Pedagogy of the Poets

“Education either functions as an instrument which is used to facilitate integration of the younger generation into the logic of the present system and bring about conformity or it becomes the practice of freedom, the means by which men and women deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world.” 
― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed

“Hip Hop was Freirean before we read Freire”

― Kevin Coval

Pedagogy of The Poets

This is our classroom:

this Cipher, this Circle,

this Open Mic to amplify our voices,

This Talking Stick, this ritual,

This space where we are all teachers and students

and our Conversation is the lesson:

our voices in dialogue, in concert,

Testimonies meeting, alchemizing in the air –

This is our Eternal Truth, our only Theory,

our Sacred Text, ever-changing,

We are Movement, Evolution,

Truly human, being praxis,

We practice the Art of Speaking and Listening.

The Word and the Silence are the legs on which we walk:

The Word to name ourselves and the world,

The Silence to hear what others are saying,

The Word to know, to defend, to dream,

Silence, the soil to receive these seeds.

This is the Garden, the Ecosystem.

This is Art and age-old Wisdom,

This is the theater, this is the stage.

This is the altar on which we pray.

This is our church and our town hall,

Our congress and congregational.

This is our government: We are the legislators.

This is our Classroom: We are the Educators.

Capitalist pedagogy works top-down:

“Study for the test / Listen up / Shut your mouth!”

Standardized curricula written by the State,

Memorizing disconnected facts for a grade.

Keep it compartmentalized – don’t connect the dots.

Teach em to be satisfied with the poverty they got.

Never use the word “oppression,” that’s unpatriotic.

Don’t teach Ethnic Studies or you’ll go to jail, got it?

Water down the history, literature, social studies,

Out with creativity, we don’t need critical thinkers, do we,

In a system where the vast majority of jobs

are to slave away for minimum wage, workin for the boss?

But something new is happening: now even that is gone.

Computers/robots automate, creating a new problem:

They don’t even need us, so they’re closing all the schools,

beefin up the police state and changing all the rules,

takin back the pensions, cutting welfare, closing clinics,

putting dictatorial rule in the state of Michigan –

if this shit ain’t fucking fascist, son, then I don’t know what is.

Tyranny of corparations: “Slavery, Inc.”

Rahm & his buddies up in City Hall huddle

like a pack of vicious vultures, to callously shutter up

another public school, till there’s not even one left.

Sellin education for a charter paycheck.

Packin fifty students in a class with old books,

cuttin back, Special Ed, art & music go first,

Then it’s nurses, counselors, janitors, lunch is gross meat,

Soon enough they’re sittin in a room with no heat.

But “It’s all about the kids,” right? Rahm is on our side,

It’s not his fault we’ve got an educational apartheid.

It’s gotta be the teachers, yeah, them motherfuckers lazy,

Better bust the unions up, cut their payment, raise fees.

Call me crazy, but I think I see a pattern:

They‘re takin away our basic needs while they keep getting fatter,

Their politics are like their classes: just monologue,

Turnin schools into jails: soft holocaust.

All of us now have to make a decision:

Keep trying to fix a broken capitalist system,

or redesign society, unite for a new Vision

where everyone participates and everybody listens --

This is why we make a space for everyone to talk.

This is what Democracy looks like: Hip Hop.

This is our Pedagogy – This is why we rock

the Mic, and we pass it so the Cipher don’t stop.

manifesto written (after a cipher at yca)

i was born with hella privilege / white skin / doors open / livin
hella north up on francisco ave / near orthodox hasidics
just within the city limits / near Devon’s indian village
so even tho I was comfy the city’s diversity was still imminent

for example / at the magnet k-thru-8 school I attended
half the kids were black / and they apparently offended
mostly white middle-class faculty and often got suspended
so i knew there was some s--- that reconstruction hadn’t mended

in seventh grade i felt depressed cuz school was hella boring
i hated the fact that they made me go back every day and kept ignoring
that i couldn’t care less about standardized tests / my childhood written for me
even being privileged did not feel like livin and this is the root of my story

i went to northside college prep / “the best school in the nation”
but Louder Than A Bomb was where I got my education
learned to listen / heard another side of the equation
saw the power of the spoken word for massive integration

now i’m rockin the pen with a raw kind of vengeance and finding the flow that’ll fit
keepin the hustle and spreadin the gospel and grinding the teaching-art biz
usin the music to get movin to it and murder each bar that i spit
you can tell by my flow that i come from the 'go and been wordplayin since i's a kid!

i’m talkin about emcees from Chicago like Defcee and Tomorrow Kings,
Bella Baahs, Nate Marshall, Emanuel Vinson, Lamar Jorden, No Name, PIVOT!
Deja Taylor, FM Supreme, Raych Jackson, April Fools, knawmean?
and a million unmentioned / renaissance yep & i’ll be reppin the Chi till I’m dead!

now i’m on a mission for freedom, for my people, so i been readin
revolutionaries and dreamin / bout a world that we can all breathe in
where there’s no one dead from not eatin / and money ain’t even needed
and i’m never gonna stop / like a radio pop hit if I make it to the top
it’ll be cuz y’all deem it

necessary / let’s get very real for a sec / it's gettin scary
the system’s broke and the cloak is tearing / it ain’t a joke it’s a smoking barrel
conclusion of this revolutionary / not a prophet / more like an emissary
here to say: with bravery and brains /
this generation could do something legendary

Ode to the Earthworm

Today I helped my daddy plant the first seeds of spring.

