L-vis Lives! by Kevin Coval (Haymarket Books, 2011)
Review by STEVIE EDWARDS, Editor-in-Chief
I have admittedly procrastinated writing my review of L-vis Lives!: Racemusic Poems by Kevin Coval for nearly a month, not because I'm a lazy editor or didn't love every cadence in it― but because this book occupies a space in racial discourse that makes everyone in the room hiccup canned laughter and check the nonexistent missed messages on their cellphones (which probably means it's important to talk about). Equally as necessary as it is uncomfortable, L-vis Lives! presents a protagonist who is an amalgam of whiteboys known for pursuing Blackness in their creeds, embodying famous whiteboys like Elvis Presley and Eminem, more obscure ones like political zealot John Walker Lindh (aka Suleiman al-Faris), and even Coval himself.
Coval begins this book with a preface that seeks to explain the character of “L-vis.” He describes L-vis as “an american anomaly that has become cliché: the whiteboy drawn into and reared by Black music, who then turns practitioner (to whatever degree that is possible― a white boy practicing Black art)” (page XI). The poems that follow provide a self-critical, honest, and at times humorous look at what compels the cool slang and do-rag of the modern day L-vis, all the while acknowledging the skeletons of cultural theft and misappropriation.
In the first poem in the book, “L-vis is a baby in the wilderness,” Coval hauntingly describes the genesis of L-vis: “i wear a pink dress but / I am a skeleton taught to wear the wolf mask” (lines 3-4). Coval creates an L-vis who is pretending, who is soft, a pink dress on the prairie bearing flowers, not even half as hard as the mask he shows the world. This poem concludes with an image that foretells much of the conflict in the poems to come: “for now i am the sun, set to rise in blackness, till i can / wear the wolf mask and roam the plains assuming all is mine” (lines 11-12). What kills me here is the weight of the word assuming, which hints at a self-conscious vein that runs throughout the book; doubt-ridden L-vis continuously questions what is taken when a whiteboy dons “the wolf mask” of Black music and calls it his own. And is made king for it.
Many of the poems in this collection (ie: “the crossover,” “Jealous of the Black Boys,” “white art,” and “what the whiteboy wants”) explore the multifaceted reasons why the whiteboy dons “the wolf mask.” In “the crossover,” a prose poem that appears early in this collection, we are presented with an adolescent L-vis who is confused and angered by the realization that the rosy picture of race relations propagated by junior high civics classes glosses over the reality of cities with neighborhoods he is told never to enter, the reality that post-segregation America is still in many ways segregated: "there was apartheid in the schools. apartheid in the lessons we sat thru. nelson mandela was in america. his name was chuck d. his name was krs-one" (page 3). L-vis looks to music to provide a space where things are no longer segregated, where people can to talk to each other:
there was a tape deck. a walkman. there was no apartheid in the music. no separation in
the library. . . there was not a gunnery filled with columbus broken promises. there was not
a cold war of white flight and divorced unions. there was a hero. for the people. all of the
people. (pages 3-4)
Later in the book, in the poem “white art,” L-vis describes the works of “tweed tenure track post poetry impostors” as being inadequate representations of his experience (line 7). L-vis calls for poems “that tie Billy Collins to a chair / and beat him,” which is certainly a sentiment I can appreciate (lines 15-16). In my first college poetry class, we read Sailing Around the Room by Billy Collins, and although I found the poems to be fairly accessible and pleasing to read aloud, there was nothing that sunk its teeth into my shoulders, nothing that growled in the alleyway, nothing that haunted.
