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doing your job

eliel, thanks for the space to do my thing on saturday. you put together an audience, open mic list and feature (jane- not me) that would have been the envy of a lot of readings in this city. for real!

for the uninitiated, jane lecroy is just plain bad ass. she featured for synonymus last year and her duet with tom abbs (which included a freestlyle) was one of the highlights of the series run. all done while she was seven months pregnant! that show was the jump off event for 2003, a week before the ‘5past13’ cd recording party so i used the show as an opportunity to give the musical rendition of “MotB” a live run through first. turns out a young lucero was in the audience and the rest, as the scholars say, is history.

if you can change one life with your poetry- then you’ve done your job. i’ve been lucky enough to affect a few lives. who knows to what end but thats what i’ve been told. friday at the nuyo open room, i read the ‘Sorta Rican” series and while the room was exactly what you would expect at 2:30 in the am after a 5 person slam, i still was able to hear one person in the house vibing on what i was saying. all the insider references were being anticipated and getting approval as i was saying them almost like if i was editing the poem myself out loud on stage. as i was braking out i see this one girl walking towards me with intent and i set it off- ‘another ecua?’

she was really loving the piece and the message- “it’s what i’ve always wanted to say” there is no bigger compliment than that so i gave her the copy of the poem and told her thanks. neruda said it’s all about giving voice to the voiceless- word!

at salon lucero, i read this other piece that talks about my old journeys wandering around this city at all hours just looking for another strip club and a good locker room tale. it’s not meant to be popular (pretty sure i will get hissed at one day when i mention the strip club but thats the way the ball bounces- g!)or even fully understood- it’s the indulgence that i ask for- in return for the hits, you gotta listen to my reflections. one of the “new” open micers tells me that there was this one piece that he was digging more than the rest and i’m thinking (i know you’ve been to the copa. too) but he talks to me about being lost and feeling your internal compass go to shit and how the piece really hit em. more good times and reason enough to keep going on with this life that kinda found me at the right time and not vice-versa.

really indulgent entry, today. makes me sound like my shit is manna from heaven which it aint. the blog.tribe knows more than the causal observer that i miss way more often that i hit and even those hits arent homeruns. i’ve made a career out of hitting where they aint and hustling to first base. to expand the analogy, if i was on a team- i’d probably be a catcher cuz i love hearing what no one else does and being privy to silent communication over yells and shout. i can also see myself covering home and waiting for a locomotive in a jersey coming to score, holding on the ball for dear life and trying my best to cover the base. i may not be real athletic but when you point to me a job and i agree to it, then ima do it.

determination isnt a substitute for success and tenacity isnt the same as being prolific, the odds say that i will fail more often than succeed but when i do get it right and jot down a good poem and hit it on the mic like i should- then you get some interesting rewards. like having a stranger that heard you recite just one time come back and be a friend and supporter and compose his own platform plea to be heard above the din of the city.

so i was in one of those moods today. this has been a great week for me poetically. i finally feel like if i have a diverse enough set of poems that i can write for the sake of writing and not write to try to prove something.

(flashback- last year after the bar13 semi-finals- a talk with two friends)

“we came here to tell ya sumthin”

uh huh

“your work this monday was cool but we think…”

yes?

“we think you should be more funny”

huh?

“you are trying to hard to be a p_o_e_t and its messin with your writing”

ok, i’ll gibe ya that but i do want to be a poet

“yeah but you are trying to sound like how you think people want you to sound instead of trying to be how you are”

what do you suggest

(in stereo)”be more funny”

“you are funny in real life- your writing should be funny”

that right there was one of the best talks i ever had in my poetic life. nothing like some straight up critique to get you rolling. even if it does take nine months for the sheet to sink in.

(end flashback)

something that i read for inspiration from time to time-



Young Poets by Nicanor Parra

Write as you will

In whatever style you like

Too much blood has run under the bridge

To go on believing

That only one road is right.

In poetry everything is permitted.

