Nikki Giovanni, long known as "the Princess of Black Poetry," dedicates Those Who Ride the Night Winds to "the day trippers and midnight cowboys," the ones who have devoted their lives to pushing the limits of the human condition and who have shattered the constraints of the status quo to live life as a "marvelous, transitory adventure." Included are poems about John Lennon, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy, as well as friends, lovers, mothers, and the poet herself.