I wrote this using quotes from the documentary, Death in Gaza.

8 Christmases ago, Mom lost her job.

This Christmas?  My grandfather had a stroke.

And my little brother was doing a current events project

-

Violence escalates in Darfur

Hurricane leaves thousands homeless

Refugees cross borders with nowhere else to go.

-

Look at these people

Look at these poor people.

-

Wake up every morning, turn on my TV

Just to get a look at those less fortunate than me.

-

Supervisor comes around, I switch off that NSFW

Only to have him see me looking at CNN and the NYT

He joins me in sympathy

-

Look at these people

Look at these poor fucking people

-

Don’t know if you’ve ever looked at porn at work

I only check the news, or at least porn masquerading as such

I don’t think I’ve ever masturbated this much

Cause looking at poor souls concentrated gives me a rush

-

Euthanasia, health stimulus, post traumatic war zombies

Youth in Asia sweating over my sister’s Abercrombie

My mother’s still gainfully unemployed

My Grandpa had a stroke and still paid for his medical bills in blood

-

Look at these people

Look at these poor fucking people

-

Thank god I can feel good when I put a yellow rubber band on my wrist

It’s like I can buy solutions with my problem set

And as long as all my blood goes toward self-satisfaction

I don’t feel guilty about blood of others, I don’t need to take action

-

Poverty, poverty, POVERTY PORN!

Towelheads getting bombed

I’ll just read them a psalm

Chinks and blacks with AIDS

So they don’t need mine

Oh poor minorities of the world, I bemoan ya

But your poverty and suffering gives me a boner

-

Yes, we can give you all the press coverage you need

But that doesn’t mean you’re more important than us winning Nobel Peace

Yes we can!  And Yes we did!  Unless there’s still things to be done … uh I mean, that is

I was too busy shaking hands, and shaking my dick, to care about your elderly, your poor, your sick.

-

So yellow people, brown people, red people too

Quit acting like we’ve never helped you

It’s not easy to use oil for lube

But somebody’s gotta do it.

-

Look at these poor people

Look at these poor fucking people.

====================================

This arose out of a discussion we had at Word!  The line, “look at these poor fucking people” should be done in a voice a la Kai Huang.  This was Round 1 for me at Brown’s first competitive slam.  I don’t know that it was a particularly well done, or politically pertinent piece.  Most of the satisfaction came from seeing the reactions of other Word! members who know that this is not my usual style.  Shrug.  Twas fun.

Grow or die…

Like, maybe I’m not cut out for spoken word

Since I didn’t grow up in the tradition

~

Cause I was raised on Mother Goose

Shakespeare’s sonnets kept me loose

Inspiration? was the ditty on my Juicy Juice;

and these threads would recapitulate

Into a ropeburning, rhyming noose;

Reasons why I might seem to emulate

Richard Scarry or a less sagacious Dr. Seuss.

~

I knew where the sidewalk ends.

It was just past Wayside School falling down

and left of Where the Wild Things Are.

So now I know why I grasp at 4/4,

Why I might cling to the meter,

but yearn for something more,

something sweeter.

~

I’ve gotten a really bad case of sore throat lately

Trying to raise my voice as high as I think slam poets usually do.

~

I don’t know why I bother

I’ve been writing poetry since I was 12.

Really, really bad poetry.

That you are never going to see.

~

But I wrote it.

And now, it’s like somewhere, sometime, some really embarrassing experience along the way,

I forgot that poetry is just the lyrics to my life.

~

I have someone come up to me after every performance I do, saying, I wish I could do that.  I should come out to spoken word sometime.

~

Do it.  I started halfway through my freshman year.

Spent my first few meetings mewling in fear.

But I did it, and look at me now

I look silly, but at least I know how.

~

The most important lesson I’ve ever learned

Was like cough syrup for my throat.

If I had taken any more, I would’ve been arrested for making meth.

~

The Audience ain’t Shit.

~

You’re not writing for them.

You’re writing because you’ve got a hunger for expression.

You have a need to lyricize your affections

And your affectations

~

I’m a very hungry caterpillar

Yearning for my day to take wing

Cause if you give a mouse a cookie,

He thinks he’s a slam poet.

