Day 25 | #NaPoWriMo | Good-natured caveats and dat

in

You know that awkward moment when you rock up to a motive and you're wearing the exact same outfit as your friend?

I don't - I never got that.

(Is that a thing for people? Is it really that deep? I feel like it's been a plot point in way too many sitcoms with female characters. To any females reading this, can you clarify this for me, please? Thanks in advance.)

Yeah. I never got that. Until last night when SugarJ Poet told me I'd copied his title for Day 24. It's awkward because it was slyly in my drafts - started on Day 23, I might add -  but I hadn't typed the poem up yet, so it got peak.

He beat me to the upload/share and I forgot to change it. (If you're reading this and are slightly confused, this has been uploaded a few days late and backdated, lest the out of sync upload dates bug me). It's not that deep, but he was cussing me out for it in the group chat, so yeah. I'm playing. And hella petty. Anyway, preamble over.

[EDIT: Rah. His has the definite article and everything. Okay, L received.]

I won't say what this one's about, but reading it back to type up, I started to think of Omar Bynon's I Go For Long Walks Now, to which a good few other poets - including the aforementioned title thief - have responded to. I'm telling myself this is my [unintended] second response (here's my first). Omar's poem is now available in video form, if you haven't read it yet. I'd direct you to the Barbican Young Poets 2016/17 anthology, but this intro has enough hyperlinks.

Anyway, here's this one.

Enjoy x

On trying to write happy poems

Maybe I can't write happy poems because I'm not. I'm a poor actor and a bad liar, so I don't know how to tell you to be happy or how to bring joy to your day in any other way than “don't be like me”. I think it will to be the most consistent thing I tell my children, if I have them.
I’ll show them my notebooks of fake-deep, stuffed with metaphors like overflowing kitchen bins, each as meaningful as an empty fridge and tell them "it’s the reason why I cannot give you the life I want and you deserve. Why to this day I wonder why your mother would waste her time, what in the hell she was thinking or doing or taking when she chose to be with me’ why I question your existence every day." I imagine my eldest, how she’ll look up at me with the cosmos in her eyes - so bright and full of everything I’ll never see but at one time hoped I would - and say nothing. Maybe do her best to console me, and for a moment at least pretend to understand the man that failed at everything but them. And I’ll tell her through our foreheads: “please don’t love a man like me”.

 

Day 23 | #NaPoWriMo | The Home Stretch

in

It's kinda mad how there's just a week left of April, and therefore, just a week left of #NaPoWriMo. It's been interesting, I think. It's also mad how I said I'd have this site up properly by week 2 but I haven't. Awkward. I'm working on that. Thank you for taking the time to log in (every single time, Squarespace). But I know you reading this are the real MVPs. Thank you.

Here's a new one.

Enjoy.

DEJA VU

the lines between dreams and life are blurring.

(you've already talked about this.
there's only so many times you can
rehash yourself.
avoid CD, record, or tape comparisons -

you're not broken.
you've no excuse.

don't mention sleep's relatives. 
that's done.

if you must be lazy, be original at least)

you convince yourself your deja vu is proof
that your dreams are prophecy. that you’re not forming memories the wrong way round
and it's not your sleeplessness that's blurred the days and warped your sense of time. 

Day 22 | #NaPoWriMo | I Think Therefore I'm Late

in

I spent a bit too long on this one, I think. It's cool, I just forgot the whole point of doing this is to take pressure off, and kill the overthink. It's the home stretch, so I'll sprint the rest.

My title reference to French philosopher, René Descartes, wasn't total vanity. I've been thinking about négritude recently, so I thought I'd write on that. To briefly summarise (and horribly oversimplify), it's basically the quality or fact of blackness, and the affirmation of the value of black African culture and identity. As a movement or general school of thought, it was started by French-speaking African and Afro-Caribbean intellectuals in the 20th century. Anyway, it was a lot deeper, denser, and more complicated than I thought it was, with so many dimensions and aspects. I don't know where I stand on it as a thing myself. I think I may have found my future MA topic, because it's WAY too big to explore in a single poem. If you're curious, there's more on it here.

I ended up with a few versions of this poem. I decided to share this one.

Enjoy.

NEGRITUDE

There is nothing grandiose in bondage. I untie
my titles from your lips. You will not neuter
my black root and stem, or state I ought to paint myself in green
or red or blue to camouflage. I am no colour. I am no part of white. I will not de-grit
myself for you to pity me for how much I endure
to prove I am deserving of your gaze. Nor will I proclaim myself. I reign
regardless. I do not need your eyes to see that I am erudite
any more than light feet leak timidity. My sinews will not tune
themselves to your tone deafness. I will just be: twist and label-free. Just as a tiger
needs no battle cry to pounce upon his prey, so I need not roar or grunt
for you. Instead I am. And you are merely deer.

