Grade 6 (Notebook Version)

Imagine, you're in an African country you've never been in before and you've just walked into your first classroom as a teacher. 
The Principal introduces you to the wild eyes of thirty five children as "a young man from England".

A boy, sitting at the back of the room, eyes like a lion cub throws his voice at you. 

He tells you he supports Man United. You try to find common ground by telling the class you are an Arsenal fan.

The whole class jeers and secretly, you congratulate yourself for turning them against you already.

When the class settles you are pulled aside by the Principal who has this to say...

See that girl sitting with her head on her desk?

Her mother died of Aids when she was born.

She has it too. Some of the children know.

Every day those children ask her why isn’t she bleeding.

They don’t understand how she has Aids and still looks like them.

Matthew, the boy who sits two rows from the back,

he broke two of the seventeen windows

that were smashed here last week.

His mother came to school with a bat that day.

This is a Primary School, Malik is fourteen years old,

repeated the sixth grade three times.

 his father had three wives at the same time before he had a stroke.

Now Malik's in a Home, the boy can’t sit still. 
He feels his whole life in his stomach,

we all have to pretend he isn’t ill.

You’ve got to talk to David. He’s the boy by the window,

he’s from the Congo. You’ll see him climbing trees in the playground.

His mother said he takes all the blankets at home and sleeps on the roof.

His world has its own sky.

The girl with the pink hair band, that’s Kim.

She never does her work, she just wants to draw.

See drew all the mountains on the wall,

She won’t get that far if it’s all she can do.

A cartoon is not a career path.

This week the children have been drawing diagrams of our solar system
Show them, show them how to colour in their planet.

Here is the Spoken Word Version of this piece.

South Africa. The First Shots.

Conversation With A South African Taxi Driver

Traffic Lights? My friend, you are in Africa. They are called Robots. When they turn green, still you cannot trust. No road wants you to get too comfortable. There are drunk drivers and many deaths, mostly pedestrians. Life eh? Cross one road badly and your whole life knocked away. Look out on your left. See how the waves rise out the sea like white horses and crash to the yellow rocks? That says Africa is a woman, only women have that much colour in their fury. You know I'm Muslim, a good Muslim. I do not drink. Many Muslims learn Islam through other idealistic Muslims instead of Islam itself. Like the women who are not allowed to drive in Saudi Arabia, I do not know where that comes from but it's not from Islam. Islam is not strict, it offers many choices. You’re an atheist? Is that the name of your God? OK, we're here. Great to meet you today Ray, take my number. I can come when the morning gets up tomorrow. Call it nine fifteen, Africa time, you might call it 11. OK Ray? See you at nine fifteen.

South Africa/ NHS/ Autumn Photography

I was packing for my trip to South Africa and decided not to pack any music, just basic clothes, camera and books. I realised a lot of my memories abroad involve me walking around strange places with headphones. I can’t tell you the sound of these places but it definitely isn’t soft rock or indie rap.


South Africa – Where, What & Why?

From November fifth I’ll be living and working in the outskirts of Cape Town in a place called Belthom. I’m going to be assisting teachers in a Primary School, using poetry to help teach English. I’ll also be working at The Woodside Special Care Centre working with orphans and children with disabilities.

One of the best things I’ve done with my life so far has been working with children in special needs camps in Ohio, USA, followed by road tripping across North America on my own. I met many people in different cities and suburbs, I felt how different states are like different countries, I understood how so many great people have come out of a country that represents freedom to its people and imperialism, slavery or Hollywood to the rest of the world.

I’ve been eager to experience something like this again and chose South Africa because of my own curiosities of the culture and political history. I’ve read and heard about the Dutch and British colonization, the Zulu wars, the spice trade, the Boer Wars, Apartheid and Nelson Mandela’s long walk to freedom. I’ve met many white South Africans in London and listened to their rants about the inequity of blacks against whites and how the political transition from Apartheid processed too hastily. They’ve told me this has created new tensions between “black, white and coloured people”.

In many ways we should all change the way we think about Africa, its history began thousands of years before European invasion yet it seems to be where we all start with our understanding. Myself included. Why is this important you may ask? Well, we all came from Africa so we’d be more in touch with our origins as human beings. The exploitation of Africa has made many European Empires and has now helped make China perhaps the most powerful country in the new century.

On Race

I’m curious to see how people will respond to me in a country with such high (on-going) racial tensions. As someone of mixed heritage (Caribbean/British if you want the box) I feel I represent the togetherness of two very different cultures. The identity crises/confusion that comes with the mixed race experience is something inflicted by a culture that can’t get rid of its colour lines. People all over the world give you different labels (white, black, mixed race, bi-racial, coloured etc) so the confusion of other people is inflicted onto you.

