Object Lesson
Object Lesson
By Jennifer Jean
Released January 11, 2021
"We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake," said Fredrick Douglas about the abolitionist movement in 1852. Jennifer Jean's latest collection Object Lesson answers this call to action as it explores sex-trafficking and objectification in twenty-first century America. Jean uses relentless, dire, vital language-often tinged with hope-to pull us into these latest, darkest stories of our homeland. Her intensely crafted lyric narratives and persona poems are based on poetry workshops with sex-trafficking survivors through the Free2Write Poetry program. Other pieces are based on in-person, or researched, interviews with survivors of what is definitively modern-day slavery. These intensely crafted, lyric narratives and persona poems are about sex-trafficking and objectification in America. Many pieces are based on poetry workshops with sex-trafficking survivors through the Free2Write Poetry program. Other pieces are based on in-person, or researched, interviews with survivors of what is definitively modern-day slavery.
Jennifer Jean is a poet, translator, editor, educator, and consummate "literary citizen." She was born in Venice, California and lived in foster-care until she was seven. Her ancestors are from the Cape Verde Islands. Jennifer's poetry collections include OBJECT LESSON (Lily Books) and THE FOOL (Big Table). She's also released the teaching resource book OBJECT LESSON: A GUIDE TO WRITING POETRY (Lily Books). Jennifer is a co-editor and co-translator of HER STORY IS: AN ANTHOLOGY OF CONTEMPORARY POETRY BY ARAB WOMEN (press TBD); and, has been awarded a Peter Taylor Fellowship from the Kenyon Review Writers Workshop, a Disquiet FLAD Fellowship from Dzanc Books, and, an Ambassador for Peace Award from the Women's Federation for World Peace. Her poetry, prose, and co-translations have appeared in: Poetry Magazine, Waxwing Journal, Rattle Magazine, Crab Creek Review, DMQ Review, Green Mountains Review, On the Seawall, Salamander, The Common, and more. Jennifer is the translations editor at Talking Writing Magazine, a consulting editor at the Kenyon Review, an organizer for the Her Story Is collective, and the founder of Free2Write Poetry Workshops for Trauma Survivors.
