The Tradition

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 2015

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Themes

Video Recordings and #BlackLivesMatter

The flowers in “The Tradition” are beautiful but fleeting, and they are an ever-present theme in the poem. Most of the text focuses on the flowers themselves (Line 1, Line 4, Line 5, and Line 8) or on their blooming. It is important to note, though, that these flowers are not blooming in the present tense of the poem. Instead, the speakers are watching a video of the flowers they planted (that is, the planting and blooming have already happened in the past). This video of the flowers blooming is a time capsule of sorts: It preserves the blossoms beyond their natural lifespan. In the same way, some might argue that video recordings are important tool in maintaining a record of Black lives and the trauma Black people suffer.

In “The Tradition,” however, the Black men viewing the video are watching the tape on fast forward, emphasizing how quickly the flowers die—and how easily a person’s life can be breezed through in a short video clip. Recordings of Black lives—and deaths—are a particularly sensitive topic. Just as the men in the poem review a short clip of their own metaphorical deaths, so Black Americans are constantly exposed to recordings of violence against Black people in the media. While these recordings have brought attention to an important issue, they can also be a source of pain and trauma for the people involved. In “The Tradition,” the beautiful blossoms watched on fast forward are a metaphor for how racist institutions accelerate Black death and, sometimes, reduce a person’s life to a sound bite on social media.

Stars

Stars are another important theme in “The Tradition.” The first word of the poem is “Aster” (Line 1). Aster flowers are named after the Latin word for “star,” and blooms of asters are shaped like stars. There are two additional astral-inspired flowers in the poem: “Star Gazer” begins the second run of flower names on Lines 4-5, and “Cosmos” begins the third (and final) run on Line 8. Additionally, the sun (a hugely important star) is described in Lines 6-7.

Stars are an important theme in elegy; as discussed in the Contextual Analysis section, “The Tradition” is an elegy. In traditional elegies, the reader is typically consoled at the end of the poem by an image of the dead subject of the poem in heaven and/or turned into a star. Brown reverses this and gives readers three celestial-inspired flower names (“Aster,” “Star Gazer,” and “Cosmos”) before the names of the dead men the poem is mourning. The names of these men do not appear until the final line (Line 14). This reversal of the traditional, consoling order suggest that there is no consolation to be had for the deaths of Black men at the hands of the police.

The Repetitive Nature of Tradition

A tradition is an inherited and well-established pattern of belief and behavior. By definition, tradition repeats. In his poem, Jericho Brown argues that state-sanction violence against Black people is an American tradition. The fact that the poem ends on the names of three black men killed by the police (instead of just one) emphasizes this repetitive nature of the pattern. Violence is not a one-time occurrence against Black people in America; it is an endemic, systemic issue, one which is deeply rooted in America’s past and cultural norms.

The theme of repetition can be found in other aspects of the poem too. Brown wrote “The Tradition” in a very traditional form, the sonnet, which has itself been repeated by poets for hundreds of years. (For more about the sonnet, see the Literary Devices section.) Other repetitive elements in the poem including perennial flowers, stars, and names.