Although many poems in this collection point to a lack of authenticity in White art that speaks of birches but not the ghosts of lynchings and living off the land but not the genocide that the land was stolen under, many also question the authenticity of adopting Black art as a white man, particularly in pieces that take on the persona of Vanilla Ice, like “rep.resent: L-vis tells a white lie” and “Vanilla Ice on the Arsenio Hall Show.” The poem “rep.resent” refers to the fact that rapper Vanilla Ice infamously lied about his suburban roots, claiming the streets of Miami as his own: “i never lived / near Black folks. The closest thing to a gang / was my little league team” (lines 21-23). In “Vanilla Ice on the Arsenio Hall Show,” a found poem that is a direct transcription of an actual interview, Arsenio questions Vanilla Ice's motivation in bringing Flavor Flav with him as a guest performer, suggesting Ice brought him on as a token to show he has “a black supporter" and is not a fake.
However, poems like “L-vis on some New Magellans” take a critical look at the cultural thieving of authentically poor whiteboys (like Eminem) taking on Black art: “i bring midwest Black vernacular / like beads and animal skin. . .i am / a linguist presenting my findings in the field / of Black labor” (lines 6-7, 9-11). Coval presents L-vis as a conflicted whiteboy, who may identify more with Tupac than Phil Collins, but has no waves beneath his do-rag and no ancestors who were stolen from their homelands or feared lynch mobs not too long ago. Toward the latter-half of the book (ie: “ode to painkillers” and “national anthem”), we begin to see L-vis chase the loneliness of belonging to nowhere with pills and booze. We see L-vis lost and treading water, a sympathetic character who is hard not to root for.
L-vis Lives! might not be my first recommendation of poetry books to read to Nana in the nursing home, but I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is ready (or at least considering being ready) for a thoughtful and brave discussion of race in America today. On a side note, it would be irresponsible of me to speak of this book without mentioning Coval's brilliantly dizzying control of the music in his poems. Nobody I can think of in poetry today can pull off a slant rhyme like Coval and deftly tie your tongue into a knot around a story that rattles with what it means to be human. When you pick up this book, prepare to be schooled and delighted by Coval's wordplay and to be challenged by his stories to think critically about your own position of power (or lack there of) in society.
*L-vis Lives!: Racemusic Poems is available for pre-order at Amazon.com and can also be purchased directly from his publisher, Haymarket Books.
I have admittedly procrastinated writing my review of L-vis Lives!: Racemusic Poems by Kevin Coval for nearly a month, not because I'm a lazy editor or didn't love every cadence in it― but because this book occupies a space in racial discourse that makes everyone in the room hiccup canned laughter and check the nonexistent missed messages on their cellphones (which probably means it's important to talk about). Equally as necessary as it is uncomfortable, L-vis Lives! presents a protagonist who is an amalgam of whiteboys known for pursuing Blackness in their creeds, embodying famous whiteboys like Elvis Presley and Eminem, more obscure ones like political zealot John Walker Lindh (aka Suleiman al-Faris), and even Coval himself.
Coval begins this book with a preface that seeks to explain the character of “L-vis.” He describes L-vis as “an american anomaly that has become cliché: the whiteboy drawn into and reared by Black music, who then turns practitioner (to whatever degree that is possible― a white boy practicing Black art)” (page XI). The poems that follow provide a self-critical, honest, and at times humorous look at what compels the cool slang and do-rag of the modern day L-vis, all the while acknowledging the skeletons of cultural theft and misappropriation.
In the first poem in the book, “L-vis is a baby in the wilderness,” Coval hauntingly describes the genesis of L-vis: “i wear a pink dress but / I am a skeleton taught to wear the wolf mask” (lines 3-4). Coval creates an L-vis who is pretending, who is soft, a pink dress on the prairie bearing flowers, not even half as hard as the mask he shows the world. This poem concludes with an image that foretells much of the conflict in the poems to come: “for now i am the sun, set to rise in blackness, till i can / wear the wolf mask and roam the plains assuming all is mine” (lines 11-12). What kills me here is the weight of the word assuming, which hints at a self-conscious vein that runs throughout the book; doubt-ridden L-vis continuously questions what is taken when a whiteboy dons “the wolf mask” of Black music and calls it his own. And is made king for it.
