This episode is brought to you by Lexar and their amazing 1800x gold series flash memory cards. If you would like people to pay more attention to your photos then you need to work on making them less boring. You don't do this by finding more interesting things to photograph but by photographing the things that are all around you in a more interesting way.  That is because those images are based around a single idea. The best way to catch someone's eye and have them actually spend more time looking at your photo is to in the first place create a picture that leaves that person in no doubt as to what that photograph is actually about. Look at these two pictures of cows right? One is quite clearly about the cow and the other is kind of less cow and more well cow and other random bits and bobs. Which one of these two communicated to you immediately what this photograph was about? So from now on ask yourself what is it why is it that you are taking this photo? What is it that you want to share with the person who might see it? You can do this at the most simple level by simply isolating the subject completely like in these Dan Winters photos or at the other extreme with a photographer like Fan Ho who worked with light and the people of Hong Kong. You don't really need to understand photography in any really great depth to know exactly what these photos are about. What was Fan Ho interested in and wanted to share with you? The opposite of a boring photograph isn't one that just kind of goes look at me look at me look at me right but it is a photo that elicits at least some sort of reaction in the person who's looking at it. The easiest way to get hold of this and understand this idea is to use your own photos to think about the photos that you also like looking at. When you were flicking through you know pages of a book or a website or walking through a gallery what was it about one picture one photo that arrested your attention? Why was it this photo and not the other one? To help you kind of get deeper into this and understand what it is about these things that caught your attention think about the pictures that you like right and when you started being interested in photos and stuff okay it was enough to kind of go I really like this picture it's pretty cool you know that's wicked and or I like the person who's in it and that was enough but now revisit some of those photos go a little bit deeper pull apart the the layers of the onion to try and figure out what has the photographer done what have they done to photograph this particular object this particular subject in a way that that isn't the obvious way this is the core thing that separates most interesting photos from those kind of average boring snapshots that are so easy to dismiss if you never go beyond taking the obvious photo then you are putting your images at a huge disadvantage it is all too easy to go out wander around with a camera see something pretty or unusual and just photograph it think how clever you are and then move on to the next picture the problem with this is that you are photographing that thing in the same way that many people have done before you even if you're not aware of it think about all those very famous landscape environments you know the ones we see day in and day out and they've been photographed by hundreds if not thousands of photographers a year now how long does it take you to look at these photos of the same subject photographed in the same way before you can be completely bored with them so if you want people to notice your photographs to spend a little bit more time on them instead of just flicking straight past them you need to go beyond the obvious you need to explore the subject take some time to you know photograph it from from different angles even just doing that you've gone beyond the run of the mill picture I photograph in what most people would consider to be very boring places you know this is the shopping center in burno I think if I seem to recall and this is a stairwell the other one is a gate at an airport when I was waiting to you know in Dublin going on a flight to very dull places and then there's this photograph of a giant star-spangled banner at Fort McHenry in Baltimore now how many tourists go there every day do you think and take a picture just of this big flag okay and and that's the obvious thing so in this picture and I'm not saying that it's an amazing photo because it's you know it's pretty average right but at least it's showing something different there's a bit of a sense of scale there's a bit of a depth to it there's a bit of context and placement we can see you know the skyscrapers of Baltimore in the background and that's all little bits that are starting to separate that photo from the boring obvious picture when you combine this with the idea that you learned earlier you know about having a single purpose in your photo it makes your image so much stronger and it's already starting to stand out from the crowd earlier we looked at the idea of the idea of having a purpose in your photo and that's the thing that's going to help catch people's attention what's going to keep their attention is composition of having a strong image that then invites the viewer to spend time you know exploring it have their eyes wander around now throughout this whole video you will have seen examples of strong images that have strong composition and you know people talk a lot about rules of composition of all these kind of things and there aren't as far as I'm concerned specifically rules there are more kind of suggestions you know much like when we talked about being inspired by other people's photographs as suggestions it's helpful to look at examples of a photographer who uses composition very very well and I did a whole video about Steve McCurry and his his awesome composition stuff which is a wonderful introduction to using composition your own photographs I'll link to it for you at the end of the video but know this the way that you can make somebody spend some more time is to throw them a curveball you know you don't have to always do the obvious thing in the composition you know change it up a bit have people half cut off and stuff just go a little bit off-piste and see what happens just feel free to explore as soon as you start exploring and playing with composition and not worrying about the rules then you are going to help make your photographs inherently more interesting to give you some inspiration to help you get past those obvious shots it is extremely beneficial for you to have influences that go beyond the quite possibly very narrow circles that you might find yourself in if you are in a photography club or a group online where everybody kind of does the same sort of photos then you'll find that you've all been referencing the same photographers and the same works that you like you know so it's almost this kind of very muddy thing so how original can you be if you're in that situation that's why you really need to get a bigger pool of inspiration that you can draw from that photograph the stairwell that we saw earlier now that idea comes from something that I saw in an Ezra Stoller photograph right I'm not copying it per se but I looked in that image the Ezra Stoller one and and it implanted somewhere so when I was confronted with something that felt similar I could take that idea as a springboard because it was there somewhere I remembered oh there's a sort of thing and and run with it so some of the photographers that I draw inspiration from come from such wide ranges of genres and it just goes to show you don't need to limit yourself specifically to the types of photos that you want to take as you start to find inspiration to seek out different ways of approaching your photos of using your camera in different ways you're going to come across an idea that is possibly one of the worst things that you can do when you are trying to make your photos more interesting so we're going to pay a couple of bills very quickly and a big thank you to Lexar and the new professional 1800x sdxc uhs-2 gold card series next week I'm going on holiday and I will be taking my cameras with me loaded up with the Lexar 1800x gold series cards in this case I've decided to go with the 256 gig card but they also come in 64 gig 128 and a whopping 512 gig capacity if I want to indulge in a little bit of sports photography or some wildlife action or if I'm feeling extra saucy maybe shooting in some 4k video for you guys then I can do that without worrying about buffers because the cards themselves have a right speed of up to 180 meg a second the cards are also designed for durability and I have been known to drop things to fall in puddles of water and in this case which is more likely subject my photos to multiple passes of x-rays and the Lexar cards are stress tested against all this stuff so I know that whatever I put into my photos the onto that card will still be waiting for me when I get home thank you once again for Lexar for sponsoring this video and for supporting the channel we live in a world where we have access to amazing tools awesome tools that can help us express our creativity in the digital environment