When I read poetry, I usually find one or two poems that are my favorite. For T.S. Eliot, it is "The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." For e.e. cummings, it is "anyone lived in a pretty how town." For Amiri Baraka, it is "Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note."

I discovered LeRoi Jones (as Baraka was then known) in the late 1960's while in college. I read the Dead Lecturer cover to cover and still have the paperback book on my shelves. So I was very excited when I discovered this collection of his lifetime work. Unfortunately, I was very disappointed. It took me over a year to get through this book and then I had to skim read the last half. Sure, I can pick out lines that I liked, but I felt most of the poems were inaccessible. Or it might simply be my inability to comprehend.

Having spent years reading and writing poetry, I am satisfied when I find one poem by a poet that touches my heart. "Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note" is such a poem. And my one wish is that some day when I am long gone from this world that someone will be touched by ONE of my poems.