Day 7 | #NaPoWriMo | I think I may have a problem

in

I did the first draft for this hours ago and went back to rework it to fix the logic and cut the fluff. It's is an hour and a half later at the time of writing this and it's a bit of a shambles. It's in scraps and I've rewritten the first line a good your times to the point where I don't even want it as a first line any more. I had a plan for tonight, started it before leaving the rehearsal space and was determined to at least have it uploaded by 11:30pm. LOL. Well, I had a plan. Personal lesson for today: always abandon the plan. It feels like a good idea at the time, but it makes it so much harder than it needs to be. Or you finally end up doing it once the plan has been dashed and you relax and stop caring, as demonstrated by my Day 1 poem. But yes. Abandon the plan. Always ignore it (unless it's an essay; in which case, follow it unless it's deviated from the task. Or your life. This is very bad advice. Don't take it.)

Today's is a response to Clipper by SugarJ Poet, which is in turn a #NaPoWriMo response to I Go For Long Walks Now by Omar Bynon, published in the Barbican Young Poets Anthology, pg. 7. Please check out both poems.

HEARTBURN AND STRESS

(after Clipper by Jeremiah "SugarJ" Brown)

These days I stay away from sour fruit
because I’m too prone to heartburn
and wretch when what should be sweet is sour.
So I never understood how you or my brother could enjoy tart citrus.

Then I remember the time Mom developed a stress ulcer
and the doctors told her to avoid dairy and white bread.

As I offer you half of my sour tangerine
and the half I’ve eaten summons stomach acid,
you tell me you saw our friend today.
I ask you how he is and you tell me of the bags he was clutching under his eyes.

Later I text him what the doctors told my Mom
about the dangers of bread to the body; 
how some things are better shed than given, 
how it is better to spill milk than drink it, and at least take some pressure off your eyes.

Day 5 | #NaPoWriMo | If You're Reading This I'm Too Late

in

This is going to be a mad one. I have a genuine excuse this time: I've been in rehearsals for this Sunday's scratch of Grey Matters, a devised spoken word theatre show exploring mental health and, as it happens, with a specific focus on black people and our communities' responses to mental health. I'm also a GCSE and A-Level tutor (exam period is coming. Hit me up) so I ran from the Theatre Royal Stratford East to one of my students in High Barnet. Then from there, sped to the Barbican to finally catch Get Out with my sister, brother, and his best friend. It is a masterpiece and the speed at which the theatre emptied before the credits got rolling was a sight to behold. It's been spoken of as horror, but I have to agree with SugarJ Poet (rah. Bare mentions on this blog), it is really a comedy. But it truly depends on who's watching it. The funniest things are often the truest. I'll leave that there.

Get Out  is showing at the Barbican and at Stratford until this weekend. Catch it. Maybe while you're in the area, you can roll through to our scratch. I have a comp going.

Love.

Enjoy (and forgive the roughness of this one)

Stay Woke

A prophet is never honoured in his home town. So when she says
I told you so 
do not be surprised because at nightfall and in darkness and in dark skin
I told you so 
is all you have to hook onto.

You grew up afraid of the dark.
Now you are scared of sleeping.
You stayed up til dawn this morning. Then you went to bed for paralysis.
But this time instead of silence,
you heard children playing by your bedside.
Before you knew it, your body was a playground
and they were dancing on your back
and you were heavy and sinking.

Tonight you think of humour and Pepsi.
You want to become the beast, cheering when one man is gored to death by another with antlers.
And you remember Psalm 137,
and then Psalm 133. 

Day 4 | #NaPoWriMo | Glowth & Beauty

in

So Twitter recently made me aware that #NaPoWriMo is also known as #GloPoWriMo (Global Poetry Writing Month, I presume). It never occurred to me that this challenge was a thing beyond the UK. Heck, I'm still yet to be convinced that this is a thing for anyone outside London's circle of mad poets.*

It's interesting. Other than sounding like a hashtag for seasonal Instagram fitness break selfie series featuring avocado-based vegan gluten-free health food snacks, of course.

But that said, maybe it isn't so far away from what myself and other poets are up to with blogs and tweets and open-mic preamble publicising this challenge. For various reasons, we want our work on ourselves and our craft this month to be [more] public. In some sense, it's like the Insanity of poetry: we're looking to push harder and Dig Deeper (hold tight Shaun T). We are putting ourselves under immense creative pressure, with fixed daily milestones to hit, under the guidance of a rigorous programme tailored to individual needs goals in order to sharpen our creative endurance, galvanising our connections, driving ourselves and one another forward to becoming the best shape we can be.

Maybe these reasons are just mine. But on a weekly basis, I'm reminded of the transformative power of creativity and poetry in my life and those of others. After much reflection and a recent birthday, I've chosen to act on my resolutions and turn 2017 into the Year of the Glo-Up. Avelino said "2016 is the rise of the lyricist"; Boiler Room confirmed that in October. Now having risen, we must shine. 

*I mean that in all senses but the ableist one.

