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Michele Mitchell / Blog

new joint: poetic promise number one

poetic promise number one apparently you forgot who i am i… through rage and confusion caged baby muses until tiring of their crying, breastfed them abuse you provided me by misleading and lying to me and they grew up to be slam poems i own them they obey like blue pits and a code my verses are overloaded with comebacks to every miniscule weakness you ever confessed to me i have to keep my slam poems on a leash because if i were to actually speak on what i was thinking those tattoo teardrops would run down your cheek. apparently you forgot who i am i inhale life and spit lines tighter than the fist around the appendage you yanked during your ten year prison bid wait-is that another baby muse screamin nah, it’s one of your kids wonderin why father isn’t something they utter with pride instead they hide behind a thinly masked metaphor of generational curses, environmental waste products, sex weed and liquor. the more you lied to me the quicker the baby muse grew into the slam poem you never knew was gonna whoop your ass. apparently you forgot who i am shed the shackles of abuse, degradation and bitterness bent them into bracelets of sunshine swept the horizon captured crystallized raindrops formed by my tears cracked them open with my fist pulled out the rainbow by my fingertips offered it to you to show life sometimes brings beauty through pain. you chose to remain stagnant tricky and sticky like humidity in july why you straddle the fence between common sense and stupidity i will never understand. do you feel more like a man if a woman is beneath you groveling than over you soaring, adoring, luring you into independence freedom and self worth? are you cursed by your own pride? i tried. apparently you forgot who i am. i will be okay not ashamed to say i do love you. when i looked into your eyes i saw my own reflection the rejection the battle inside that rages from not wanting to admit you are hurting. the need for you to be strong is ten-fold but the power is depleted. i cry in the shower too i cry for you, me, muses in cages and the evil that men do. in the same breath i praise my Creator for making me a poet pouring my tears onto pages that i can choose to rip up or read give or receive deny or believe we are like night and day but at dusk and dawn we were one apparently you forgot who i am. slam poems are sleeping by my feet i fed them hope in hope i never have to write like this again that baby muses can be nurtured with honesty, loyalty, sincerity grow into verses who press their palms into the small of my back whisper kisses into my neck and stroke my cheek into a smile with my morning cup of coffee. i would have loved you with the exact intensity you desired at any moment but i grew tired of waiting for the truth while wading through the lies. apparently you forgot who i am i tried to be as refreshing as seven chilled strawberries fed to you on a covered porch through a cool breeze before the storm but you were too scorned. i can walk away say nothing and still be everything you and the concubines you consort with wish they could be all that is left to hear is the door my heart and this piece slam apparently you forgot who i am. © michele mitchell 2010

Desperate Women in Music

I always joked that I used to date losers just to get a fire poem out of it. But normally I would belittle their behaviors not glorify them. And although poetry and music are cousins in the artistic family tree, music seems to do the opposite. This may be repetitive to many but I am elaborating on it nonetheless. First let me preface, I am not perfect and have fallen guilty to listening to lyrics sung or rapped by female artists that were less than positive. (I affectionately call this era the Lil Kim Era) But lately, mostly due to my recent “eye opening experience” I have noticed there are a plethora of songs being sung and possibly written by women that describe unfavorable relationships. This situation prompts me to pose these questions: Does art imitate life or does life imitate art? Do female artists have a responsibility toward their women audiences? I would like to start by, yet again, bringing up the song by Melanie Fiona “It Kills Me”. (enter non-adoring sigh) This song is about a woman who apparently in a relationship with a man who is in a relationship with someone else. She knows the relationship is unfavorable, knows the man means her no good, but she cries out in the song that she wants to have his baby!!! What is scary is I know of women in this situation (and they have succeeding in getting pregnant) and what they do not realize is by continuing in this relationship they are demeaning themselves. Does desperation hang over their existence so heavily that they have to settle? Also what does it mean when this song is a hit and we have millions of teenagers and young adults blaring this track out of their speakers?? What does that teach our women? Does it teach them to settle for any man just to have a man? In respect to men, does this send the message that they do not have to modify their behavior because they know there are women out there who are going to accept the negativity regardless? What is happening to love and respect? Where did it go? Is this song emulating life or is society emulating the song? It makes me angry and I want to shake these young (or sadly sometimes old) women and tell them of my “eye opening experience”. I want to explain that a REAL man will only UPLIFT them. So before I go off on a tangent about what makes a real man let me say this: “It Kills Me” gets no airplay from me and because of that track, I am no longer interested in listening to anything Melanie Fiona recorded. Next, and I know I am probably going to get stoned by some of you, I am a little pissed at Mary J. Blige right now. I mean of course I love her and her contributions to R&B; she was deemed the “voice of our generation”. However, I just fully listened to the lyrics if “I Am”. This whole song is talking about a relationship where the man runs the streets acting single but yet comes home to a good woman who will love him better than anyone else. Or does he? The song seems to be a warning or plea to this “man” to not be unfaithful because he will never find “another woman like her”. Um, well according to Melanie Fiona, he will find another woman like her and she will want to have his baby. I’m just sayin. For the record, ladies if you have to tell your man “not to act single” chances are he is already acting single and you need to be too, as far away from that man as possible. There are other songs from the past by female artists that do the same thing: Whitney Houston-“Saving All My Love For You” Shirley Murdock- “As We Lay” and “Husband” So rather than go off on another tangent about the acceptable behavior of man who truly loves his woman, I will just implore women everywhere to stop singing this type of negativity in our homes, our cars, on the train, and in the clubs because for those of us that are still single, we are putting energy into the atmosphere that we do NOT want to attract back. Or at least I don’t. Peace, MM