the problem is that none of these presets none of these actions are going to create an interesting photograph from basically rubbish you might be familiar with that especially you know putting a lipstick on a pig and and well you know that's what happens when you try when you try and put stuff onto an inherently boring photograph in an effort to to spice it up if that photo doesn't have any clear purpose or you haven't done anything interesting with it originally or you haven't you haven't gone be the obvious it's not going to be sorted out by you know just chucking on a load of digital effects what does happen though when you do this is you end up making your photo look like everybody else's and and why would you do that why would you actually actively make your photo look like everyone else's by all means use digital effects by all means work the magic in the digital dark room but don't think that that by itself is going to make your photo look awesome it isn't true that there is good light and there is bad light there is just the way that you choose to use that light however what is true that there is light which is more forgiving more interesting and a hella lot easier to shoot in the golden hour is one such example you know that time of day when the sun's down low and it's all warm and beautiful and it's just looking awesome it's you know it's hard to take a bad photograph then but when you combine that feeling of the gold now with that single purpose with a composition that invites purpose look into the photo then you are so far ahead of the pack now remember you don't have to jump up and down you don't have to shout you just need to create some sort of interest in the viewer and that's when they will stop being boring that's when your photos rather than the viewer will stop being we can make boring viewers if we want that sort of thing but this is the whole point is that you are looking for tools that you have at your disposal and light is one of them to just elevate your pictures in some sort of way if you learn to spend time trying to photograph in different types of light then you can always find an interesting photo and stop blaming other things outside of that for the reason why your images are boring it's entirely possible that your photographs have become boring at least you think that they become boring because that the image that you have in your head is not translating into the photo that you see and you just need to reset something so when you put the ideas that have been in this video into practice that you go back to the basics you think about why why am i taking this photograph what is the message that i want to send not a deeper message but i won't say look at this is an interesting thing but i want to show you that interesting thing in an interesting way when you put all the other things into practice then you are getting a step closer to aligning the ideas that you have up here with the image that ends up with and it does take a little bit of time so don't be discouraged right even little changes will start to help you feel like you're getting away from those boring everyday obvious photos and just please bear in mind remember that you don't need to be creating masterpieces they don't need to be viral sensations these photos they just want to stand out a little bit from the crowd catch somebody's eye and when you start doing this consistently you are going to consign all those boring images to the dustbin having those ideas of composition to play with and put into your photographs is as i mentioned a great way to have them stand out this is the video that i talked about that features the wonderful work of Steve McCurry and we'll give you such inspiration on how to create and use awesome composition thank you ever so much for watching and i will see you again soon


All right, Michael, take it over. All right, thank you, Anissa. Good evening and welcome to the inaugural address of San Francisco's eighth poet laureate, Mr. Tongo Eisen Martin. Thank you all for being here for this very special occasion. I'm Michael Lambert, your city librarian. And I have the tremendous good fortune of partnering with our city's poet laureate and supporting his work through the San Francisco Public Library. I want to extend my sincere congratulations to Tongo on his appointment. But first, let me begin with a land acknowledgement. I want to welcome you to the unceded land of the Ohlone Tribal people. We acknowledge the many Ramaytush Ohlone Tribal groups and families as the rightful stewards of the lands on which we reside. The San Francisco Public Library is committed to uplifting the name of these lands and community members from these nations with whom we live together. And now it is my pleasure and distinct honor to introduce the honorable Mayor London Breed who will begin tonight's program. Madam Mayor. Thank you so much, Michael. And I am really thrilled to join you all this evening to introduce our newest poet laureate for the city and county of San Francisco, Tongo Eisen Martin. As some of you may already know, Tongo's poetry is renowned for how it fights for racial justice, equity and human rights. But what you may not know is his deep commitment to being a mentor, a role model for so many in our community. I've known Tongo since my days as the executive director at the African-American Art and Culture Complex where he served as an instructor for literary arts. He taught young men and women how to find their voices, how to use the arts, especially poetry, to make those voices heard. He showed young people that it was possible to find success as a poet, a possibility that had never actually seen real to some of them until they saw it personified in Tongo. I saw this with my own eyes the impact that this had on young people, especially young men in our community in the Western edition. So while I know his achievements and accomplishments have been recognized around the world, I am most proud of all that he has accomplished right here in our shared hometown. Our arts and culture are a key part of our city. They're a cornerstone of our values, of our diversity and inclusion, bridging the gaps between cultures and bringing us together to understand and embrace our differences. That is why we have worked to backfill the projected loss in hotel tax revenue that was funding dedicated to arts and culture programs. We created an arts relief program of $2.75 million to support working artists and arts and cultural organizations financially impacted by COVID-19. And we launched a guarantee income pilot program that is centered in equity to provide 130 artists with basic income for up to six months. I'm so excited to see our arts and culture rise from this pandemic stronger than ever before and to show how our young people and children, to show our young people and children that being an artist is a critically important profession, to show them that we are committed to supporting our artists because of how much they impact our communities in so many incredible positive and uplifting ways. With that being said, I know we're all excited to welcome tonight's host for his inaugural address as our city's poet laureate. Everyone, it gives me so much pleasure to welcome Tango Eisen Martin. Thank you very much, Madam Mayor and everybody who came, I'm blown away by the attendance here. Really only barely feel worthy of it. First, I have to say, Makaya Bryant. I have to say, Dante Wright. I have to say, Sean Monte Rosa. I have to say, Wumiabu Jamal. I have to say, Leonard Peltier. I have to say, Elaine Arkansas. I have to say, Ursula Detention Center. I have to say that Ronald Reagan was the inauguration of a corporateocracy that had me frisked before I got out of elementary school. I have to promise you that this isn't a poem. I want love and peace. I have to say that I'm a revolutionary. I have to say, settle your quarrels. If you let me tell it, I was a pretty internal child with an eye for the parallels of the world while being reared by the easygoing radical hurricanes of the city. Warriors at rest, licking their wounds from a hard 60s and 70s fight with the system. Raised by parking wreck directors, by deities of Bay Area hip hop, by functional dope addicts, by the suspended animation that was our pockets, tripwires laid between the blues and food, a good homeland for comedy. I was raised by collective memory, understanding that you can be the next Malcolm X if you let your neighbor live, understanding that ideologies are created by people as determined by their relationships to power, or your set of beliefs match your relationship to power, understanding that at some point, a cosmic reality seeps out of rundown people and to always look for poetry there. To be in this moment in San Francisco, Poa Gloria is an honor and a haunting. See me and see these ghosts. It's an honor and a plea that we reorient ourselves to a people's power. Make no mistake, we are in an epochal shift, a change in eras that is not even dressing down anymore. A lot of strange fruit in our breakfast bowls, a lot of counter-revolution replayed every night, and a death coat growing even more desensitized.  