I Didn't Ask For Any Lip
Jazz Vocalist Par Excellence Jimmy Scott (b. July 1925-June 2014) Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child has always been with us. When I looked up its origin, there was none. One day, it stood up on his hind legs in the distance and wailed. Its origin is America itself. Its an old, traditional spiritual …
Continue reading "BHM #8: SOMETIMES I FEEL LIKE A MOTHERLESS CHILD"
Judith Jamison (b. May 1943- Nov 2024) from 'Cry' circa 1971. Judith Jamison, Dancer and Choreographer with the Alvin Ailey Dance Troupe Jamison was from Philadelphia and stood tall at 5' 10". For 'Cry' she had to be sewn into her custom costume Watch a staging of Cry choreographed by Alvin Ailey for Judith Jamison, …
Continue reading "BHM: #7 EKPHRASTIC RESPONSE TO ‘CRY’ / POEM FOR JUDITH JAMISON and ALVIN AILEY"
Planes, Rockets and the Spaces In Between (2018) by Amy Sherald There is a blue sky across the street from the end of the world a sky without center or capitol even the birds have deserted the horizon birds know better only a rocket dares reach toward the eternal without consideration of heaven. On the …
Continue reading "BHM #5: AN EKPHRASTIC POEM AFTER ARTIST AMY SHERALD"
Television was infected with TV Specials in the 70's. Any comic or singer worth a mic, who could fill a nightclub on a weekend night, would eventually be tossed an hour long TV Variety Show. Richard Pryor was becoming a huge presence on the standup circuit in the 70's and in May 1977, two years …
Continue reading "BHM #3: MAYA ANGELOU ON THE RICHARD PRYOR SPECIAL"
“He was more concerned about his mustache than his haircut. He always liked his mustache to be up off the lip, like a butterfly. He would tell me, make it like a butterfly this time.” Nelson Malden, MLK Jr.’s former barber Deputy US Marshal Bass Reeves (July 1838 to January 1910) Frederick Douglass (Feb …
Continue reading "BLACK HISTORY MONTH (BHM) #1 GREAT MUSTACHES OF BLACK HISTORY"
What shall we do while Gayle King is in space? Cities bombed for ‘redevelopment’. Rubble raked for bones and bread. But keep ya head up; Gayle King is in space! Jupiter needs a COACH outlet. There’s no Sephora on the Crab Nebula. America’s mall looks too small to be great, so says Gayle King from …
Potrero Stage Theatre, first night sound check Prelude A friend calls monthly, like one would check in with a therapist. A mutual acquaintance has brought her to tears multiple nights. Who is open to just listening beyond me? Our years together, she's earned my patience. But one night she stopped and asked about me. How …
Congratulations! It’s a book!! Ghetto Koans: A Personal Archive is now available from Black Lawrence Press. The bulk of poems in Ghetto Koans: A Personal Archive represent attempts to finding myself as a poet, by training my eye to focus on and validate things I found beautiful or curious or odd or all of the …
Continue reading "Ghetto Koans: A Personal Archive – Book Reveal"
Pre-orders are now available for Ghetto Koans: A Personal Archive, my third poetry collection due this June from Black Lawrence Press. These poems are memories, meditations and monologues. Stories of witness gathered during my time living in West Oakland around 2007 -- before and after. Oddities and encounters formed into poems while; standing at bus …
Continue reading "Pre-Order Ghetto Koans: A Personal Archive"
The first cassette recorder I ever bought was the first adult machine I'd ever owned and it felt so thrilling it made me nervous. I immediately did two things with my recorder: At once, I began collecting theme songs to tv shows and sit-coms I watched (Not that anyone cared ) and second, I snuck …
The Dirty Rat 