Author Archives: Oscar Bermeo

tree jobs

to quote living color. just finished interviewing for another teaching gig. i wont lay out any more details as to not ruin the thing but just keep your fingers crossed for me as this gig would be SO in line with my personal mission and artistic statements to the point where it is almost clairvoyant.

super bowl at fish’s was a blast. this particular tradition has evolved into quite the fiesta in the last decade. starting with the 18′ tv to rams-titans with only me, fish, my bro and sis, eric and 6 week old noel to last night’s all_you_can_eat_from_all_over_the _planet poet/friends/family blowout. noel is now four and almost tackled me down in the third quarter when he grabbed my ankle and generally left me out of breath for most of the second quarter. that was most of my super bowl, trying to keep a four year old happy- yeah, i had an awesome time.

the other highlight of this weekend involves my inner.nerd getting the spotlight and going all hours at guy’s for d&d. cool in that we have a lot more fun than you amy think because we are naturally dumb that way and un-cool in that i missed what sounded like a dope bash out in brooklyn.

life is hectic when i want it to be but i still have enough control to be able to dissapear when the mood hits me and it’s still hittin from time to time.

over at jobs uno y dos i am getting into serious beef with an elderly coworker. at first i thought it was just my natural oscar.at.work.can.be.a.real.bastard personality shining through but said co-worker has been able to piss off about half the working staff and alliances are forming. bad news- coworker and big boss are really cool and if it boils down to a choice- i think i’m ass out. and so are the days of our motherfuckin’ lives!

edwin torres will be at 13 tonight which makes this a cant.miss show (feels good to have one of those happenin at 13). the last cant.miss was tony brown @ urbana and that was worth all the trouble of getting out of work early.

monday, monday, monday…. if all goes well then i will be kissing these free afternoons away but i am so used to working six days a week that i really dont care. though i should start planning a real vacation soon. havent had one since 96 when i hit puerto rico with wanda.

i am audi 5000…

putting the rican and poetry back…



Feb 11th @ the Nuyorican Poets Cafe

Acentos presents Nuyorican Encomium:

A synonymUS Tribute to Nuyorican Poetry

Hosted by Guy LeCharles Gonzalez

Open Mic Sign-up@7sharp.

$6 ($5 w/ student id)

…Poets & musicians gather at the mecca of the Nuyorican movement to pay tribute to the poet laureates of Loisaida.


dont get it twisted- i love the snow. always have. i remember the blizzard of 78 and how we had a mountain of snow that we would get all ghetto on and slide down it using crushed cardboard boxes as sleighs (the real fly had milk crates as sleighs!). back then you could count on a snow storm or two in december and then the snow would stick around till about march.

the last few years in nyc, the pattern has been different- snow blizzrd, three days of heat, rain- all gone… rinse, lather, repeat. this year we finally have the snow sticking and, of course, mofos have no idea how to clean the sidewalks. as such i have almost busted my ass a good three times at the gas station by my job.

last year, the threat of a snow storm kept folks away from the ‘lil bit louder’ anniversary jam so when i heard that there would be 100% chance of snow, i was afraid for acentos and wanted to make sure that at least the cabal and raina would be there… that way at least we could have a workshop or something ;-)

numbers say it pretty well- 19 person open mic. that equals to almost 40 heads in attendance. not bad, not bad, at all. the mic was diverse and not everything was my cup of tea but thats what its all about- ya dont have to like everything up there and i would probably get more scared if everything started to sound the same. ‘the inner circle’ is staying pretty consistent but theres always room for one more.

alcohol check- no drinks during the show, a post event corona cuz i was really thirsty and a ‘blue ox shot’ on the house… not bad.

raina leon is well on her way to getting published but more importantly, she puts mad love into her work and it pays in her performance. her central theme was family and you could tell that shes got mad love for dem. i look forward to hearing her more often and i hope that if there is some other person running a mic out there reading this– book her!

introspective moment- this one kid, daffy, took the mic and he was SO excited to be up there but more importantly- his support system was all in his corner and living and dying with every word he put out there. i was feelin that and it was cool to just observe that.

insider moment- Main Entry: ca·den·za

Pronunciation: k&-‘den-z&

Function: noun

Etymology: Italian, cadence, cadenza

1 : a parenthetical flourish in an aria or other solo piece commonly just before a final or other important cadence

2 : a technically brilliant sometimes improvised solo passage toward the close of a concerto

3 : an exceptionally brilliant part of an artistic work

(ah, jess, my lil diva)

other moments- mc keeps getting better & better (btw, the girl that told him he should remane the piece ‘panty dropper’ was mad cute… go matt! go mattt!). MR will be a force very soon. five minutes means different things to different people. we still need more woman on the mic. we have been able to get some respect from nyc’s finest/bravest– well, at least they know when to leave. i am pretty happy with things and thats good enough for me.