In this society, all emphasis is on the development of the system and not the development of the people, or should I say, not the complex revolutionary development of the people, the system. As all of these narratives, subplots, molecular life, bells and whistles, heroes and plot twists, raptures and reforms, as the richest character life of any stage play or movie you can imagine while the people are considered this super simplified mass of basic need and basic ambition. This inhibits us and stunts our humanization making us feel like we are not the most crucial factor in the synthesis of all social reality. The objective of the ruling class, turn us all into objects, or the walking flatlined when we come to life or enjoy a feeling of aliveness when doing an activity, job, function, even flexing a right that the ruling class prescribes all of which furthers their power. So we get the effect that all of this reality is being produced in a galaxy far away and in galaxies more relevant than ours, in our culture, in our potentials to organize and creates a tendency to cower in the face of the historical moves the power structure makes surrendering to what is presented as something that is not your human right to understand nor participate in. What poetry teaches us is that there is nothing, especially no whole pictures or greater social context that we cannot name for ourselves, and therefore there is no bigger picture that we cannot transform. Stephen Bico said, the most powerful weapon in the hand of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed. One of their most important psychological tools is to keep everyone selfish, keep everyone willing to suspend the humanity of others when necessary, keep everyone from experiencing the full range of their consciousness. We have to grow out of our individualism. I know individualism has even literally saved some of our lives, but we have to grow past it now. I know that joining in these ruling class agendas has saved some of our lives. I know we have found temporary dignity in their furious hegemonic imagination and suffering these illusions of footing or some kind of capitalism of color, history slowing down to the speed of our catchphrases about money and action call me crazy, but I don't want any role in this imperialism. It's time to move on. We have to forgive ourselves and grow into a revolutionary consciousness. We have to synthesize a better ideology. The project of analysis is where we enter as human beings bent on reabsorbing our powers to determine our humanity and determine our reality. Take a step towards revolution. It might take two steps towards you. Send this project where you will find me with my little poems. I wanted to make this inaugural address collective because when it comes down to it, I cannot tell where I actually individually begin and end. I'm an extension of and extend into the words, hearts, spirits and solidarities of these people who have shown up for me today, who have been showing up for me since the variety of cradles I have emerged from throughout my life. Steel doesn't have to sharpen steel. Sometimes it's a different matter. Sometimes it's just that steel reminds you that you are steel.  I could actually keep you all here all night. With dozens of people, I would surely be nothing without. The people both here and watching from our various strongholds are my entire strength, all my revolutionary commitment and have provided me the architectures of thought that I make music with today. Before I bring them up, I'm going to warm things up for them. You know, societies wander together like hopeful drops of a virus. Citizen testimonies have been all offering me a nation of breadwinners to hold me back like it's a brinks. I wrinkle the concrete sometimes like flesh. My Martin Luther King permanence turning away from a podium into the reads like God is the dangerous twin.  From the loyalty oath of their great superstitions, the loyalty oath of their great reforms. I mean, I return to my mother completely disrespected. For peeling the heat off of purgatory, they kill poets like me. Walk me away from my poems, never to be heard from again. In this final industrial complex of bloodlines, picked over, picked through a sporting spiritual depth that you devil at least half made, police become a pretty work. I'm reading a lynch my shoestrings like they were tea leaves teaching you how to write about cities. It's the 25th century in the mirror, people.  Cupid of needlework spell-tuned for the proletariat. The relapse ministry. Cupid of needlework with talented people curled up in a fetal position next to a diamond dine just another service day in the theatrics of tea house fascism and a bouquet of surveillance cameras in the poverty of God. New blue-eyes corpses of water, newly potted presidency of one big shiny coin if you ask an animated capitalism and other non-literal voids killing his white freedom. The deification of hyphens, medicine bread and picture shows, great protestors in LA, guests of our ink drop kicking roses in the graveyard DC mink like a stone torn in half the pen advances despite CIA guideposts despite not African passing futures. A metaphorical but not surreal day in the horn-written life, horn player improvising king. Like a radio prize fight feature in shongo himself, a real hand sweeps the land of racism. May I make progress with the gun? May I return to the ground? Our mother Emmanuel, you know they put on music that evening, a swinging type body language for you to drink with your fermented five dollar bills for your body language. Some applause my past stomach line and neither a good thing nor a bad thing like being psychic on the way to a lethal injection. It'll sit you down with Lady Day. Lady Day leading youth who surrendered their souls to Africa too soon. Pallity thought floating in the cup of water she saved me accessing my stomach, accessing the love of the American lynched. Coast leaves wooden avalanching to the wrist. Our mother Emmanuel avalanching to the sharp keys pain. The deal you make with pain. You know piano makes sense for them. Land hands on the world gradually. Adjusting to bend the necks on the streets of the North. Traveler sailing in pain, repeating pain in the North. Ten trigger fingers on that piano of harmony would have me. Hundred fights offered every direction. Lady Day leaning on trees again, recruiting the countryside itself saying lay your plan out on this lightning. Make your poems the corner pocket of men. I've greeted the blues itself. America may clean my dead body but will never include me. There goes the poet. Killing without killing. Never mind this painting of your language. May I be a meaningful lynching? A crow's passing. Good and dead by the afternoon. I go to the railroad tracks and follow them to the station of my enemies.  There are toddlers in the rock. I see why everyone out here got in the big cosmic basket. And why blood agreements mean a lot and why I get shot back at. I understand the psycho-spiritual refusal to write white history to take the glass freeway. White skin tattooed on my right forearm. Sewers near where I collapsed into a rat-infested manhood. My new existence is living graffiti in the kitchen with a lot of gun cylinders to hack up. House of God impart no cops and part of my body brings down to Christmas. The new bullets pray over blankets made from the old bullets. Pray over the 28th hour's next beauty mark. Extrajudicial confederate statute restoration in the waistband before the next protest post. Hey, by the way, time is not an illusion, your honor.   You're moving money again, your honor. It is only brain in one thing. Nine white cops and prison guard shadows reminded me of spoiled milk floating on a oil spill in a neighborhood making a lot of fuss over its demise in New Lake before a Black Panther party. Malcolm X's ballroom jacket slung over my son's shoulder, the figment of village. A new noose to a new white preacher all in an abstract painting of a president. They boss-lavered some time, didn't it? The tantric screeches of military boats in election Tuesday cars, the cold-blooded study in Lake Orange proved that some white people have actually found a noose. And sundown couples made their vows of love over opaque peach plastic in both action audiences. The Medgar ever second is definitely my favorite law of science. Founded news clippings and primitive methodists, my arm changes in periodisms. Simple policing versus structural frenzies, elementary school script versus even wider white spectrums, artless bleeding in the challenge of watching civilians thinking. Terrible rituals they have around the corner. They let their elders beg for public mercy. I'ma go ahead and sharpen these kids' heads in the air as myself and see how much gravy spills out of family crafts. Modern fans' award, well, well, with their t-shirt poems and t-shirt guilt and me having on the cheapest pair of shoes on the bus. I have no choice but to read the city walls for signs of my life. You know, apparently too much of San Francisco was not there in the first place. Now, this dream requires more condemned Africans to put another way, state violence rises down, or still life is just getting warmed up, or army life is looking for a new church and ignored all other suggestions, or folktale writers have not made up 10 minds as to who is gonna be their friends.  