Is life on Earth getting worse or are we paying more attention to the bad parts? Dr. Charles Chaffin explains, “Why We’re Drawn to Bad News” as a product of our brains’ evolutionary negativity bias:
“From a survival perspective, early humans who were hyperaware of threats were more likely to avoid danger and pass on their genes. This bias toward negativity, known as negativity bias, remains with us today, making bad news inherently more attention-grabbing than good news (Rozin & Royzman, 2001).”
May’s trending search topics conveyed a strong collective negativity bias. I guess we’re all trying our hardest to survive. With any luck, reading poetry can help.
Joe Biden
On May 18th, news broke that former president Joe Biden was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Condolences and well wishes flooded social media. Biden shared his gratitude on X.
It’s easy to connect Joe Biden with poetry, as he chose a groundbreaking inaugural poet in Amanda Gorman—the youngest ever to fill the role. Gorman’s poem, “The Hill We Climb,” called for unity, with numerous lines written in the wake of the January 6th insurrection. Listeners were deeply moved.
If you loved “The Hill We Climb” but never looked further, here’s an opportunity to read a different Gorman poem touching on themes of American identity.
2. Brooklyn Bridge
Continuing the sad news trend, a Mexican navy ship crashed into the Brooklyn Bridge, with two casualties reported so far. More condolences spread through news and social media.
The Brooklyn Bridge is inherently poetic for me, as Vladimir Mayakovsky wrote a poem about it, and I wrote my senior honors thesis about Vladimir Mayakovsky. He was awed by the bridge on a visit to the U.S., and poets reliably turn awe into art.
In my favorite section of the poem, Mayakovsky likens the bridge’s skeletal frame to bones and fossils from which post-apocalyptic geologists might reconstruct our modern times. I love this idea.
3. Valeria Marquez
I hadn’t heard of TikTok influencer Valeria Márquez prior to writing this, and hesitated to include her when I learned that she was shot and killed during a livestream. I don’t want to trivialize death. But nothing about this round-up is trivial: it reflects the desperate terror of contemporary life.
I don’t know much about this story, but I know that gun violence is a widespread modern scourge. Richard Michelson writes about it in his poem, “Angels with Guns Guarding the Gates of Heaven.”
4. Nottoway Plantation
Friends on social media shared celebratory posts as the U.S.’s largest remaining plantation burned down. Who could blame them? Quintessa L. Williams published “The Fire This Time: On the Burning of the Nottoway Plantation” on Medium, highlighting the disconnect between Black history and white nostalgia.
Sean Hill elucidates similar themes in his poem, “Governor’s Mansion Hands.” Don’t skip the footnotes.
5. Tornado
Continuing May’s bounty of death and disaster, deadly tornadoes hit southern Kentucky, with more slated to impact mid-Atlantic states in the coming days. Sensational news headlines suggested a lack of warning due to federal budget cuts, but local agencies clarified that stations were staffed at the time and warnings issued.
I’ve experienced a few tornado warnings in my life and was fortunately missed by the storms’ paths each time. They carve shocking and surreal trails of destruction through communities and landscapes. Eric Pankey uses a diorama to capture the mood of an impending tornado in his poem, “Realia.”
Few people searched for spring blossoms this May, but I think we need them more than ever. As a final offering of hope and healing, I share one more poem from our current U.S. Poet Laureate, Ada Límon: “Instructions on Not Giving Up.”
Hang in there.
Written by Allisonn Church
Allisonn Church was born in a small rural community to a mother who pinned butterflies in glass cases and hid scarab beetles in her jewelry box. Her first favorite poem was “The Willow Fairy”’ by Cicely Mary Barker. Find a list of Allisonn's published work at churchpoems.wordpress.com.