Category: Performance / “Spoken Word”

#WhyIWrite

Some mornings I wake up writing.

Through my window, the early sun is shining,
my eyes still blinded I find myself rhyming syllables
with consonants that complement and comprehend the bigger picture
of the scripture prominent in the dominant society.
I see the problems with humanity…
The insanity of extreme mindsets
from every heavenly sect set to threaten the youth into fellowship,
the threat of punishment exploding in the streets
of the east and west, it’s like the people playing God
forgot to take their midday rest.
With shit like this we’re reduced
to only the children knowing what’s morally best.
And I test my patience pouring coffee
while the radio buzzes a news stream
and soon I’m three sips and set
to forget I was ever a part of humanity anyway.
Ready to write off my citizenship to earth
so I can find a place to live where the right comes first
and a shared sense of solidarity isn’t a byproduct
of a brainwashed waste of humanity repeatedly
attacking the innocent and weak.

I mean, three headlines a week shouldn’t be dedicated to mourning and obituary.

Some mornings I wake up writing,
and still hiding under the covers
I wonder why I was wired this way.
Programmed to take the pain and suffering I see
and re-channel it into a quick catchy beat
in hopes that somebody sees through to me.
I surround myself with laughter and animals and love
but sometimes it just doesn’t cut and I wake up writing,
I wake up sighing,
and I go right back to sleep unprepared to spend another day
watching the outside world dying.

National Poetry Month started several hours ago, and runs through the next 30 days.

What’s that quote?

If I only wrote when I had time I’d never write at all…?

Something like that. 

Part of Me

Part of Me

Part of me, is so disturbed by recent events, that part of me is moved to move words and form my own opinions but it won’t change anything. And that’s part of what fuels my rage and desire to grab them by the collar and say what is wrong with you?
An entire country, giving undeserved empathy to some teen who thought that he could get away with anything but got caught.
And I shudder, and the thought of hundreds of other girls that will never speak up. They know what’s coming, this storm of shame and blame from a media that only aims to say she was drunk, so she’s a liar, and it’s her fault the star athlete’s lives are over.
That clearly, she set herself up for rape when she lifted the plastic cup to her face and decided to partake in part of being a teenager.
This part of me is enraged that I live in a place that think’s it;s ok to say raps isn’t a crime when the victim made an “obvious mistake.” That teach’s it’s ok to take photos and forward to every half known name and publicly humiliate and then claim in court you weren’t a part of anything.
A witness. A bystander who didn’t stop to say hey this girls unconscious this isn’t ok.
And this part of me has to restrain from breaking down when I hear their names, anger boils inside cracking up and down my spine as I’m brought back to a time, reminded of freshmen year. Waking to the sound of tears that one of my worst fears had become a friends reality.
And 4 months later I packed to leave campus, because he’s walking past us like nothing ever happened.
Sex without consent is a death sentence. Not in the law, but in your mind. Trapped with thoughts inside ageing over time like a pomegranate wine multiplying every time something reminds you.
And it’s a stress that both male and female victims hide because of how our society has promised to treat them.
Part of me, thinks more than anything, that everything needs to change. We need to stop teaching don’t put yourself in bad positions, and start teaching, don’t rape.
It sounds like common sense but clearly isn’t from the news today.
And part of me, thinks this anger and frustration is a waste. But part of me knows that’s to blame, because if no one speaks up, nothing is going to change.

Note Taking

That, has nothing and everything to do with your class.
I’m sorry I’m not paying attention,
but there are matters at hand that I must attend to amend the bends
and folds bursting out of my mind,
making matters miserable for me sitting here
peacefully, quietly.
Blood pumping, veins throbbing,
creativity robbing me of the educational material
you desire burns forest fires over my notebooks.
Khaki clad lectures and suede serenades of study
just don’t fit in these pages
while I itch with irrational grammatical fears and anxieties.
Commas and semicolons haunt my daydreams and
white space suffocates until I awake and shake with
inspiration.
Adoration.
An overactive imagination that my pen fails to control, falls to the floor,
and catches your attention that I’m not looking at the board.
You ask me what is written and
I am shyly smitten that you have some interest in my art.
Margins somewhat peek at the subject that you speak but the ants beneath my feet tell me to retreat to the corners on my mind and give a clean sweep onto the page.
Do not be enraged that I am not engaged, my minds just setting the stage for my pen to be more than lifeless and grey.
So I suppose all I can say, is yes, I am taking notes.
But no, they have nothing —yet everything— to do with this class.