And I brought a cigarette everywhere. I'm taking many a walk to the back of a bus.  I left my watch on the public bathroom sink and took the toilet with me. Through it at the first bus I saw, eating single mothers half alive, it flew through the bus line number, then on out the front of the White House, they hopefully you find comfort downtown. But if not, we brought you enough cigarette filters to make a decent winter coat. A special species of handshake, let's all know who's king and what's the lifespan of uniform cloth? This cough needs to quit acting like those birds singing. Rusty nails have no wings, have no voice other than that of a white world down there, book pages in the gas pump. Catchy isn't it? The way three nooses is the rule, or the way potato sack masks go so well with radio calls, or the way condemned Africans fought their way back to the ocean. Only the fine waves made a 1920s burnt up piano parts, European backdoor deals and red flowers for widows who spent all day in the sun mumbling in San Francisco. Red flowers, but what's the color of a doctor visit? There are book titles in the streets, book titles like hero, you'd make a better zero, or hey, fur coat lady, the president is dead, or pay me back in children, or they hung up their bodies in their own museums, and other book titles pulled from a drum solo. Run here, hero, lie at the hiding place, all the bullets and 10 precincts know where to go. There's no heaven nor the other good idea in the sky. Politics means that people did it and people do it. Understand that when it's San Francisco and other places that was never really there. I bet this ocean thinks it's an ocean, but it's not. It's just sixth admission street. All know who's king, king of thin things.   You all call the neighborhood. No set of manners goes unpunished. Never mind the murderers, insomnia, or the tea kettle preparing everyone for police sirens. You know, a lot of God can happen in three seconds. Not much heaven though. Here's a man before a fight. Leave me a lone type character emerging from the penniless death of a one-way street fiction. This is a fancy way of saying I'm going to make it even if I have to drive backwards. All I have is court changes in a thousand backhands driving the street like I'm choking a car for the nephews. It hasn't been the sun since November and it hasn't been the street I can't choke to death. This city better back down. You see this gun on the table and something about staring until it all feels stable. Why would not protect everyone on my death sleep late? My son better be quick. My daughter better shoot first because we fall for no one. We fall for nothing. Okay. The first thing you'll feel is the heat. This lady would tell me, trying to tell me about possession. A drink life need is what I mostly hear. And most of the world leaves me alone to breathe small like a giant, to go to jail every once in a while when a genocide kicks up in late May. When politicians have too easy a time, I'm gassing back without a one-way street in honor of myself and in honor of you. If you understand the nature of the world, how long I've been just like my father when hell of a resemblance says the anxiety of the neighborhood. This is a crossroads or a crossroads narrative with so much crossroads, people getting the habit of turning back, turning back only to find themselves remembering me, but not my last words of man before a fight, to fill the heat. But there's nothing to keep in mind. There's nothing to remember. Really, there's nothing to be. It's just this moment and another, then stare, then it all becomes stable, then the table let's go fuzzy and Friday's the unfamiliar face peeking through the window. It's cool to pant it for a second. Composer is wasted on your worst enemies. People are marked on that sidewalk.  Everybody knows this in a wire hanger empire when the blood stops walking, that feeling isn't father enough to be permission to fold. You better swing one more time. That father of yours rose from the grave and said, just give me five more minutes. He said running water is a myth. It's us who are running up, down, and all alongside this water. And people don't rise from the grave. They're not laid down, neither.  It might be your time. You'll feel the heat. And when four walls demand to be four walls and the earth outside mutes don't panic. Don't try to recreate the earth outside. Don't tell jokes to yourself. Don't even talk disrespectfully to the four walls. Instead, unclench your fists and walk away. There might be heaven if you understand the nature of the world right on. Off goes one hat, on goes another. The first beautiful genius who I brought is the leader of us all, savior of us all, and just has never not provided me with 100 love. Beyond family, please give it up for Mahogany Brown. Wow, T. Yeah. You said it best in the chat. This is your poet laureate of San Francisco. This is probably the smartest decision our country has ever made San Francisco. Lead the path. Lead the way. I want to say something that I wrote for Tongos Nuba coming out because I believe this with my whole body, soul, my bone marrow. Not only is the San Francisco poet laureate a title. It's just a title unless you are willing to fight for people's freedom and Tongos poems are an archive of survival. They are a bridge. They do the profound work of serving in the clips of literary measure where the speaking rhyme and slant calling forward Medgar Evers or with the spirituality of an oppressed people. Tongo offers stanza after stanza as a sunrise, as a new beginning, as a revolution. In each of his poems, all of his work leads us towards liberation. I am so honored to read next to him. I'm so thankful that Washington was published with Black Frater Press. In this poem, I wrote Tonga was one of the first persons I had listened to it because he's the barometer. He's the barometer for am I doing this right? If you have that person in your life, give them their flowers and make sure that you send them good food or coffee. I was writing this piece years ago, months ago, COVID years, 10 years. So months ago in response to the numbers of those we lost to police brutality. And at that point, I think it was maybe 13 months, maybe 14. And the number of victims of police brutality was 1,407. And by the time I printed the poem, it was 1,408. And so the name of this poem is 1,407 ghosts all speak to number 45. He think he bad. He think he big and bad. He think he goon. He think he smirk and goon. He call us thugs. He call us everything but a child of God. A child of black sons.  A child of vassaline dipped faces. A child of knee on neck witnesses. A child of buried a baby with the bullet wound. He call us late for dinner.  A child of fire this time. A child of extinguisher for lunch. A child of fire next time. A child of turn the cheek.  A child of taxes cover his golf days but we prayed. We prayed. We prayed with the sage stick. We turned three times in a circle. We cursed at the corner. We called the ghosts back from the yard. We called them back from the sewer. We called them back from the Hudson. We called them back from the river. We called them back from the swamp. We called them back from the bay. We called them back from the basement of the White House. They barely got to rest anyway. And we asked them for a favor. We asked them for resilience. We begged them for the heat and the hunger. We bring them glass and beheaded mannequins. The white foam party looked like a crucible. We stopped the concrete and the Soho streets turned cooly. We fist to the sky and the grass turned to ash. If you keep your eyes peeled to the horizon. It looks like the lynching coming home to roost and look at him. Hiding in a bunker under a burning plantation. Tweeting about who knows what.  That's a cheap trick. That's an NRA snitch. They are dying breed. But we can't call it. We slept on the porch. We pissed near the bushes. We walked three quarters around the promise grave. We call him back to his aunt.  He tells us look, look, look at the spaceship. We tell him nah, look at our fists. Both boots on the ground. The ground vibrating a prayer. The masses massed up and blood sick. The virus of his legacy in the air. But we won't leave until the massacre is finished. No, we won't leave until his skin peels from his scalp and falls into his hands until his roll game pain loses. It's Luster and his children run from the flames. We ain't going nowhere. No, not even to pray for him. Not even to his funeral. This country is boiling over. The children all wear baggy clothes and spit hip hop lyrics during lunch. They are godlike and beautiful and his stomach turns over with envy. We tell him you lost the war. You lost the streets. You lost the cops. You losing sleep. Who got next? Who got next? Who got next? Who got now? Who got never? We are an echo of every name that's died under the guise of law and order. Count backwards with me. Bring the ghost back from the yard. 1,407. 1,406. 1,405. Since you've been in office. 