Be Holdg — ROSS GAY

Contents:

• ROSS GAY
• ROSS GAY’S BE HOLDG
• ROSS GAY
• OF BASKETBALL WH GRATU: ROSS GAY’S PAEAN TO DR. J BE A MULTIMEDIA PERFORMANCE
• TAKG FLIGHT: ROSS GAY’S ‘BE HOLDG’ TELLS A BLACK STORY THROUGH PHOTO AND LYRIC
• INCG JOY: POET ROSS GAY ON GARNG, GRIEF, AND BASKETBALL
• ROSS GAY POEMS
• BE HOLDG BY ROSS GAY
• ROSS GAY: HAVE I EVEN TOLD YOU YET ABOUT THE COURTS I’VE LOVED?
• GAY MOSW · CY GUI

ROSS GAY

Through a kd of lyric rearch, or lyric medatn, Ross Gay nnects Dr. And how that reachg might be somethg like & Reviews“The brilliant fourth book om Gay...

”— Publishers Weekly starred review“Ross Gay’s work is not only celebratory.

”—RHINO“In turng an stance of athletic prows and grace to an expansive metaphoric visn, Gay pulls off a syntactil tour force. ”—Baltimore Art“Gay’s poem theoriz an ethics that is pably polil, and s ebullient gratu, fore and aft, reads not jt as an overflow of thankfulns but as a ncrete practice of the ethics Gay suggts. Ross Gay tak one fluid human gture and through expands the lungs of personal and munal history so they might hold all joy, terror, and vlence of this world.

ROSS GAY’S BE HOLDG

In this terrible era, Ross Gay has wrten a book that breath this broken world and then returns to so we might breathe too. Ross Gay has once aga proven himself one of our greatt poets.

Aga and aga, the betiful note he holds and hands, that’s what Ross Gay be sayg.

Bee of Ross Gay (2016 Kgsley Tufts Poetry Award wner), I found myself somewhere I never thought I would be at 1:00 a.

ROSS GAY

Ross Gay’s newt book-length poem Be Holdg is prefaced by some advice: If you kids out there don’t know who Dr.

OF BASKETBALL WH GRATU: ROSS GAY’S PAEAN TO DR. J BE A MULTIMEDIA PERFORMANCE

I watched this inic shot, which is central to Gay’s poem, set to every song om Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah to Parliament Funkalic’s Give Up the Funk. I end up here bee Be Holdg, like all of Gay’s work I’ve enuntered, entreats the rear’s participatn. Bis his formal and lyril talents, one of the reasons I fd Gay such an astonishg poet is his abily to create an awarens of an other or others.

Together wh Shayla Lawson, Gay -found The Tenrns Project, which he speaks about on his lightful terview wh Krista Tippett of On Beg. Gay speaks of the iative, his vtment actn wh and for others, and how this is all enpassed the word “tenr.

J fly on our screens or om above, and then as the poem mov, we too are flyg, fallg, then flyg, while beg held our flight by Gay’s liberate and tenr voice. Gay’s poem, many ways, is takg the still imag, the ptured bodi, and reanimatg them.

TAKG FLIGHT: ROSS GAY’S ‘BE HOLDG’ TELLS A BLACK STORY THROUGH PHOTO AND LYRIC

To me, Ross Gay’s abily to fd, create, and make tangible, the nnectns between people is all the more miraculo—or rather “amazg but not miraculo”—durg the months of isolatn (5). In 2020, I n no longer take for granted that I n be near and hold my loved on, and the tenr touch Gay endows on the subjects and objects of his attentn, cludg the rear, feels all the more prec. Rarely do a book-length poem hold s rear as tenrly and timately as Ross Gay’s Be Holdg (2020) held me.

When I say this poem is powerful and movg, the words fall short; this is a poem to experience, to read out loud, to cherish, to any good poet would, Gay plays wh language and meang, unpackg for his rear the signifitn of words like “shot” and “hold. ” Gay’s figurative language and poetic vic force his rear to nsir the potential vlence of our gaze, particularly when is unved.

Biblgraphy:Gay, Ross.

INCG JOY: POET ROSS GAY ON GARNG, GRIEF, AND BASKETBALL

Ross Gay was born Youngstown, Oh. Gay is the -thor, wh Aimee Nezhumatathil, of the chapbook Lace and Pyre: Letters om Two Garns (2014), and wh Richard Wehrenberg, Jr., River (2014).

ROSS GAY POEMS

The basketball urt at Girard College is transformed to a stage for the world premiere of ”Be Holdg, ” an origal performance of Ross Gay’s book-length poem. “I found myself watchg aga and aga, the way you n rewatch somethg that’s betiful, ” said thor Ross Gay. The “basele sop” is the basis of “Be Holdg, ” a book-length poem by Gay published 2020, which Girard College is now prentg as a choreographed performance by poets Yolanda Wisher and David Ga, and a new posn for piano and percsn by Tyshawn Sorey, performed by the mic ensemble Yarn/Wire.

BE HOLDG BY ROSS GAY

The basketball urt at Girard College is transformed to a stage for the world premiere of ''Be Holdg, '' an origal performance of Ross Gay's book-length poem.

Gay grew up Philalphia the ‘70s and ‘80s. Gay pots to a particular moment Ervg’s spectacular basket, when he turns his head away om the play and seems to be lookg past the ball, past the other players to what appears to be the far distance. Gay had been workg on the poem while stayg wh his iend, director Brooke O’Harra, wh whom he had llaborated before.

ROSS GAY: HAVE I EVEN TOLD YOU YET ABOUT THE COURTS I’VE LOVED?

“We were chg to try to do somethg together aga, maybe on a slightly bigger sle, ” Gay said. Gay wrote “Be Holdg” for the page to be published as a book, and was not wrg the poem to be a performance. J’s feats of stctive xtery, which if you weren’t lookg refully uld be head-spng, Gay’s poem swoops and div whout warng to a wi range of tangents, always g back to make the pot.

GAY MOSW · CY GUI

Gay says he still follows the 76ers. Award-wng thor and poet Ross Gay turned a 25-send basketball clip to a book-length poem. Gay’s poem, “Be Holdg, ” stemmed om him watchg a vio of former Philalphia 76ers forward Juli Ervg, makg a reverse layup the fourth game of the 1980 NBA Fals.

Ervg’s show-stoppg move is the first image Gay illtrated for his Zoom dience at the creative wrg partment’s first stallment of the “Yawp!