With only this condition of course,

You have to improve the blank page.

it was one of those days whre i wanted to rememer who i was- a newbie in the back who was either listening intently or writing furiously. i’m still a good listener and have been surprised as to how much goodness there is out there. not the same furious writer but i’ve been hanging with some folks who only pause from their journals long enough to catch a breath and enjoy the new landscpae before attacking the blank page like a young poet should and, let me say this, until the last poem is written- we are all young poets.

just another day around the way

forget poetry for a minute–

-92.7 WLIR goes off the air… this happened at the start of the new year and was a shock to the system. lir was the first station that i actually felt listened to the people. the vision network gang would send them requests via fax and they would read em out with all our dumb comments and all. more importantly, this was the station that dared to be different. before it was the rage, they took a chance with bands called pearl jam, rage against the machine and alice in chains to name a few… even after alternative went mainstream, they were playing the songs that made these bands great and you could count on some 80s obscurity popping up very now and then… nothing like some early u2 or peter gabriel to keep you grounded… then they fucked up and went with mainstream with their alternative… figuring that they had the best DJs and a finger on the pulse of long island youth (angst- personified), they went national… in the process losing their grassroots touch… not only that but they couldnt compete with the big boys and as every one was playing stone temple pilots, LIR got left in the dust… they resurfaced by playing the europe techno grooves that were becoming the norm of the clubs… not just the sheet you heard on other stations but more intense tunes that had a complexity all their own… it wasnt for everybody.. they lost some folks but gained back their core audience and as alternative faded to teen pop… LIR rose high again as the station that dared to be different… i still tune over to 92.7 to see if this is some bad joke but its not… more info here

-A-Rod!… once again, the yankees play the off field game better than everybody else… a move that started as a- we cant let boston get him turned into the trade of this century thanks to a random knee injury… are the yanks better… in hitting, yes… in infield defense, yes… in merchandise sales, hell yeah (btw, the sale of a-rod gear will easily make this deal a profitable situation)… attendance, up… outfield defense, spotty… pitching, critically in need of a lefty… middle relief, a joke… closing, its mariano or nothing and this is the man who makes or breaks the yanks every year… the whole world hates the yankees even more and thats just fine… if they dont love you now- they never will- so why bother… “your whole team is bought!” our catcher, shortstop, DH, closer and 3 starter are all home grown from day one. name two other teams that can boast that. (at the end of last season we also had a home grown second baseman and 2 starter, btw)… the yanks are one of the last home grown teams out there that realized that its a buyers market… sadly, this accelerates the process of full corporate take over of sports, a reality that took hold with the dodgers leaving brooklyn and free agency- all way before the era of steinbernner

-the job… my nemesis at work got the ax yesterday… she pushed the last button and it was done… not a real happy time cuz she forced my boss to do what she had to and it was fucked up… on the flip, it was only a question of time and me and my lil band realized that as soon as we started catching her heat… my coworker was gonna riff and i told her to chill cuz we were gonna end up on the wrong side of the blame game cuz i knew that homegirl was more apt to talk behind the back shit than we were and that she had more moments of solitude with my boss… sorry to see ya go

-the beard.. i grew it as a kinda warm up to mondays feature… the knicks did it once in the post season with all of em (except ewing) shaving their heads (done dat) and the devils all grew out their beards in their quest for a stanley cup.. we aint shavin till we win!… i figured i would get all grizzly adams till the big day and then resurface in my old form.. really surprised with the random and unprovoked “looks good!”… for now, its sticking around cuz, as a bald man, i dont have very much to help keep me styling so i resort to messin with the facial hair… maybe i will go with the braided biker goatee look next (not!)

-the blog… having more fun but as i told jess last nite… this bad boy is for me and to keep a record of my thoughts on shit… i know the feature report was hella long but i dont care… it aint for y’all… its for me

-new ideas… in my head… real ones… not just the ones that i get from people or from the past… me and guy were munching after encomium last week and i was bringing up mad shit from the past… i know i freaked him out with the shit that sticks with me which is why i always raise an eyebrow when random ideas suddenly “appear” cuz i am pretty sure that they came from old convos and other discourse… but hey, columbus discovered america, right?… lincoln freed the slaves… marc smith invented slam… its all about your PR… a good spin doctor is the shit… ya know?… i can freely say that most of my ideas are straight out of somebody else’s play book and from what i’ve seen of the people that i hang with- they probably picked it up from someone else’s play book… and so on and so on… nothing new under the sun.. since i just realized that this great new idea i had was actually somebody else’s suggestion… let’s see how it can be tweaked

also, thanks to all of the blog.tribe that showed up at the feature… love ya like if i stole this line from a trini poet!