1,404. 1,403. 1,402. Since you reminded us what America was built on. 1,401. 1,400. Where they protect a supermarket before they protect a black body. 1,399. The bones still slick on the side of your empty plate. 1,398. Shaking and quaking to the anthem on one knee. 1,397. You got us mansplaining a revolution. You got us white-splaining a movement. You want an action plan on how to be human. But we're not moving. We're not budging. Not until each and every soul is accounted for 1,396. 1,395. Not until each and every baby is accounted for 1,394. 1,393. Not until each and every victim is acknowledged. Their bail money returned. Their families account buckling over with reparations. We ain't going nowhere, bunker boy. 1,392. 1,391. 1,390. 1,389. 1,388. 1,387. 1,386. 1,385. 1,384. 1,383. 1,382. 1,381. 1,380. Congratulations, Tango. Speechless. Thank you so much, Mahogany. Before I bring the next person on, just wanted to send a special thank you to Janice Miricatani, Davor Majer and Kim Shekhor, or in attendance, former poet laureates who just gave so much and continue to give so much to not just poetry, but the potentials and well-being of the people. Really the only light to follow but next I wanted the participation of my co-founder of Black Frater Press, co-founder and director. She's the most special healer I've come across along the way. She's just had a profound transformative effect, not only on our work trying to put a people's press together, but just how I even spiritually carry myself or psychically carry myself. So one of the beautiful ones that is here, please show love to Allie Jones.  Thank you for having me here, Mo. I was over here screaming just now, just really honored to be in this space and share some words with y'all. Before I do that, though, I really just wanted to call us into a collective breath. Yeah, I feel like we've all been moving really fast, so just wherever you are, just take a deep breath in and let it out. I don't want to remember my life before mermaids. I was raised by saltwater queens, blessed by magical beings of mythic proportions, daughters of Yeme Ya and Gumbo, those who remind me of the beautiful resilience that lives within us, coiled crowns adorned with calorie, these goddesses maintain the grace of a gazelle with the ever-changing tides. Mais sirene, my mermaid queens, flowing, crashing, rising, my grandma Genevieve, cayenne pepper royalty, celestial matriarch soft yet steady as a metronome in the kitchen with a laugh that could brighten any dim room. I'm afraid of what is to come because her certainty is founded in love. Her setbacks created the beginning of her greatest comebacks, flowing through the roughest currents and remaining strong, flowing, crashing, rising. Mother Teresa, calming like rosemary and gentle as gardenias, earth warrior who taught me to respect and protect the earth, to value all forms of life, holding space for her softness and her offspring, unconditionally magical, conjuring potions that transform the flu into a slight sniffle or inventing the perfect bedtime story. She grew in the midst of adversity, never allowing fear to stop her pursuit, crashing against every judgment or expectation or determination, flowing, crashing, rising. Mais sirene, my mermaid queens, cousins who always reminded me that I could do anything, sisters that challenged me to seek softness in times of pain and trauma, to look at myself in a mirror untarnished by self-loathing, my aquatic angels who kept me sane when all I thought I could ever be was crazy, loving with our hearts wide open, guided by our gut feelings and our star signs, rêveur, croyons, amont, et guérir, dreamers, believers, lovers, and warriors, rising above black holes of insecurities, doubt, and fear, flowing, crashing, rising. Thank you. Congratulations, Tango. Man, this is difficult to experience and then have to come back to the surface to bring the next warrior on. I really appreciate you, Ali, and everyone who's shown up and we're just getting started. The next person I want to bring up is really, you know, has just been my big brother from day one. So much of the way I navigate a poem, the way I navigate a street, you know, he just taught me how to move around this universe and also taught me that you don't save anything for the swim back to shore. So without further ado, jive poetic. Yo, congratulations. Congratulations, Tango. Listen, if anybody has ever had a conversation with me about poetry, they know that I say Tango's name at least four or five times in a conversation. I don't think I've ever had a conversation and not mentioned his brother. He's been a good friend of mine for years and he's been one of my favorite poets. He still is and congratulations, brother. Well deserved. Yeah, I'm gonna do this piece and that's it. This is a warning from the bottom of a slave ship to all the indigenous people. Yeah, that's it. That's the intro. That's the whole intro. Arrowwack woman. My fear is this warning may never reach from my throat to the alarm of your intuition. For we share no language to express the danger your people face. They are not safe. They'll be ripped limbless.  Thank you very much everybody, big up large up tango, congratulations family, brother, friend, big up tango. That's my favorite poem of all time. The next poet actually, I want to introduce with what could have been, you know, an innocuous anecdote, but changed the course of my life. When I got to New York as a kid, I had a partner in crime, another young poet, and he was the first cat that took me down to the New Eureka and Poets Cafe, where I would, you know, receive this, you know, more than the education just, you know, participate in this lineage, one of the most beautiful poetry lineages ever facilitated. And so, you know, without, you know, without bouncing off of this new twin, you know, I would not have had, I wouldn't have had the relationship to craft that I would grow into.  So I'm really excited and honored to be able to introduce Anthony Morales. Yeah, my brother, peace and blessing to everybody who's here. Congratulations, congratulations, big up to the city of San Francisco for your ready. I mean, biggest and most liberating and free and poet, I know. So I mean, big bro, I mean, this is just the culmination of that journey when we was just running down to 236 East Thurstree between avenues, B and C and trying to just, you know, shake them bricks up. And we're still doing it. So peace and love to everybody and here we are. So from my son who gave me this poem, beyond beyond.  There's no gravity or light or love or whatever you need to survive. The limits of death is called a vet horizon. Now the other side to escape, you have to run fast and speed of light.  So then if you were ever trapped, no, you not because all you have to do is close eyes and expand at the speed of the universe stretching further than we can imagine. Cool, huh? What about when two black holes collide and what you hear in the vacuum sounds like a chirp. And listen right now, poppy. How many birds are singing all at once together as those two black holes smash and signals shooting stars sweep across the universe colliding results in a brand new galaxy and what? How many galaxies? Funny you ask. It's about 100 billion. Then why does cancer or Milky Way has maybe 400 billion stars and 200 billion plans, but that's nothing compared to IC 1101. That galaxy has 100 trillion as they ask that you can wish upon. A light is not that close 6 trillion miles away for us to walk there or even hop on the next space shuttle leaving that town would take about 37,200 years, leaving off a century or round up a decade. Did you get all that astronomy? This is why I love looking up at the stars. Be careful when lost. Find that North guy with divine direction. So then stare at my constellation glowed dark stickers on my ceiling. I invent a rocket that gives infinite life on our quest to reach the unknown while we float. One of these days we will arrive and how powerful we prayed a brand new planet to breathe and notice the breeze. Which way does the wind push the next step and how is the earth like your idea of a rubber band? Let's see if we can pull as fast as we can within this room in this house on this block in this hood in the city or state or country smallest grain of sand in the beach and spectrum of any cloud and then beyond. Don't worry so much. Enjoy all the moments. Be excited you are alive. If not, then no point in your resistance to gravitational force. Let all that air rise, not drown and maybe the answer to astral projection is the quantum leap of confidence in a dark matter existing whether you believe or not. Did you get all that knowledge you needed to know just in case a spaceship break the bad luck attached to your dome fascinating? We are so far from the edge of outer space but when we look up at those stars the twinkle is in our hearts anywhere in the cosmos. We are ready home beyond beyond. Thank you. Congrats big bro. Peace y'all. Right on. Right on. So the next person I'm bringing up is does not have a poem for you in the traditional sense but he makes music with his work and with the realities he holds nothing back from. Here's a cat. This is really when I think of San Francisco's finest. Here comes your dictionary picture. He must have found the 25th hour in the day of the week because he puts in the work of 100 people in San Francisco for the whole village. You'll find them with the youth, you'll find them with the elders and everybody in between.  