Poetry & Performance

A competitive poetry performance in which selected audience members score performers, and winners are determined by total points. Slam is a composite genre that combines elements of poetry, theater, performance, and storytelling. The genre’s origins can be traced to Chicago in the early 1980s. Since then, groups of volunteers have organized slams in venues across the world. The first National Poetry Slam was held in 1990, and has become an annual event in which teams from cities across the United…

Welcome, dear somanauts. Let’s go on a journey together. And as we get going, we’ll think about ways in which we can protect ourselves, and prepare ourselves for our journey. And to do this, I invite you to take a breath, in your nest where you are right now,

we were joy junkies riding coal waste on old mining roads. the white birch divining subtle vibrations of earth. railroad tracks ribboning orange the sinking sun.

In October of 1871, the oldest University in Nashville TN, teetered on the brink of collapse. To survive, Fisk University staked its last $40 on a set of field hymns…

She texts me and I light up like the neon
frame of the jukebox in this closed bar.
I walk the parking lot. Only a Christmas
tree witnesses me so I get in my...

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Begin. Cutting board, strawberries, fridge,
magnet with pic of ocean. And 2: White
woman’s hand. Cuts the top of a strawberry.
And 3: Lines the berries straight against
the fridge. The green parts are gone....

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Begin. A gold box with a bow. How nice.
And 2. Some are ivory, some are stone.
And 3. Stiletto boots with black buttons.
And 4. This necklace is. This music is
bump, bump-bump...

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First frame: White shoulder
in a car, tank top, seatbelt.
Second: Sign reads “Motel $29.”
Third frame: Desk and over
there an Al-Anon brochure
“Detachment.” Four: Window
with blue lights. On and off.
Five: Domina’s half face. She’s...

I ask when
is the last time you returned yourself to yourself. I
am a hypocrite to make
you answer what I cannot. Love
is a death wish between two men bold enough to believe in it. To
love you is to fade daily. To...

For nothing more than the Love of my people
I fight
staying my path
honoring the ancestors
dragging the children to freedom with the passion of the Christ
because even as a child You freed my mind
and I Love Your imperfections
         ...

a poem cannot save a life
cannot Luke Cage your skin
fend off a dark alley attack
cannot make you less woman
or less poor
or less Black
and
thus
treated equally

a poem cannot stop a bullet
stop a bomb
stop terror on your doorstep
your step
even with poem in hand
could...

I’ve parked parts of an 8-knot tongue somewhere in my breath
My glottal effect be global
Sound like everywhere I’ve been
Speak like 441 and Peachtree
My language is southern
The fine line between bourgeois and uppity
I am narrator of the equator’s talk
Got a whole...

I often hear of roses grown from concrete—
forgive me if I find it difficult to celebrate the bloom.
Most are simply torn back down by weeds,
their seeds deemed undesirable, scattered,
planted in infertile
soil spoiling any opportunity
to exceed what they’re perceived to be.
Uprooted.
Petals...