power to the performance poet!! (And a thank you)

      As I wrap up the month and close the book slowly on my time in Edinburgh, Scotland, I look back and reflect on the poetic growth and inspiration I have gotten from the poetry community here and I realized a couple of amazing and auspicious things about this place and the people in it. I wrote in stanzas for some reason, we’ll call it habit:

Here

I am aloud to be a poet. Period. 

There is no such thing as a poet who is not yet a poet. 

Just poets trying to be the best poet they can be. 

That is the beauty of poetry. 


I came here and identified as a poet 

and was not compared to a BNV champion, 

I was not degraded to a hobbyist, 

and I wasn’t told that I wasn’t good enough 

to take the title and claim the name. 


This, is what it looks like when poetry has equality.

 There is no room for hierarchy, for the adoration 

of poets that make more money than they do change

more headlines than they do thoughts. 

Are there poets with more experience you may ask? 

Of course! 


But these are the same poets who will 

invite you to a pub after the event and engage in poetic discourse.

They will ask you to challenge, ask, and debate with confidence

that you are being heard as a poet,

nothing more, nothing less. 


These poets are the same poets that will book you for gigs 

and encourage you to do better, be better, and perform more. 

These are the same poets that will ask what works for you after the workshop– 

These are the same poets that will actually HOST WORKSHOPS!!


This is called accessible inspiration. 

Along with the many other amazing performers in the area

I hit the jackpot in Edinburgh, Scotland. 


So there I sat in a pub, 

with a bunch of amazing artists discussing

Poetry as she was happening in Edinburgh. 

As if she was living, breathing and 

wasn’t  picky in inhabiting everybody.

You felt the movement and Poetry 

opened her palm to you because you were 

especially invited. 


It was refreshing 

to talk about the poetry I was living; 

there was no obsessing over poets 

we will never get to talk to or work with 

Because they are too famous to spend time with us 

without a substantial fee.

All the poets here are poets by their own decree.


Here, a poet is active in adding to the canon

submitting theories to poetic action. 

No application is needed. A poet is a poet. 

Period. 


Only 5 months in this city/town

I can’t say I know every corner.

But I do know now

that I will hold proud my title 

as a Poet 

Performance poet

Spoken word artist

Extender of word

Tamer of thought 

Sharer of heart.


We don’t need slam championships and 

publishers to open our lips.  

And as I see the American horizon 

I know there are poets who are dying to speak

but they think they need the money and 

need to be famous

for people to give them a listen. 


I will tell them 

what I learned from Edinburgh

What I learned from Loud Poets

What I learned from Glasgow 

What I learned from Scotland 


If you are a poet. 

You are poet. 

Period.