Poetry Power

I again stepped WAY beyond out of my comfort zone at school on friday.

One of the English teachers has been trying to introduce the school to SLAM poetry, or Spoken-Word poetry. She has a local poet that has been coming in, and invited some kids to share their own poetry. She wanted us as teachers to encourage more kids to perform, so after pushing the thing for a couple weeks, and after watching another TED talk, I asked if I could perform. And I did. Friday we had an assembly with some professional poets doing their stuff. Luckily we (the kids, myself, and the teacher running the thing) went first. It was incredibly uncomfortable, but I got a lot of good feedback from the teachers, and some of the kids too. One even said I inspired him! The professionals that came out were really moving. One was a graduate of LADE who has gone on to win in national poetry competitions, and has performed on HBO. Hakim Bellamy and Carlos Contreras are part of Urban Verbs. During a conversation after the show, I still felt small in comparison (literally and poetically) but I responded to something Hakim said by quoting a line from one of the poems he had performed. It was amazing to see how that affected him. He, as a poet, tries to affect people. To move them. To connect through words soul to soul, and I guess that validated him. Proved that his work was working.

As for me, is this the last time I perform my poetry? Who knows. I don't anticipate being the next Taylor Mali, but I'll probably do more here at the school. For you, though, is the poem I performed below. It's there as I wrote it, not as it came out, because nerves will have their way with you, no matter what you do.

I am a performer.

It’s “A Nite at the Improv.”

Six shows a day, five days a week. Thank you! Thank you!

Thank you very much! I’ll be here all year!

Any tips are greatly appreciated;

Please pass the hat.

I am a performer.

Playing an actor in my own life

Following the script I have written

Hoping to be the person I said I have been.

But playing myself to be younger than I am

When I start to feel old,

And pretending to be very old

When I’m looking for respect,

Hoping that you don’t put 2 and 2 together

And find out that 2 is how long I’ve been a teacher.

I am a performer.

I play everything’s cool, even if it’s not

And I get all riled up if you don’t talk

Cause I want to hear your thought.

I see something beyond that blank stare

Tempting you to speak your mind,

And I will not let you stay silent!

Because “IDK” is not the answer to a questions

But the beginning of a journey.

I am a performer.

I am a street corner preacher

Crying “Repent! Repent!”

For the end is near,

But finals are nearer.

And tik tik tock says the clock.

Time is passing, are you?

I am a performer.

But here I am.

Heart on my sleeve.

Telling you to look at me. Know me.

This is who I am.

But, in your mind,

 You will see me standing here,

And you will remember, that

I am a performer.

Reverie

Reverie can be defined as: A state of being pleasantly lost in one's thoughts; a daydream; a dreamy or musing state; absentminded dreaming while awake; an abstracted state of absorption.

Do you ever experience something that just stops you dead in your tracks? There is a song, that does it to me. Gabriel's Oboe from The Mission. I find it practically impossible to do anything while it's playing. I am overcome in reverie.

It happens to me often enough with music, but sometimes it hits me when reading a student's paper. I see some image of their future, and the stack drops into my lap, and I just think. Reverie to me is reminiscence of the future. Like starting a story "Once upon a time...in the future."

It also overcomes me with the smell of tree blossoms. It's subtle, unnoticeable, then you catch it and it's the only thing you can smell. Lilacs at night. You're caught up in everything, then you stop. Then your mind flashes through its register, and then there's that moment of recognition. Lilacs. And you have to stop. You have to close your eyes so that the only thing in the universe for one second is the smell of lilacs. Or the song of an oboe. Or a sliver of a moon, so faint its hardly there.

Sometimes there are moments that are so romantic, that you cannot help but be overcome. They are so perfect, so idyllic, so picturesque. But then there are the moments that are so unabashedly normal that when that little thing crosses your vision you are sweetly jerked out of your reality. A toddler's laugh, a sunset, shapes in the clouds. A whimsy, that if you don't give into it, it's gone. Sometimes you have to choose not to give in to the reverie. And there is a certain bittersweet sadness reserved for just that moment.

Sueño

Sleep doesn't come in the summer when it's hot.
You lie there
Waiting for it to come, like it always does.
But instead you are left to argue with the sheets.
Are my eyes open or closed?
All I see are scenes played out on the blackness.
When it comes, it sneaks in.
The dreams are unsettling,
So real, you swear they are.
Then you're awake again, and hot
Because the sun's already up
And the shade trees are gone
And all you want is a peaceful sleep.

National Poetry Month

April is national poetry month. i've never really celebrated before, but i've missed poetry. also, when stuck on what assignment to give my ninth graders after watching a movie about apartheid, i decided on a poem. so they have to write a poem, any kind, about cry freedom. Here's one of my own that has been brewing in my head since friday.

     sit me down at the sea

     and be by me to look out over the world

     lost in horizons and sunsets.

     the bigness of it all, sinking in.

     but not really.

     we pretend to contemplate the universe

     but minds slip back to calendars and tasks.

     so we say, 'one day'.

     one day

     i will sit at the sea

     with no cares in the world, but the world

     and the bigness of it all.