The following version of this poem was used to create this guide: Brooks, Gwendolyn. “We Real Cool.” Poetry Foundation Online. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/28112/we-real-cool.

Note that parenthetical citations within the guide refer to the lines of the poem from which the quotations are taken.

“We Real Cool” is a 10-line jazz poem with a swinging, syncopated meter, written by Black American poet Gwendolyn Brooks in 1959. At the time, the predominant trend in jazz music revolved around bebop and its derivative styles of hard bop and cool jazz. These styles were characterized by fast rhythms, complex melodies, and intense improvisation around a central motif. Brooks’s poem reflects these characteristics as it explores some of the cultural spaces occupied by jazz, in particular those with seamier connotations like pool halls. The great adulation with which the poem has been showered since its publication has led some, including Brooks herself, to consider it overrated. But though her poetic legacy rests on much broader ground, “We Real Cool” represents a marked achievement in the development of a poetic style capable of capturing the spirit of jazz music. With its economy of language, cohesive sound, and space for improvisation, “We Real Cool” makes a claim for jazz poetry as that which can be performed.

The poem opens on a scene featuring young pool players in a bar. They speak in unison, describing themselves as cool dropouts who stay out late, fight, sing, drink alcohol, and do things with jazz and girls. They close by predicting their imminent deaths.