Response 1, Week 4-Adrian Matejka

I find “Tyndall Armory” narrative, yet the language poetically challenging and interesting enough to avoid a prose sensation. The poem largely describes a scene of a Public Enemy and Terminator X performance in 1987 at the Tyndall Armory in Indianapolis. The details remain vivid and interesting, including “graffiti spray-painted jeans” (9) and “one night / after amateur boxing and one night / before bingo” (5-7). The poem details the cultivation of a new anti-establishment sect of rap music coined and supported by many of the black youth. This revolution constructs an empowering movement later to be reflected and influential to other rap sects (and thus imperative to the chronological evolution meshed within Mixology), strong enough to rebel against bureaucracy and whiteness, or to “make / any Tom reconsider his friendships” (34-35). I particularly enjoyed how well Matejka utilizes details and alliteration to swirl the language around tensions and cultural references, such as the lines, “refused wine coolers and wee, / white woman and white lines” (22-23) and “The Wop like the black maître / at the Highlands Country Club refused / to seat black people” (18-20). Matejka balances the passive language to contrast the otherwise volatile subject matters portrayed.