo-Doo and A Niggered Amen, which was published December 1 1975. Ahmos Zu-Bolton was Resident Poet at Carver High School in Columbus, Georgia in the spring of 1976, where he met, taught and was a major influence of =n the life and poetry of Will Dockery, and, the next year, Grace Cavalieri


 * In 1977 he took my first full-length poetry book Body Fluids for distribution and sent me the first check I ever received for poetry. I think it was $7.00 or $8.00. He reached across race to include me. Connections. Interconnectedness is more like it. Ahmos was most of all deeply connected to his own family in De Ridder, LA and spoke often of a father who thought he could do anything and let his son think the same.

In Washington, DC Ethelbert Miller became his historian. Zu-Bolton was co-director to Miller's Directorship of the Afro American Resource Center at Howard University; and, there still exists in DC a community of poets who will always revere and love him. He teamed up with artists in New Orleans, Galveston, Austin and Houston to produce his HooDoo Festivals.

While living in New Orleans he taught English, African American Studies and Creative Writing at Xavier University, Tulane University and Delgado Community College. He was Visiting Writer in Residence at University of Missouri. When Ahmos Zu Bolton died in 2005, that college held a candlelight vigil. And, he connected with the old as well as the young: he and his wife, poet Harryette Mullen, worked with senior citizens in 1978, teaching and encouraging their life stories.

A Niggard Amen, Zu-Bolton's masterpiece
The poetry collection is in Epic Poetry form four sections: The Books of X, Y, Z and A (the alpha and omega?). Zu-Bolton’s main characters are Blackjack Moses and Livewire Davis, starting with Blackjack Moses returning from Vietnam... "he has no weapon/ (he threw away his gun/ when he threw away/ his bible." In "spacedream struggle" he writes, "I fought the Christians today. / Me and my man Jesus, who is/ on this mission with me,/ and who would have me/ turn the other cheek/ nigger." The words "Me" and "Jesus,". Later in the poem cycle "the fool (an excerpt from the diary of blackjack moses)" is a six-page poem: "the fool/ you know him/ he once told you the secrets/ of his life/ there’s a file on him/ at the pentagon/ he ain’t no myth/ him for-real baby…" And "the fool lies down/ with these ancient ones./…they teach him/ the holy song & dance,/ they give him cups/ of his own blood/ to drink// they teach him to eat/ of his own flesh…"

And so it goes.

Phrases and Keywords from the poetry collection
Title A Niggered Amen: Poems Author Ahmos Zu-Bolton Publisher Solo Press, 1975 Original from the University of California Digitized Apr 25, 2008 Length 48 pages Subjects Poetry › General Poetry / General

abstract ain't alley baby bebop bible blackjack moses blackjack told BOOK bout burn castle chant cheek church coming composes a history couldnot crack daddy-o-blues play dance dancers darkness dawn dead-end defense deja diary dick Dreamplace dreams escape eternal nigger face fast father fire & love fist fool spends fool the fool frown ghetto hated hides hungup inside Jesus jive ju-ju know swingers light Livewire Davis Livewire's mama mama mirror moons mother move myth never Neverdie NIGGERED AMEN night old place ollie street otherworlds poem that refused poet seeking poetry preacher psychiatrist rage rebirth reflection rhyme ritual run he runs run run sang scream screw seeking a poem shadows shoot sister blues sleep slum song spilling spin spirit star STUMBLING THRU sugarcane sweat tangents teach theatre threw thru blue eyes thru my window tribe turn victory vision voice walls womb

Recognition
Zu-Bolton's poem, ""Reading the Bones: a Blackjack Moses nightmare" (originally printed in American Poetry Review), was included in The Best American Poetry 2003.

Poetry

 * A Niggered Amen: Poems. San Louis Obispo, CA: Solo Press, 1975.
 * Featuring Four Third-World Poets (by Peter Blue Cloud, William Oandasan, Ahmos Zu-Bolton, & Ricardo Sánchez. Laguna, NM: A Press / Austin, TX: Relampago Books, 1979.
 * Ain't No Spring Chicken: Selected poems. New Orleans, LA: Voice Foundation, 1998. ISBN 978-0-9668063-0-4
 * 1946: A poem. Berkeley, CA: Ishmael Reed Publishing, 2002. ISBN 978-0-918408-34-1
 * 1946: A poem. Berkeley, CA: Ishmael Reed Publishing, 2002. ISBN 978-0-918408-34-1

Edited

 * HooDoo 1 (edited with Carolyn Chew). DeRidder, LA: Energy BlackSouth Press, 1972.
 * Synergy: An anthology of Washington D.C. Blackpoetry (edited with E. Ethelbert Miller). Houston, TX: Energy BlackSouth Press, 1975.
 * HooDoo 4. Houston, TX: Energy BlackSouth Press, 1975.
 * HooDoo 6½ (edited with Lorenzo Thomas & Adesanya Alakoye). DeRidder, LA: Energy Earth Communications, 1978.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.