Thrush Poetry Journal
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Taylor Mali

The Poet as Journalist

           It is difficult to get the news from poems
           yet men die miserably every day for lack
           of what is found there.

                —William Carlos Williams


I do not report the news
though I truck in truth
and use as proof
images from life
and the street.
Midnight is my only deadline,
the human heart my only beat.




Taylor Mali is one of the most well-known poets to have emerged from the poetry slam movement and one of the original poets to appear on the HBO series Def Poetry Jam. A four-time National Poetry Slam champion, he is the author of two collections of poetry and a book of essays, What Teachers Make: In Praise of the Greatest Job in the World. In April of 2012, Mali completed a 12-year project of convincing 1,000 people to become teachers and marked the occasion by donating 12 inches of his hair to the American Cancer Society. 
For more, visit his website: www.taylormali.com



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