Ig-nite Ig-nite
Ig-nite Ig-nite
Calm like a – !
Calm. Calm it down
I was never enough, always too tall
too short too skinny not buff
enough, the right build but not
the right rage & my speech
was always too rough
to be one of those chique geeks, I was
smart but more ass &
ask me in class what the answer was
& chances are I’d blast it
in curse words but today I remember when penny candies really only cost
a penny & I remember when I lost
my mom in a mall & all
my dreams of freedom blew away in fear.
I remember
when my father & brother & I tracked a deer by its breath
through a frozen forest & it seemed to evaporate between us & I
was never so relieved. I remember bleeding
from my mouth more times than I can count from
kicks & fists, missed jumps & the lumps inside my cheeks that you get when you lose teeth & I
Ig-nite Ig-nite
Ig-nite Ig-nite
Calm like a – !
backwards zee. All zees
& half asleep it was too easy for me see
to get in trouble, living in my bubble
imaginary world, all the words heard
forming a universe in my mind made of rhymes
& Beastie Boys designs (aw yeah! kick it!)
& a friend of mine says he wrote poetry for girls
& that’s enough to remind me of being beneath
a train when it started, a rain
storm so heavy it lifted our neighbour’s shed & floated it
away, I remember when a day
seemed endless & I remember when
a red dress from my mother’s closet meant
something was going to happen when it came out. I remember when
blame was a sentence, lines were penitence &
rhymes came easy, when sleazy
was a verb, when
albums on wax were black, & attack
meant attack & no
meant you were ready to give it back, were ready to
Ig-nite Ig-nite
Ig-nite Ig-nite
Calm like a – !
BOMB! Baby!
These days I’m
calm like a bomb
when I’m on the stage because
poetry on the page is
TOO DAMN QUIET!
I learned to riot dance from
Rosencrantz & Gildenstern, who are dead
but live on in my head, I made my bed in school
& lie in it too because
without all them haters & nay-sayers
gawd knows where I’d be, so praise be that I
ignited, calm like a bomb! donned poets’ robes
& everyday I show it,
blow it, calm like a bomb.
These words,
a pen & pad in my hands, feet to stand
on & breath after breath that lead to death, these words
have given me life,
contextualized strife, set riffs adrift
in ears from 8 to 80 in school gyms
& KABOOM! in classrooms, on streetcars & in bars,
banquet dinners where folks in black tie suits
who might shoot me looks of indignation
clap hands in appreciation
cause when you spit the poetry it’s real B, touches reality &
Ig-nite Ig-nite
Ig-nite Ig-nite
Calm like a – !
BOMB!, where I’m from
truth is pure, comes from lungs & poetry…
poetry is sung.