Poetry Reading

I went to the lowertown reading jam on October 23. It took place at the “Black Dog Café” which is a small café inside an old brick building. It reminded me a lot of tea garden. Not to draw stereotypes, but the ambiance this poetry slam gave was “hippyish.” 

I was amazed at how many different age groups were present. I saw families with babies and toddlers, teenagers, college students, adults and even some elders. It shocked me because in class we were warned that there was a high possibility that we’d be the youngest people present. Not only did the range of ages shock me, but the amount of people that were there! I walked in 10 minutes early and all the tables and chairs were already taken. Everyone was sitting with tea or coffee along with a pen and notebook ready to take notes. 

Out of the multiple poets we saw, my favorite was Marcus Harcus. In fact he is running for State Representative. Consequently, his poem was about politics and how our society needs to provide more equal opportunities. It discussed how everyone should have an equal voice despite demographic statues, race, and age. He talked about his campaign and how he sought to make the government more diverse. Unfortunately Harcus doesn’t have a book or any poems online (like all of the poets there). He was so dramatic that after reading the pages his poems were written on he’d throw them off to the side. For me, this showed how much he cared about politics and equality. This changed my perspective on poetry because Marcus Harcus talked about a present issue in our society. It was more interesting to me because it was something I could relate to. I really enjoyed this poetry slam because I was able to see more than one poet. 

^ This is Marcus Harcus

Marcus Harcus Website: http://marcusharcus.org/

Genders

                After watching Charlie’s video on the difference between girls and boys, my mind immediately jumped to the gender agreements in languages. I took Spanish from kindergarten through 10^th grade and begun French in 11^th grade. Both of these languages have grammatical gender agreements where something is either “feminine” or “masculine.” A group of girls use the feminine agreements, and a group of guys use the masculine agreements. What’s interesting is that a group of both girls and guys use the masculine agreement. In every situation, in both French and Spanish, where girls and boys are both present the masculine ALWAYS overrides the feminine. In our society and within our languages and other like things, there are engraved sexist rules and ways that are present from the day we are born such as my example of genders in language. So, it feels almost impossible to reverse the idea that men are superior to women unless you question the base of our society.  

Louis Jenkins Response

                I decided to read and focus on the “Afterlife” and “Football.” The first thing I realized was that they seem to be paragraphs in poem form. Both of these also seemed to be telling a story initially, but then shifted into a larger more complete message.

                The Football poem was more straight-forward than The Afterlife. I like how Louis Jenkins started with something that his readers would find interesting or relatable, football, and somehow turned it into the moral message of self responsibility. The line, “One has certain responsibilities, one has to make choices,” really resonated with me because I feel this was when the poem really came together. I believe the message he was relaying to us readers, is that it’s up to us individually to set our own morals which will determine our own view of right and wrong. The only thing I had trouble understanding was the football comments strung throughout the poem such as “My man downfield is waving his arms.” I don’t see how this adds to the point he is trying to make, and I even believe that it detracts from his message.

                 From the title of this poem “The Afterlife”, I concluded that the poem was about two dead people talking about their life when they were still alive. Were they seeking to find the point of life? The quote inside the poem which stated “It didn’t seem to have any plot” suggests to me that they had concluded that there was no point to life. They talked about what they did and didn’t like, but what I couldn’t find was the message being portrayed. At first I thought it would be something cliché like “live life to the fullest” but when I reached the end, my theory wasn’t even close. It ended with the two people stating their regrets…regrets that they couldn’t even change. What is that trying to tell us?

                

Fear

Fear

“We have nothing to fear but fear itself”

Although it feels impossible to kick the fear,

That has bubbled inside moe for the last 15 years.

The endless thoughts of being sick,

Was a way I believed I would always live.

But now it seems I can finally see,

What this quote really is telling me.

To break the wall standing between,

Me and the uneasy acts us humans need.

To transform my fears into what I believe

To be a positive and to relieve,

The pent up stress within me.

Florida

Florida

Blow up arm life vests,

Squeezing my helplessly young arms.

To my star shaped

Sparkly pink sunglasses,

All left decorative shapes into my pale skin,

By the intensely bright yellow sun.

Building or mounding damp sand together,

To build, what I question now, a sand castle.

And flying vibrant lion kites in the bright blue sky.

Fishing alongside my cousins on a sail boat,

And the feeling of content as I real

In, a dangerously scared baby shark.

Are all memories which can never fade,

And all I have to blame is m age,

As to why I can’t re create these days.

Chris Martin's Poem Blog Response

Chris Martin Blog Response

Although Chris Martin’s style of poetry keeps me focused and involved, I cannot deny the fact that it is seemingly confusing. Lines such as “A muted computer Chip” and “the impossible Sky like itself only Vaster, bleuer, two and a half” makes me think outside the box as to what Martin could be saying. Unfortunately, I have not come to any conclusion as to what those lines mean. I have considered metaphors, symbols and even devices such as personification to try to uncover what the underlying moral or message in these poems and lines could be.

In the midst of my confusion I couldn’t help but analyze each line in each poem. The one that I disagreed with the most came from “The True Meaning of Pictures” :

“I see pictures every day and by

God there is as much

Truth in them as in any shifting”

I couldn’t disagree more. In my view, pictures are everything but truthful. Usually, pictures only capture the most exciting parts of someone’s life –or the worst. For example: While facebook stalking someone you don’t know you automatically click on their pictures. Their pictures often look glamorous causing you to envy this person’s life when in reality; your pictures do the same. These pictures you’re viewing are not a good indication of what this person’s life may actually be therefore they are not portraying the truth. I understand that Martin’s line about pictures could be analyzed and interpreted in many different ways; this is just the way I understood it.

In conclusions I think Chris Martins poems make me think harder than any other poems I have read. I believe that they have many different meanings to them and what makes the poems so confusing are the small details that make up the entirety of the poems.