About the Artist
Hoke S. Glover III was born in the Bronx, NY in 1970. His parents moved to Lanham, MD.
Shortly thereafter. He attended private schools in Prince George’s County and graduated from
DeMatha Catholic High School in 1988.
He then attended the New School for Social Research in New York and graduated undergrad
from Bowie State University. He received his M.F.A. from the University of Maryland in 1997
where he studied with Stanley Plumly, Michael Collier, and Merle Collins.
In 1992 he founded Karibu Books as a vending operation with locations at Bowie State
University, Howard University, and other locations throughout Washington, D.C. By 2005,
Karibu Books had become the largest African American Bookstore in the country.
Glover’s creative work covers a wide variety of subjects. His poetry has been published Crab
Orchard Review, Ploughshares, Obsidian III, Joint, Rattle, Smartish Pace, The Patuxent Review,
and other journals. His poems can also be found in the anthologies Dark Eros, Soulfires, and
Testimony. His first book of poetry, Inheritance, published by Willow books in 2016 centers
around family and attempts to distill the everyday wisdom and evolving experience of family
life.
Currently, his work has been focused on a manuscript Singing Until Tomorrow: A Traveler’s
Journey. At the center of the work is the essay “Hospital for the Negro Insane”, which gazes
upon the site of the abandoned Glenn Dale Hospital in Prince George’s County and the
Crownsville Hospital for the Negro Insane. “Hospital for the Negro Insane” explores the
relationship between fear, trauma, and the history of slavery, and shows the role the African
American cultural worker in the humanties plays in mending the psyche of the country.
In 2017, Hoke traveled to China to teach at Central China Normal University in Wuhan. Singing
Until Tomorrow includes a series of essays called the Wuhan Soundtrack which reflect on
African American culture from China, and draw connections between African American culture
and that of the Chinese.
In 2006, Hoke began to study Taiji (T’ai Chi) and has developed his practice over the last twelve
years. Though one can imagine Taiji as a work of the body and physical exercise, it is also
clearly mental work and scholarship. Taiji, Taoism and the I-Ching have informed the creative
work he produces and can be seen as an invisible thread in Singing Until Tomorrow.
Artist's Statement
My artistic philosophy is rooted in a craft and discipline that integrates my unique experience as former business man and African American Bookseller with my creative work as a poet, non-fiction writer, and cultural activist. My non-fiction work seeks to test the boundaries of traditional African American narratives. Though my non-fiction work makes use of the personal, there is tension between the autobiographical and the refined practice of the business as it lives and breathes in a world with customers. In this regard, my work as a poet helps. My approach is to present vignettes whose images resonate in such a way that their simplicity resonates as bright as the intellectual ideas. Most of my essays are fragmented and mimic the juxtaposition of various changing impressions encountered in a writer's journey as a businessman, or a businessman's journey as a writer.
