[Michael] Harper's Debridement is a trio of poetic sequences, each exploring the life of a key figure in the black man's valiant struggle to achieve an American identity, and representing three different eras in United States history: John Brown, Richard Wright, and "John Henry Louis," a persona for the black Congressional Medal of Honor winner who was murdered in Detroit. (p. 114)

Harper, recognizing that the crucial breach in the cultural identity of the black Westerner dates back to the epoch of total blackout of consciousness (the many decades of slavery with their legacy of namelessness: racial and cultural amnesia), set about to fashion a poetic instrument with the efficacy to fill the void of the historical interregnum…. Harper, in his first volume, Dear John, Dear Coltrane, pledging himself in spiritual apostleship to the great jazz master, modeled his rhythms and verse measure after Coltrane's music. His debt to...