Episode #043 Pulled Over In Short Hills, NJ 8:00am - Ross Gay

Close Talking: A Poetry Podcast

Connor and Jack delve into Ross Gay's powerhouse poem "Pulled Over in Short Hills, NJ 8:00am. Jack breaks down how he arrived at his choice of this poem and the two discuss police violence, the inescapability of race in the United States, the ending of the film Inception, and the Green Book, a travel guide used by black families during the Jim Crow era. Find out more about Ross Gay, here: http://www.rossgay.net/about Find his books, here: http://www.rossgay.net/books Find his poem about Eric Garner (mentioned in the pod), here: https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poem/small-needful-fact Find us on facebook at: facebook.com/closetalking Find us on twitter at: twitter.com/closetalking You can always send us an e-mail with thoughts on this or any of our previous podcasts, as well as suggestions for future shows, at [e-mail]. Pulled Over in Short Hills, NJ, 8:00 AM By: Ross Gay It’s the shivering. When rage grows hot as an army of red ants and forces the mind to quiet the body, the quakes emerge, sometimes just the knees, but, at worst, through the hips, chest, neck until, like a virus, slipping inside the lungs and pulse, every ounce of strength tapped to squeeze words from my taut lips, his eyes scanning my car’s insides, my eyes, my license, and as I answer the questions 3, 4, 5 times, my jaw tight as a vice, his hand massaging the gun butt, I imagine things I don’t want to and inside beg this to end before the shiver catches my hands, and he sees, and something happens.