Enough from me.

Enjoy.

BEAUTIFUL THINGS

You never saw beauty in yourself
because beauty is in the eye of the beholder,
so it became infallible
unless the beholder was you -
in which case, it was irredeemably flawed,
your irises were funfair mirrors warping what was natural and balanced in it’s own right.
It is no wonder, then, why you are always fat
and fat is wrong
and dark is serious and heavy and raw.

This is why you ask to be read late at night and known only with the lights off
and you keep your reader’s hands away from the softer parts of your form,
or where your creases are a bit too deep for you
- or even where bone is a little too close to skin.

My dear
Who told you beauty was in perfection? Or perfection in symmetry
or that perfection was a spotless sun?

But you’ve stopped listening to me
when I tell you how these palms love the balance of your form.

It’s why I’ve stopped laughing at your jokes.
When shade is now your only reprieve, it is no wonder that you dream of shadows.

Day 2 | #NaPoWriMo | WAY TOO CLOSE!!

in

I didn't post yesterday's poem until well into the night and said I would do better today. 

Well, I cut it WAY TOO FINE and I was wrong. If I'm honest, I spent too much time procrastinating until daybreak. Then I procrastinated more after waking. I also found my earlier drafts today too problematic to post in first draft form (essentially all NaPoWriMo poems are first drafts) without rethinking and editing. Time was not on my side, as you can tell, because I'd betrayed and misused it, and took it for granted. I'm going to be honest here: this whole introductions is a way for me to ease into the flow of writing because something needs to come out finished. Lesson for Day 2: practice the lessons you learned the day before. Don't be like me, fam. Also, don't make promises or oaths or swear - just keep them. Chances are you're promising or swearing because you know your word cannot be trusted - either by others or yourself. Both of these need addressing.

SKRR! BREAKING NEWS: Whilst writing this, Laurie requested I write either:

  • "[a] Poem about me and my crushes" or

  • on "romantic terminology".

I'll do this, then. This one's for you, Laurie.

On romantic terminology

i refuse to fall in love. i tell myself i will walk
into it straight-backed, with a map and then call
myself a maverick because to crush is to make yourself a bleeding apple
and your heart resemble a peach
or an ass
or a peachy ass.
but because i am upright
my head is always above my heart.

but in a sense, would i not be head over heels
anyway? since my heart is in the middle of my body? 

(afterall i will walk
not crawl on my belly like a snake) 

but then so is the ass,
and an upturned bum is what a heart looks like
to people in love.

and on that note, i guess
i won't be in love, per se,
when it happens. love will live in me,
i hope. because the heart has chambers,
and the brain has pathways. when i walk
into love, i hope it will be on her pathways,
and they'll be corridors to her chest.
but not strictly so.

but it means i have to find them first. maybe
i need a new map. but i haven't found the entrance yet. maybe
one day
love will find me
lost outside her window
looking for her pathways. or
one day,
i hope, she will walk mine,
too.

Day 1 | #NaPoWriMo | New Form

in

Happy April!

So, originally this shouldn't have taken as long to finish as it did. I started writing this morning thinking "I'll just do an acrostic! No biggie. No pressure. Finished is better than perfect" and all that. Then upon reading my draft, I thought I could do more with the form. Before I knew it, I was counting words per line and getting into something that wasn't as easy as it first seemed. 

The best thing about this is allowing yourself to follow your instinct and not worry about perfection. Let it come to you and you can return later. I ended up devising a brand new form called ALPHA+OMEGA. If you're a poetry geek or just wanna try it, hit me up. This piece wasn't going to be one of them. Then I realised upon typing it up that my earlier draft didn't make sense. Really, it was editing it to be readable that shegged me time-wise. 

If there's one thing to take away it's this: don't be like me, please. Just do da ting. I only finished it once I stopped overthinking. Had this been late, the title would be way more apt that it should be. But tomorrow is another day; I'll do better.

I hope you enjoy.

Hold up: shout-out to all my [VERY patient] #NaPoWriMo squad. Word up to the following: SugarJ Poet, Anna Kahn (their blogs are linked below), Kit Finnie. Hold tight Kareem Brown and Laurie Ogden. There are more wavey people, but these are the poets I've spoken to today about the challenge. 

Okay. Enjoy x

BAPTISMOS/BACKDATED*

Before  forming  you,  I  knew you would  succumb.
Apathy  became  fear;  potential,  the  jaws of orca
Coaxing     you     to    a    solid     past.    The   ship
Kept you afloat, then stopped holding your weight.
Drowning,   you   cried,   blinded   by   tiny  seas.  I
Answered  you with angels of anxiety, and breaths
Tearing death rattles from your lungs, forcing them
Empty.  You'd  forgotten the womb is an ocean too.
Darkness  brings  life.  Know that so do the  waters.

*baptismos: βαπτισμός(the act of) a dipping or washing; purification effected by means of water [Source]