Contrary to what you learned in IFP, listening to other people's poetry does not have to be a hateful ordeal. Thursdays at Notre Maison (18 W. 25th St.), you can see a Poetic Sit for just a small donation. Last Thursday, it turned out to be 12 local poets who either read poems or performed spoken word pieces. Owner Jacqui Cummings describes Notre Maison as a "teahouse," a place where people can unwind, read or play games in a no-smoking, alcohol-free environment. (Luckily, Honk Kong Restaurant, one block over, fixes a fly mai-tai.) Jacqui was a good hostess, and it's a very welcoming atmosphere.
The guest host for the evening was E the Poet Emcee, who warmed up the crowd with a couple well-worded poems that established one of the night's general motifs: frustration with the black situation in America. In "Oh Black Woman," E says, "America is like chemotherapy and niggas rather live with cancer, because it burns less." A strong statement, certainly, intended to evoke a strong response from the audience. Like a lot of spoken word, the poetry performed on Thursday was overwhelmingly exhortative, desirous of individual and community action. After all, spoken word is a form which focuses on rhyme, rhythm and aggressive performances.
That's not to say that every poem performed was socially progressive. Aquil Mizan criticized America's public school system as a "defecational system" in his poem "It Takes a Village to Raise Our Children". However, the only solution he offers to this problem is the Christianization of schools. Also, when Jacqui Cummings performed "Misconceptions of Love," a poem that needs serious editing, I was thrown by a contemptuous, if errant, reference to "Adam and Eve."
Others were better. In "Answering Machine Message," Tayree, addressing a pushy former date, confessed, "I regret the day I gave you a chance to be an ass." Steve, another performer, gave sensual, intensely lyrical poems. "One Minute" dealt with a near-fatal heart attack. On how death felt, he said, "The abyss is force-feeding me" -- distinctly powerful stuff. Another highlight was Sista Educator, a self-described frustrated Baltimore public school teacher, who tenderly lamented the wasted talent of her students. She is the featured poet for Thursday, March 11, and it will probably be a performance worth seeing.
The evening culminated with Native Son, the night's featured performer. Native Son, who looks younger but sounds much older than his 25 years, is a member of the spoken word crew The 5th L and a native of Baltimore. Although he only did a set of a few poems, his effect on the room was incalculable. The audience, myself included, was rapt as he performed, and this 5'11", gentle-looking, dreadlocked college gaduate's stage presence was absolutely phenomenal, but his poems were even better.
They were rhythmic, educated and jazzy, maintained a conceit consistently and intelligently over the course of a relatively long poem. For example, in his first poem, "Dummies," he spoke with ironic romanticism about people who have sex without talking it over, thinking they're in love. After entertaining various riffs on the theme of muteness, he concluded the poem perfectly: "Body language is designed for the dumb."
Between poems, Native Son talked to the crowd about his poetry and what stood behind it. He expressed a deep affinity for the streets of Baltimore, and he later told me that he spends time walking the city and talking to its people. His view of the current state of our city, however, was markedly more positive than that of the other performers. He said, "We all have a part in making things better," and I was charmed by his optimism when he pointed out that "love is definitely a part of history," contrasting the longstanding hardships faced by Baltimore's black community.
The most valuable point his poetry made was about the primacy of individual action. In one poem, he stated, "I look around me only to see / All the scapegoats have been slain." It is imperative, he said, that black people begin to look within their own community for the leadership needed to promote them in society. Nor is Native Son a poet on the sidelines: He actively identifies himself as one of the new leadership for the Baltimore community. After speaking with him for 10 minutes, I felt more optimistic about the state of social progress in Baltimore than I ever had before.
Notre Maison on Thursday nights is the best poetry you'll find in a 10-block radius, so hop on a shuttle, check it out and come back wanting to listen to "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised."
