Poetics of Resistance: Rankine's Don't Let Me Be Lonely as Phenomenological Lyric

Abstract

In this article I read Claudia Rankine's prose poem Don't Let Me Be Lonely through the lens of Martin Heidegger's philosophy. In particular, I use Heidegger's concept of Gestell to argue that the "unpoetic" elements Rankine collages into her book are not opposed but rather integral to its lyric. By contrast, critical responses often insist that Rankine pits the book's more poetic elements against the products of media and pop culture she includes. I contend that by foregrounding the enframing of all language, Rankine writes a lyric that actively resists that enframing and seeks to authentically connect self and other.