Our garden is a little thing – 8 square-feet of precise soil

carefully measured, topped with compost from our kitchen,

mixed with bone meal laid last week (a labor of love),

irrigated by a little rubber hose on an automatic timer.

It is April 9^th, and everything is ready – almost – for today.

The worms are coming.

2,000 of them, in the mail, any minute now.

When they arrive, we are supposed to be ready

to put them into their new environment right away,

so we work, and – thank God – it is the first really nice day

in Chicago all year. Beautiful. Sunny. Cool. A breeze.

I lay the final 2-inch layer of compost with a little trowel

while daddy sifts the rest to free the darker, damper, dirt.

At noon, the worms arrive

in a little box – much littler than “2,000 worms” sounds like.

We open it to find a green cloth bag stuffed with dirt and worms,

from which a few little ones have escaped and are crawling

toward the edges of the box. They are tiny, thin, dehydrated.

Poor things. Daddy picks them up, saying “Oh, no you don’t,”

but he misses one, so I pick it up and look at it in my hand.

Barely moving, but yes – it is alive.

We take them to the three compost bins and sprinkle them in,

to join the few that have survived the brutal winter.

I watch them writhe in the soil, slowly spread, and start to dig.

Then I take the bag over to the garden, and place the rest of them

in the very center of our 8 square-foot plot:

a clump of them are stuck together: they look like a little squid

or octopus, flailing its tiny tentacles, until they, too, spread and dig

(I notice a particularly feisty one that jumps and flips a couple times)

they roll, they inch, they slither, they crawl,

to the safety of the dark and damp

to the nourishment of dirt and water

to work their alchemy,

little magicians…

dad explains how they improve the soil

by eating and excreting their nitrogen-rich castings, “black gold,”

(worms must be the only animal whose poop actually smells good!)

and how at the same time they aerate the soil 

– little moving tubes – veins, or wind pipes of the dirt.

they are as much the earth as they are animal…

 I told my dad that I would help him for just an hour

(because I am “very busy”)

but I am having so much fun that I decide to stay

and help him with the final task of the day:

planting spinach, lettuce, and onions.

I am honored

when he offers to let me do the planting.

I dig the rows with my fingers – shallow and thin,

while daddy fills the little disc that spreads the seeds.

and, after careful measurements, I sow them in the ground,

whispering small blessings of deep gratitude

and prayers for great abundance.

Then, I reach my hand into the bin

which dad has filled with black gold from last year’s worms,

and with that, cover the newly planted seeds

and gently pat them down.

And just like that, our work is done,

at least for today: the first seeds of spring are planted,

and will grow, with a little help from our friends:

the sun, the earth, the rain, the wind,

and the little worms.

real time

in "real time"

i'm 24--

it's winter

(New Year's Eve)

but, feel Rhyme

find Nevermore--

Remember

(Eternity)

if i can write in Rising meter

--Dickinson-inspired--

maybe we, through Poetry  

(that transcendental Liar),

can break the shackles of the Clock

& Rise in timeless Bliss--

above the Paradox of life,

& out of "That" and "This"--

("The day is made of many days"

Neruda writes in "Time"

--indeed, it seems i know what he means--

in heart, if not in mind)

i see the clock--

12:21

& then 12:22--

on my computer screen

as i

compose this verse

for you--

& soon enough,

12:23

arrives to take its place,

& by the time i write that line,

12:24 replaces it!

i take a break to pee & think,

& 5 whole minutes fly--

& during those 5 minutes,

i must wonder -- where was i?

in Mexico--

in Outer Space--

Chicago,

in my room--

at Native Foods

with you, my friend,

discussing power’s Doom--

& how, we say, a Brand New Day

is waiting to come in--

(i hear it Knocking softly Now

upon the hearts of men--)

& that to Hope is no small thing

--& no mere fool’s Dream--

but rather, just to thankfully

acknowledge Time's great Scheme--

for what are we but chemicals

& atoms, after all?

set into motion by a Bang

--so infinitely small--

& yet, our small parts equally

complete this greatest Story--

& through our lives, though short, we strive--

revealing its true Glory--

the Poet, & the Coffee-Shop,

the Mother nursing Child--

through all of them the Universe

is working, is compiled

day by day, & year by year,

minute by small minute--

century by century,

of every small Thing in it

--the snow on the magnolia tree

is beautiful & still--

the world is cold,

the Tree is old,

outside my windowsill--

Tomorrow starts a whole New Year

--quite arbitrarily--

& yet, it seems significant--

Revolutionary, even.