So please give us a good word brother uncle Damian. My people, my people, my beautiful people. Can you hear me good? I got you. I got you. I'm going to make sure you hear me man because it's really important for the people on this platform to hear what I'm about to say. First of all it is my honor to even be in the same anything as the amazing, talented, delactical individuals that I've heard this evening. It is my honor, pleasure to be with you all. Let me say that. My name is Damian Posey. I'm affectionately known in the community as Uncle Damian. The People's Champ. That's not a name I gave myself. That's a name that the people gave me. I actually won an award at the Chicago from the Breakout Foundation for my work in the community. Now let me say, you know, some people like to call me a role model but I'm not a role model. I'm a real model. Like I go say it man, you know, I like to think, I never heard it like that man. The picture dictionary definition of San Francisco man, but my heart is here. I was born and raised here at General Hospital by a way of Bayview Double Rock, you know what I mean, to film mode. Blinch and Guard is material here. I've been all over, you know, but my story didn't start, you know, Picket Fencer, none of that. Y'all know how it is in the city man. No father, single mother had me. She was 16 years old. Did she have my sister? She was 18. So I was a man at the house at a young age and I made a lot of mistakes. I made a lot of mistakes because of, you know, lack of guidance, lack of leadership, and to keep it real because I'm loving this chat right here, man, because of systemic racism and, you know, lack of leadership and stuff of that nature and lack of individuals like our poet, like my guy, Tongo, you know what I mean? If I would have been able to hear those type of words when I was a young person, I know for a fact that my life may have taken a different route now. I feel like God set me through the journey that I went through so that I could be here where I am, but I know there's a lot of young people who don't need to go through that. The five shots I took, I've been shot five times. I did teen years in prison. I changed my life and I came back, man, to get back to my city, to show them what resilience really looks like. Not to show them to remind them because the people are already resilient. We already know that. And I spoke on the young people because I had the pleasure of bringing the man that we're honoring today to this place. Let me show y'all real quick because I'm in this place, you know what I mean? Y'all bear with me because I just came up out of there. He knows. You see that over there across the street? Let me get my finger right. Juvenile hall. God is here. I just came up out of there. I helped to facilitate a boys' group every Wednesday. We're just getting back because of COVID. They kicked us out for a year, but we kept fighting. We're not giving up. I mean, before COVID, I had the pleasure of bringing this young man in to speak to the young people. And let me tell you for real, and I'm not saying this because we own this. I don't know how many times young people I've seen in the juvenile hall and on the street have asked me about our poet. And I say our poet, you know what I mean? Because he belongs to all of us now. They didn't make him.  Not that he asked for it per se, but it was bestowed upon him just like the title of People's Champ was bestowed upon me.  Someone that I can call on when I need a good word. Some of that I can call on when I say, you know what? I got some young people that want to be poets. I need you to talk to them. I need you to mentor them. You know what Tongle says to me? No problem. Very busy man. A lot of responsibilities. Some, you know, in some circles, a superstar. Definitely in my circle he's a superstar, but not for one second has he ever hesitated, ever hesitated to get back to the community, always reaching out to me what you need. What can I do? Let me know. Man, this stuff is going on. I see it. What can I do? I see you out there. What can I do? And that's the humbling part about it, that people who are praise, who steal because I always ask, man, what can I do? What can I do for the people? Don't, you know what I mean? Titles and what I've done and what I'm doing. No, there's always something to do. There's always more that needs to be done because we live in a society who does not champion poets like you guys on here. And we need more of that. All of these should be on the radio just like they got the baby and all of the other people. God bless them. That's their poetry. But we need this too though, because I know a lot of young people look to you guys and see that. We also were together at Philip Burton and he did his thing, tore it down.  And he has no problem doing that. And that's a very rare skill. That is a very rare skill, man, that our brother has. And I'm so excited for him. And I'm so, I'm so happy for you, man. And I'm glad that you are getting this shine. And I'm glad because you know, you know how it is when somebody from the home team wins, like a real one, you know, he's been grinding as hard as really for the people and he with the people and he wins. Like, you know, your next door neighbor will win the lottery or something like that. You'll be happy for them. You'll be using money too, but you be happy for them because, you know, they're close to you. It can happen to you. And greatness is around you. And greatness is around us. Greatness is around us. And his name is Tongo, man. And once again, man, congratulations. Congratulations. And thank you so much for having me on this. You know what I mean? Because, you know, I do my thing. I've been blessed to travel around the world to speak, you know, I'm with Eric Thomas and Association, man, the biggest motivational speaker in the world. But this platform right here with you amazing poets and speakers is beyond almost anything that I've ever experienced. The stuff that I'm hearing, you know what I'm saying? From all of you guys, I just came out of there. Like, I just came out of there with young people who are fighting for their lives. Like, this is, this is not no joke. I don't want to get too deep. This is all a celebratory for Tongo, but he brought me on here and he told me to keep it real because I'm in these streets every day. You feel me? I fed three communities today. You might have seen me teamed up with Mobilized Love. Y'all can check me out, us for us, all at once. No plug, but y'all can check us out, usforus.barea and see what we are about. See what Tongo supports. Drops me off stuff, taps in with me all the time about what's going on in the community because I'm out here.  If you guys need anything, y'all tap in with me. Y'all tap in with Tongo and Tongo, you know you're my brother. And you know, as soon as I get to, okay, I need you back up here in the juvenile hall because we got a group of new individuals who need to hear you, who need to hear the way that you put it because I'll be talking and I'll take up this whole hour. You know what I mean? I get comfortable and we can talk this real talk about what's going on these streets with these police, this black on black violence, this Asian hate, all of that. I'm in the middle of all of it because that's what, you know, the mission God put for me. You know what I mean? Had me go to my journey for that. But there's some young people in there who need to hear you guys, who need to hear Tongo in here and out here on these streets in the community. So please, I encourage each and every one of you, I encourage each and every one of you to stick with your talent. Please, please keep pushing that love, keep, please keep pushing that truth. The way you do it, the way that you do it, the unique way that each and every one of you guys do it. Please do not stop with that talent. Please do not stop with that talent, man. I appreciate you and I love you. Congratulations, Tongo. We're gonna do some amazing things in the community for the people and with the people, man. If there's anything I could ever do to support you, you already know what's up with me, man. Peace and love. Let's go. That's right. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, brother. Much love. And I will see you in the trenches shortly. You already know.  You know, when I got back to San Francisco, got back to the Bay Area, you know, in a way, I started over in all categories of existence and she was right there with me.  So please give it up for Joyce Lee. Thank you, Tongo. I'm speechless with just everything happening tonight. And you know, I believe it's all just the beginning stuff. You know, this is all just the beginning for you. I'm super proud. I'm going to read y'all a few things I'm working on. And yeah, I won't stop to explain it. When soul music still had souls to snatch. When Lit was simple Saturday night with friends and records before Google. I dreamt of fulfillment in small neighborhood, big family. The only thing missing about old Oakland is the South. I watched struggle love, struggle black, struggle and poor and learned love there in struggle. Nothing is easy to me. Not even if the world applauds or bows at my wheel easy and easy.  