“And I wish you would come home.”

Inspired.
Copy. Paste. Scratch that. Erase.
Deep breath, begin.

The lace ribbon waist was a waste, look up at her face
and trace the white space
between freckles and scars
and whisper
when I see your eyes
I see shooting stars.

Like a moth to a light, must fight off another night of the temptation.
Your anticipation of allegations and accusations
from association is a hallucination.
Careful contemplation for explanation cannot beat extra examination.
The merciless manipulation that raised rebellious retaliation is your strength.
Do not forget that.

Lace waist wasted in satin neck ties and dark dress pants,
look in the mirror to see her and see
Beauty.

See yourself.
Your future, your heart, your home.
And see your bruised and battered benevolence that broken, became brilliant.

Thalia and Melpomene

 

Dear Professor,
They’ve asked me to write and read a poem about a tragedy, and I seek advice.
How do I come up with something that won’t make everyone cry?

Dear Professor,
Scratch that, I changed my mind.
How do I write a poem that innocently hides
my intention to make them all cry?

Dear professor,
I’ve got a draft. Would you mind reading it a couple times?
Please take note and send feedback on the specific volume and intensity of tears you cry.
I promise not to defame your manhood, but it’s important you do not lie.
I bought stock in Kleenex yesterday, so I need to do this right.

Dear Professor,
I apologize for my future absences from class.
My mother is having surgery and I need to be there for that.

Dear Professor,
Yesterday I found myself watching a woman breakdown and cry.
I couldn’t help but wonder how it feels
to have a camera in your face as you chase every trace of hope
that your child was one to survive.

Dear professor,
What is it like to die?

Dear Professor,
How’s that poem critique coming along? I’ve sent 8 emails now. Did you read it? Is it too long?

Dear Professor,
Did you know our textbook is 20 pages short?
The editor appears to have forgot and author, they don’t have any of my work.

Dear professor,
When I was a child, one of my best friends died.
I sometimes visit her remembrance tree,
sometimes I wonder what it means to be alive.

Dear Professor,
Do you ever wonder about tragedy?
How lost you must be
that your experience of reality
becomes so trapped in the TV
that you’d do anything to see the curtain close on you.
Mental state so deteriorated
that fear is no longer an experience
but an escape through the 6 o’clock news.
I confess, if they knew they’d think me a monster,
but I felt nothing like that mother.
I was too disgusted by the news,
jumping with a thirst to be the first to burst the worst updates
breaking in with the death toll,
3, 10, now 20 children. 6 adults. One mother.

Dear professor,
I don’t understand.

Dear professor,
What gets me the most,
is knowing those parents have closets full
of Santa’s gifts that will never get to be opened.

Dear professor,
I’ve submitted a poem for publish.
I figure I tell you I borrowed an idea now
before you come looking for royalty checks.
But let’s be honest, I’m an art student,
I’m sure I more so need it.

Dear professor,
I told an audience today my goal was to make them laugh.
The whole damn time they sat on the edge of their seats.
I wish you had told me, at that point, there’s no turning back.

Dear Professor,
I challenged myself to make somebody laugh
with the saddest story I was offered,
to put my light heart on something so fundamentally bad.
Dear professor,
I think I failed.

Dear Professor,
There’s someone crying in the back.

Dear Professor,
Did you buy stock in Kleenex?
Tomorrow I will be at the hospital, I might be late to class.

Dear Professor,
I’m running out of time and getting pretty nervous, I don’t think they got my message.
Death is sad, but it happens to us all,
and I learned pretty young you have to accept it.
But if you could shut up the news for just 5 damn minutes,
I think some premature certificates could be prevented.

We live in a culture where we shun the ill,
push them around, then are shocked when they fight back.
Somehow we’ve grown to expect the best from those we’ve treated the worst.

I think the problem here is something moral, nothing less, nothing more.

Dear professor,
I’ve tried not to be too political,
I’ve just tried to keep a grip to what’s real.
I’ve never had a child before.
I still often wonder how that woman feels.

Dear professor,
I had a moment of clarity today, I’m currently thinking it over.

They told us it was unsuccessful, they had to put her back under.

And suddenly, I feel everything.
Suddenly, I no longer wish to wonder.