new joint

in the meantime in the meantime cold crept through the window wrapped itself around her shoulders to remind her she was alone again she wasn’t the type of chick to keep a friend on standby so she sighed and sunk deeper into her comforter this comforter was down with the realization that alone is better than used, abused, taken advantage of, roughed up, beaten, berated, or belittled still at times like this when cold creeps through windowsills like little cobalt kitten feet on her collarbone to remind her that she was alone with no one to share her worries with spend her evening with plan her day with even share her award winning chili with her only comfort was that there was more for her… there was more for her there is more for her

new joint

at dusk we held hands secretly...i still feel his thumbprint on my palm still hear the silence between his sighs still afraid the look in his eyes would cause me to lean over to kiss him still smell juicy fruit gum on his breath feel his thumbprint on my palm sense the guarded movements while listening to slow jams that were not supposed to be for us. still can’t trust myself so i let go publicly while secretly holding his hand in my mind i memorized his thumbprint.

Tonight ...

...was hot!!! The poets were on fire...Lamar Hill was there and he performed a piece that made me cry (darn him)... I was unable to download my live recording, lol but it's okay, I made contacts, had fun and even was recruited for a new venue. I have a LOT of work to do starting with a collaboration with my poet friend Kia (hi Kia, waves wildly) Not sure if my producer will be proud, lol, but I sure hope so. He is so much more than a producer though. He is a mentor, teacher and friend. (waves to Kd, wildly) Note to self: Do not eat fish sammiches and drink liquor laden coffee before a performance...Ugh my stomach. Now I need to get to bed to rest. My granddaughter is coming in the afternoon and I am soooo amped. Peace, MM

Real Quick

Mickey is dead. I found him under a stuffed animal(zee zee) in my room. Thanks Nino. Bailey is standing guard where Mickey was last seen. I'm creeped out. Exterminators with traps are coming Tuesday.

Coraline and Mickey

Okay so "Coraline" is a really great film despite the appearance of "Mickey" in my home office. My screams sounded like Ms. Peacock from Clue and if you haven't seen that film, catch up, (it's all about the wit people.) Anyway Bailey was a hero and slept by my side while Nino was locked in the office to um…extinguish, Mickey. This morning I woke up and went into the office to grab the copy of "Coraline" (AGAIN GREAT FILM) to take back to the library and Nino was smug sitting under the desk, but there was no Mickey carcass. (This is not an Italian cat cuz Mickey woulda been dead and body parts woulda been arranged methodically around the candles on my bookshelf like an Catholic alter) But nonetheless, Nino was smug. (Could the Russian part of Nino have ate Mickey? Is that even possible?) My three biggest fears are Pigeons, Bridges and Rodents, followed by Reptiles but not so much, as a rogue iguana would never find it's way into my tub unless I lived in Mexico. I hope Mickey doesn't come back. Puts buttons over my eyes and pretends to enjoy it here (gotta see Coraline to appreciate) Peace, MM

Busy With Business

ok...networking is hard work...and i hate it...lol thank God for the street team i will be in the studio thursday and have a performance friday... i need to talk to my photographer...(lol this is SOOOO funny to me) so he can work on my album cover cuz i need business cards ASAP... all of this is humorous to me but exactly what i need... i am really proud of the way my daughter handles business; just because she is quiet about it, doesn't mean she can't get down... i am becoming a soup guru...cabbage stew with navy beans, who woulda thunk...ill keep you posted LMAO @ my son not adding me to myspace... PSA: WILL MY FANS THAT HAVE NOT YET CONFIRMED THEIR EMAILS WITH REVERBNATION PLEASE DO SO THANKS!!! i think that's it for now... peace, mm

Poetry and More...I am...

This a bunch of ramblings from the years end and now... ***************************************** thank GOD last year is over... the song "it kills me" by melanie fiona (did i get that right?) is quite possibly the WORST message a young lady could send out to young women...be for real...the relationship aint working out...you know he is cheating on you...he doesnt treat you right BUT you want to have his baby so you can be stuck with him for the next 18+ years...WHAT KINDA CRAP IS THAT????...Crap like that only happens in...well...damn OMAHA....LMAO i wish i woulda thought of that sooner....(inside joke) (clears throat...sorry i had a bad day and im out of newports) dont insult my intelligence, im brilliant enough to know you will eventually trip over the foot you have on my neck lying to me is a waste of YOUR time...just because i dont say ish...dont mean i know ish... i want to know how one wakes up one day and decides to play the harp...where does one go to school to play the harp...do people have their own personal harps and do they carry them around in harp cases...if not, does that mean you are playing with other people's harps...is that nasty? do harps hoard germs?...i wanna know... im sorry there is absolutely nothing sexy about a boy/man whining through his nose about how he invented sex...what happened to all of the male R&B singers with bass in their voices...everyone sounds like rhianna now -sixteen year old boys with sinus infections....DEATH TO AUDIO TONE!!!... im annoyed by people that have their nose so high in the air that they cant keep their eyes open to see that they are being played like a ...HARP... dont ask questions you really dont want the answers to in 2010 because i am not biting my tongue any more... there is a reason why i do not have a gun permit people...THINK ABOUT IT like the scorpion, i am only deadly when provoked...other than that i am the sweetest person in the world...really...i am...stop laughin...look just because i dont take crap anymore doesnt mean i aint sweet...im real sweet...stop laughin...for real... tinkerbell was so vindictive because she was too tiny to balance out her emotions of anger with compassion...i think that's what's wrong with me, seriously...there is too much emotion in this little compact space and i just erupt.... there is a poem about a hippy on the horizon...and i am proud...