When love slurred its allegiance to me with my grandfather's eyes so sincere sunken so as if seeing someone sinking aside a slave ship a salty feet and future love has always been you should listen to me. You should believe me. I am a black woman you cannot imagine dreaming from this angle the way I want I deserve. On bended knee praising apologies since the day before I created myself a secret swimming from my daddy's pleasure my granny already paid the world's entire debt. Bless me to be the one to bring the world the bill. I have rested a bit on the cotton pick.  Numerous nights I learned patience and pig fat salving bloodied white meat vertebrae thrashed gaping with the sick pleasures of others the hot piss of the church the tar and feather of this regime men of all hues trying to shove themselves inside of the moribund gashes in my back saying my skin beg for the extra slits otherwise why else would it rip so melodically for their pre-exonerated invasions many miles endured a parched endurance so long at love's feet in hopes to prove I too am most worthy at love's side I deserve to bathe in sensual tears to be loved without being conquered to be held while strong bended knee until bloodied if need be heart ripped from one's own rib cage in hand septum and full signum cruces before kissed and someone bowing or dying in allegiance to me I deserve sacrifice every sway must wink and not in this hell all and not yell in this tell all body where I am not lovely the most or myself as I shimmy and elfin revolt imagine I am white headed dancing burlesque is teaching me every old dirty trick how my beautiful black be injected in minstrel how blackface is still america's pornographic rage against nobility black ain't never been no pretty lady black just beautiful ugly enough to sex rape desire possessing and secret black is violent invisible offense close your eyes turn your head I am vulgar dripping wet and pure clapping everything except my hands permitting myself to ignore your idea of black our idea of beautiful throw me money or cotton while I show you the broad back both came from the cellulite thighs your grandfather cursed in pride the lips your sister paid for and then applause or not I'll dance to learn myself naked tango I love you I love you I love everybody on here thank you so much right on and again you all you all you all know how both beautiful and difficult it is to not just be I just want to be quiet and just sit with the power of everybody so forgive my I forgive my stuttering the next person now has has been with with me since the cradle um literally uh well first I should I should say the shout out to our mother you know for who who who who brought us into this brought us into this world you know in in all in all categories brought us into this world you know physiologically but politically spiritually um you know you're really just uh you're just looking at at an extension of really of her love um but now my my my brother uh uh Biko as in Martin I would like there's no there's there's not one there's not one second of me with without him there's not one grain of of anything that I that I am uh without him um you know I'm the most uh blessed human being in the world um to have you know to have this this this uh this water this water walker of a brother um with with me um just uh yeah there's there's no there's no way to there's no way to describe what it is to to grow up with the light you know so uh please everybody um uh show love to my brother Biko as in Martin tango could you uh put your face up for a second please just so I could see you somewhere tango tango told me I wasn't allowed to talk about him and I think I understand why because uh I wouldn't be able to say anything but I love you I love you so much and I'm proud of you I'm very proud of you um always and uh you know you know what time it is this is just another face time it's just another call but um uh man I just want to give it all to you brother I love you so much and and I thank you for everything that you've done that you're doing that you will do um to all the panelists you know I want to thank Anthony for for being his brother as soon as he touched down in New York I want to thank Jive and Mahogany for for being his family for for helping him grow up uh in New York um because I know he grew up out a lot out there I want to thank Joyce for for being his sister in words and just in life I want to thank Bamu if you want there just you know took us to our first poetry events you know um I got to thank all the elders on here I think I saw more on here before everybody uh just love everybody um so much and uh proud of everybody and everything that everybody is becoming and uh tango man you you you a soul survivor man you are the best of us and uh let me uh let me think about some words so I don't get uh you know caught up as as uh as it goes I quite armor said there are some of us who are remember us don't let history turn you to a gold digger father has many mansions but I ain't no house nigga many mansions ships and headquarters indeed dutch east india klu Klux Klan co until pro spilling the blood of the land the blood of my man's in them montse musa was spilling that blood too 12 000 and fetters forced to follow him as he slave drove to mecca whose ancestor is this whose ancestor is this who are you the breaker of the floodgates the flood the water contaminated by the world it drowns the child floating on his dead bloated mother's back until he is found healthy from breast milk but alone confidence of a king but no throne but that was a thousand stories ago when I read stars like letters I've taken too many words name too many stars change their names again and again like god's misplaced in the new world hovering around candles for heat ancestors ancestors drowning in rum and tobacco feeding them what they died over the chocolate they never knew cocoa up to their neck the arc of history a jar with rotten teeth a sugar fang in constant search for new soil as we scatter from our gardens like dead flowers popery for the grave site scavenging remnants studying the veins of dead leaves building dead houses out of dead trees trying to carve out a piece of what's been carved and carved over with dying dog fangs fighting over the gold montse musa dropped along his pilgrimage was it a pilgrimage for slaves or another long walk in the history of our displacement an invitation to our bodies from all who witnessed tracing Muhammad's steps Muhammad's armies over burnt villages when we were buried ancestors literally and figuratively in the name of their god we buried ours and if you didn't dig fast enough you died before your children children who had no idea who to pray who hadn't yet learned to perform your last rites we've been stuck in a performance of another kind what could be well with my soul my solar well they kill so these waters won't rise so the faces at the bottom stay scouring the bones and the precious metal between skeleton fingers to pay tribute to idols with their bridal still in our mother's jaws did we forget our bleeding mothers bruises on their face teeth marks on their nipple ropes burning the flesh around their waist every step they take a holy stare towards a crucifixion gogatha at the end of our journey as they carry us like crosses from cavalry to chicago as the world mocks them in scorn as we follow the men who have killed to control the gold killed to write the story poor flesh into molds now that the metal has run out poor stories into children with no past to rid them of the confidence to create a future pour their parents ashes into the sky so they never see the stars again i am a descendant of the slaves who marched behind monsimusa dreaming of cutting his throat who prayed at the rivers they knew would be dry soon who dreamed of me one day burning all empires to the ground there are some of us who are remember us the police celebrated chauvin's guilty verdict with a gunshot that left the 15 year old girl dead in the street memorializing the act of killing pumping blood into the veins of a giant that stomps from sea to shining sea the sun never sets on their trigger fingers the night gives no rest to our children i don't need to watch the news the gunpowder in the air tells the story the city is named after one of the most gory villains villains to give glory to white supremacy columbus ohio they call it full circle circle their bullets traveling time whizzing around the planet children falling before they can call their mothers my little sisters and brothers it took 400 years from columbus's arrival for the Haitian revolution to knock imperialists off the land where columbus stood it better not take us 400 years for us to revolt again to get these killer police off a stolen wetland where they murder children and go home to their children so they can