~

And if we’re going to battle,

Imbue your words with might,

Or they won’t break through to me.

If your epistles are pistols

Then thoughts problematic

Are my words semi-automatic

~

So people please, get out a pen,

Go out and inspire,

Be introspective dragon,

Spit hot fi-yah

~

And even if I lost my voice,

And I could no longer be a rhymer

I’d still have my words

I would still be a signer.

========================

This is dedicated to Rachel Julie Rosengard, who talked me through part of it, and who I owe the inclusion of the butterfly metaphor to.

~

Uhm… I was going to debut this at Brown’s first competitive slam.  But I did not make it to the final round.  Although I am arguably now among the top 10 poets at Brown (very arguably – I will fight you).  Combines the nice thread of Ars Poetica with feelings of inadequacy and compensation.  Liner notes: some references to Mark Doss and Chris Seung-hweezy Baek.  Also the last line and the fading voice are stripped from my vagina for V Day piece.  When performed, the last line is said in conjunction with some sort of hand sign (usually a heart for peace and love or a “W” for Word!)

—————

She arranges her petals, and she carefully flattens her flowy, spring dress.

She looks for rainbows in dewdrops; from water and starlight, she wants nothing less.

She stands up on her pedals, and then she leans into the sun’s gentle caress.

And motions left/right at the stops; I fell in love with her a little, I confess.

~

It was Valentine’s Day, not cold but brisk.

A day for flowers, for taking big risks.

And call me old school, for holding classic poses…

But when I say truths this day, I say it with roses.

~

She’s a shy, quiet lady… a real whaddyacall… wallflower,

But she moves like she dances, with grace and with power.

Her smile is refulgent, but it doesn’t reach her eyes, they are cloudy.

Maybe… too many romances, which have wilted and turned sour.

~

It was Valentine’s Day, warm Spring rain.

A day for flowers, for easing your pain.

And maybe you would call me a fool for conveying it this way:

I think the variety of us is best expressed through bouquet.

~

She arrives at the counter a quarter to seven,

And waits for the fools who seek aromatic heaven.

Everyday, but this day most of all, flowers as sonnets and doves;

Flowers for prospects, for people enthralled, carry their hopes or their loves.

~

It was Valentine’s Day, silver lining.

A day for flowers, I’m not a tree, but I was pining.

And call me stubborn, but I will not run for cover.

Give my hearts on a stem, cuz I think I’ve always loved her.

~

She’s a flower girl now, and it’s because she likes the work, you see.

She was flower girl for her Mom’s wedding, and decided that’s what she’d grow up to be.

She knows how to stop… and smell, even while picking out emotions for other women.

But while those would be lovers wait to tell, no one gives her the time of day… then:

~

It was Valentine’s Day, sun and breeze chime.

A day for flowers, for taking sweet time.

I put my love into petals and thorns, and then the cashier beckoned.

I buy one for my lady, and give the flower girl a second.

RRP

4/7/09 – 4/9/09

=======================================

She’s a flower girl now

Ever since she was one

at her mother’s wedding

~

She knew that she

wanted to give people

inexpressible emotions on a stem.

~

She’s a flower girl cutting

long stems on roses,

So men can show

women their feelings

but still keep their distance.

~

Would be lovers come and ask for carnations

to go with their sweet words and late night libations

~

I do flowers like suits,

classic lock, step to you with classic poses

So when I say something with botany

I say it with roses

~

She has flowers for every occasion

I love you, I like you, I’m sorry

She has more power than most other vocations

Has flowers for happily ever after stories.

~

She smiles with outlook untinted

Sunshine through any rain showers

Men in suits who can taste difference in vintage

But not appreciating the beauty in front of them, wallflower.

~

She sees flowers come and go.  She knows

that flowers are fleeting, like promises for a lover

I see her majesty, immeasurable in poetry or prose.

I give a knight’s oath, that if I promise her, I’ll deliver.

~

I buy my Valentine a rose,

And buy the Flower Girl another.

2/10/10 – 2/11/10

Part I was my piece for the 2009 Spring show “Lightbulb Constellations”.  Part II was written because I couldn’t find Part I during the meeting right before Valentine’s Day, so I tried writing it from memory, then kind of just went with it.  Maybe I’ll polish the second part up sometime.