Many of the poems in this collection (ie: “the crossover,” “Jealous of the Black Boys,” “white art,” and “what the whiteboy wants”) explore the multifaceted reasons why the whiteboy dons “the wolf mask.” In “the crossover,” a prose poem that appears early in this collection, we are presented with an adolescent L-vis who is confused and angered by the realization that the rosy picture of race relations propagated by junior high civics classes glosses over the reality of cities with neighborhoods he is told never to enter, the reality that post-segregation America is still in many ways segregated: "there was apartheid in the schools. apartheid in the lessons we sat thru. nelson mandela was in america. his name was chuck d. his name was krs-one" (page 3). L-vis looks to music to provide a space where things are no longer segregated, where people can to talk to each other:
there was a tape deck. a walkman. there was no apartheid in the music. no separation in
the library. . . there was not a gunnery filled with columbus broken promises. there was not
a cold war of white flight and divorced unions. there was a hero. for the people. all of the
people. (pages 3-4)
Later in the book, in the poem “white art,” L-vis describes the works of “tweed tenure track post poetry impostors” as being inadequate representations of his experience (line 7). L-vis calls for poems “that tie Billy Collins to a chair / and beat him,” which is certainly a sentiment I can appreciate (lines 15-16). In my first college poetry class, we read Sailing Around the Room by Billy Collins, and although I found the poems to be fairly accessible and pleasing to read aloud, there was nothing that sunk its teeth into my shoulders, nothing that growled in the alleyway, nothing that haunted.
Although many poems in this collection point to a lack of authenticity in White art that speaks of birches but not the ghosts of lynchings and living off the land but not the genocide that the land was stolen under, many also question the authenticity of adopting Black art as a white man, particularly in pieces that take on the persona of Vanilla Ice, like “rep.resent: L-vis tells a white lie” and “Vanilla Ice on the Arsenio Hall Show.” The poem “rep.resent” refers to the fact that rapper Vanilla Ice infamously lied about his suburban roots, claiming the streets of Miami as his own: “i never lived / near Black folks. The closest thing to a gang / was my little league team” (lines 21-23). In “Vanilla Ice on the Arsenio Hall Show,” a found poem that is a direct transcription of an actual interview, Arsenio questions Vanilla Ice's motivation in bringing Flavor Flav with him as a guest performer, suggesting Ice brought him on as a token to show he has “a black supporter" and is not a fake.
However, poems like “L-vis on some New Magellans” take a critical look at the cultural thieving of authentically poor whiteboys (like Eminem) taking on Black art: “i bring midwest Black vernacular / like beads and animal skin. . .i am / a linguist presenting my findings in the field / of Black labor” (lines 6-7, 9-11). Coval presents L-vis as a conflicted whiteboy, who may identify more with Tupac than Phil Collins, but has no waves beneath his do-rag and no ancestors who were stolen from their homelands or feared lynch mobs not too long ago. Toward the latter-half of the book (ie: “ode to painkillers” and “national anthem”), we begin to see L-vis chase the loneliness of belonging to nowhere with pills and booze. We see L-vis lost and treading water, a sympathetic character who is hard not to root for.
L-vis Lives! might not be my first recommendation of poetry books to read to Nana in the nursing home, but I would highly recommend this book to anyone who is ready (or at least considering being ready) for a thoughtful and brave discussion of race in America today. On a side note, it would be irresponsible of me to speak of this book without mentioning Coval's brilliantly dizzying control of the music in his poems. Nobody I can think of in poetry today can pull off a slant rhyme like Coval and deftly tie your tongue into a knot around a story that rattles with what it means to be human. When you pick up this book, prepare to be schooled and delighted by Coval's wordplay and to be challenged by his stories to think critically about your own position of power (or lack there of) in society.
*L-vis Lives!: Racemusic Poems is available for pre-order at Amazon.com and can also be purchased directly from his publisher, Haymarket Books.