grow old and kill our children again my little brothers and sisters i remember the first time with my brother i was accosted by the police i don't remember the second the tenth or the one hundredth can't tell you how many times i had to force my pride into my stomach face dirty on the concrete praying i'd make it through another search don't get used to that hurt swallowing your words it's like swallowing your teeth sharpen your mind until your bite is strong enough to take back these streets is going to take every one of you to turn history inside out to alter the trajectory of columbus's arrival to alter the trajectory of san francisco no trial will bring back the aloni no poem will bring back macaya brian the black jackabins defeated the french with self-love and machetes why they feared her with that knife i see azuli don'to dancing in the sky teaching spirits how to yield the sword before forming in their mother's wounds all wounds return as warriors saints no longer confused that christendom will never be christlike angels need the living to protect them to speak their names day and night another black few to destroy to keep columbus white to celebrate columbus in every life white supremacy will claim to remain on the throne leaving piles of bones on our corners for mothers to sort through because not every victim gets a new cycle just a new rifle while their killers parade meet me on the plantation we sharpen in blades the one macaya brian was holding is around my neck the one mario woods was holding i'll use that to carve our names in the cliffs of ocean beach they will remember the last three percent before they try to sweep us under history don't ask me why i'm wearing a pig's head on my head like the aloni war deer if you know you know either we grow or become bones 1492 has turned into a millennium but revolutionaries are perennial and it's time for black eyed peas it's time for another Haitian revolution with the whole diaspora up to speed put some revolutionary news in the air to read until the sun sets on the giant and our babies can sleep love you tango thank you love you too man and uh now y'all see where i get it from uh really i'm i'm i'm sitting here like yeah man it's something wrong with it now last uh last because he was um last because he was a beginning um this this cat there was i knew the last poets i knew sonny sanchez i knew gill sky here and the other you know prophets and then i didn't know uh i didn't know the the the modern application of of poetry um i hadn't seen it i i hadn't seen somebody walk on water and um and and mark by muti joseph um brought it all the way into this room right here that i that i'm that i'm speaking from um talk uh my brother and myself um how the imagination or your imagination is for lack of a better word to be imposed to to to to be um to to to be a crystal that everybody else can walk around in um in a in a in a in a way that i i never saw um art facilitated because we didn't know until we met him that art is to be facilitated spiritually art is to be facilitated from the the deepest um the deepest parts of your of your spirit um so closing this out um please uh please show love to mark by muti joseph what's up man okay first of all i'm like everybody else i can't believe what's going on i can't believe what's happening i just can't believe what's happening second i was laughing earlier at mahogany brown because she had to perform after tango and i was like but now i gotta do something after bica and like thanks bro appreciate that um third i want to say that tango isan martin just might be uh the greatest poet of our generation and that's really good but he is a very very good man and that's probably more important and he is a great man that's a product of uh an excellent woman i just want to say arlene isan i'm grateful to you i love you i love you and uh thank you for your sons okay uh so uh these are two poems uh i just i was just remembering what it was like in the beginning so these are kind of two poems that remind me of the beginning i love you tango i'm a gill scott craving and i'm starving 19 degrees in the sugar hill shade i got the heart sweats first minute post midnight viced breath burst staccato from my tar scarred chest each exhale a regrets a remorse code evaporating like a gravestone cold in the juju heat i'm a hailstorm chilled hate frozen in the shape of a needle mark trying to heal my broken heart a junkie walking through the twilight waving high to the noon in delirium all my salutations sound like eulogies to the future in memoriam temperature climbing this is the high life and i'm falling i poem on my addictions i rhyme these tracks i god my wishes i scroll i black i baron i crawl i'm calling collect from tomorrow i'm broke thanks wondering if you'll buy back this backpack of sorrow can i trade it for some snack i got a needle filled with black boy promise you can borrow if you can stomach the fucked up ways it makes you act all the fucked up things it makes you say all of our healers have been killed or betrayed and ate nobody fighting because nobody knows what to save wait wait wait i am so lonely in the ever-changing sameness of this high a piece of a dream looking for a place to sleep in the speech of a wasted man lord have you ever tried to turn your sick soul inside out i am craving and in my starving i have nowhere to turn but gill scott's mouth millennial whispers apocalyptic shouts harlem west riverside gill scott heron on my mind i think how we all just watched him die so culturally immune to our own slow long suicide so ashamed of our inability to rehabilitate him so germane to a culture of disposable and numb i ask a junkie about environment he speaks to me of gill scott of winter in new york of the birth of hip hop of active neglect of knowing that what you're doing is killing the body it's unsustainable placing limits on your own future but so fucking turned on by death so turned on you lay your head on its chest i can feel the city breathing chest even in the beginning there is death a spirit sheds and becomes light after life after glow all love that was wonderful really but chapter closed there will be mourning among the still human clothed souls the rest will experience an orgy of the infinite after death when life begins to function in poly dimension we die to become love in every direction the appetite for something more adventurous than a straight line time is running a race and space is losing the infinite balanced on whisper thin string strong loose minutes marionette like strange fruit the puppeteer is paradox pulling tight like light being sucked into a fat black pandora's box life bends at the knees begs death to hold off pleas but when life succumbs it's like when the wave learns that it is the ocean when the ray of light decides to leave the sun the pre dawn first blush of the not yet morning when the night and the day are one all one not the moment of death the moment after when angels wings ascend her from the fall of a gun blast pick them up before his body breathes its last the spirit detaches before the fall and the spirit becomes one with all their unified theory like the union of orgasmic bodies traveling in something infinitely more sensitive than flesh life is death as a vision as a lived permission inception of an intuition of what to cosmically expect life is just a set of lips to whisper born to kiss our names back to the wind so our spirit might hear it and vibrate amidst for incarnate and back again reciprocal energy spirit and flesh time and space are running a race to the infinite and in just a minute time is going to run out of space in which case both time and space will cease these words rolling off my tongue the first breath of after death in my lungs after life i just go back to where i came from after glow light and smoke man i've been running for a high like this all my natural born life thank you for including me tango i love you brother i love love you and love uh man love love my whole family here both on this side that side all sides um that's all folks uh from uh from from me and mine to you hold on hold on drop a thousand hearts in the comments for tango drop a thousand fire all of that thank you i appreciate you all the the chat river is on fire tonight friends and tango we want to thank you so much and we want to thank everyone else for joining us for this collective inaugural dress amazing um everyone was just amazing and powerful tonight we want to thank our partners the friends of the san francisco public library city lights books lick wake for their support in this event and you can rewatch this event and these amazing poets on our youtube channel and tango we'll be back with us many times but really soon next week the 28th in conversation with hanif abduquip for his new book um a little devil in america a celebration of black performance cultures and communities in the united states and that's a partnership with moab so please join us then and i wish we could all unmute attend a panelist you can definitely all unmute and give the love and the love is flow big up big up big up big up hurry hurry hurry hurry hurry hey peace and blessings peace and blessings