Sparrow and I went to a poetry slam the other day,
In the neighborhood, at Ashland and Grand.
For someone who likes to write poems,
I go to very few things like this.
The man at the door was big and burly.
He asked, smiling,
“Are you going to sign up for the open mic?”
I shook my head.
A confession:
As many of these as I’ve written,
I’ve never read any aloud.
(I know. Don’t roll your eyes at me.
I’ll be the first to admit I have no testicular fortitude.)
Like my favorite Rexroth and Bukowski poems,
I could never hear anybody reading these poems aloud;
These words, they lift up off the page and illuminate
themselves.
At least, that’s how I like to see it.
I looked around. We were the only
Non-black people in the bar.
Redstorm, the host, took the mic.
He had a raspy voice
and a
young man’s
swagger.
Suddenly we were regaled with tales from the street,
Crack and Christ and women and despair
and
Grown men pouring out their hopes and dreams
and
All the lines in the room erased themselves.
Later, on the way home,
I looked at the graffiti scrawled across garages,
Walls, alleyways, and wondered
If those words were any different
Than the ones
Written on
This page.
I like knowing that we all want the same thing.
Sometimes I wonder if we’ll ever get it.
D.H. Lee