I struggled with this throughout my school years but meeting other mixed race people and discussing the experience with them helped me to make sense of it. I now celebrate the ambiguity of my appearance and I want to invite the whole world to the party! 


Conversation With A Doctor

I went to the travel Clinic after the NHS told me I had to book six weeks in advance for free treatment. At the clinic I paid £75 for three injections to keep me protected in Africa (Hepatitis A, Typhoid Fever & Polio).

The doctor who gave me the jabs ranted to me about the NHS cuts and the new procedures that are being phased in.

I’ve been a doctor thirty years, so I’m glad I’m coming to the end of my career. It’s terrible now. The new doctors and GPs are being trained to prescribe the lowest costing medicine as opposed to the most effective, it’s a disgrace. You’re my eleventh patient today, you see more people travelling from the UK are getting Malaria and Yellow Fever because the dangers aren’t emphasised enough and people are inconvenienced in getting treated…

Five minutes after he’d injected my upper left arm I passed out in the middle of this conversation. My vision went a fuzzy pale grey then completely black. I came though and I was on the floor with the doctor’s panic stricken face over me. I had no idea what happened. It was like when you skip a scene on a DVD and you know you’ve missed something so you ask someone to fill you in.

Me - Woah. What happened?

Doctor - You passed out buddy; I can feel you’re burning up! I’ll get you water. NURSE!

I found out later that because I have low blood pressure I should always be laying down when receiving injections.

Autumn Photography (Shadow Experiments)

In the UK the season is changing from Autumn into Winter. South Africa is coming into its summer so that's another reason for me to to jet pack. For you people staying put there is beauty in the cold seasons. The first picture below was taken by myself in London Fields on a late monday afternoon and the picture below that was taken on Tottenham Court Road one cold November night.

Farewell London.

Performance at Brizzlemania (On Loneliness)

This is a poem I wrote one night while on tour in Chicago. I was trying to figure out if I was feeling lonely or if I was feeling sorry for myself. After a conversation about this I realised how reluctant I was to allow myself to feel lonely so I just let it be and wrote this.

(Excuse the sound of the waitress walking around the room collecting empty glasses off the tables)

Do not ask me if I'm lonely,

I will not know how to answer.

Mum says I came out her womb,
screaming like I was wounded
until I was put in her arms.

Do not ask me if I'm lonely.

Writers talk about owning their own loneliness,
but I think its just something they say to the walls.

I get mad at time, at times
because it can't give me any more of my childhood.

At times,
all I can taste are the spaces
sore between my broken teeth,

at times,
I see old lovers under falling snow
in yellow summer dresses,
looking like a warm place to escape to.

Grandma says
its amazing what we keep in our brains,
some we want, some we don't want.

This is the darkest place inside me,
I walk in, turn on the night and watch what disappears,
do not ask me if I'm lonely.

I do not know if loneliness is an injury.

I was afraid to learn this poem by heart
because of what it might do to my heart.

I sit with my loneliness and we both agree,
we like each others company,
but only when we know what to do,
with each other.

Breaking Silence by Jacob Sam La Rose & Strange Light by Derrick Brown

This is Jacob Sam La Rose's first full collection believe it or not but it's worth the wait as its published by the leading publisher of poetry, 'Blood Axe'. Jacob is a key figure in the UK poetry world as a performer and writer. I caught up with him for a chat about his thoughts on Slam Poetry and why there is a divide between poetry on the page and poetry on the stage.

Listen Here

This is the forth collection of poetry from US poet Derrick Brown. Derrick Brown is an ex-weatherman, failed magician and paratrooper turned poet. He runs his own publishing house (Write Bloody) and is a key figure in bringing some of the biggest names in performance poetry (such as Buddy Wakefield, Anis Mojgani, Andrea Gibson etc) to the page. I caught up with him in Boardway Market, Hackney for a Boar Burger and a chat about travelling, performing and getting older.

Listen Here

These interviews are episodes from 'The Punch & Gumption Podcast', run by myself and William Stopha.

Subscribe to hear more from UK poets such as Polarbear, Hollie Mcnish, Inua Ellams, US poets such as Emily Rose, Robb Q Telfer and German poets such as Sebastian 23 & Lars Rupple etc.

Here's a video of Derrick at last months Keats House Forum run by myself and Simon Mole.

Operation : You

A thousand miniature versions of me are wearing masks of your face.

They stand at machines behind dirty factory walls,

listening to your telephone voice on the PA system.

Film Recommendations & A Week In Pictures.

Dizraeli's mind-blowing set at Chill Pill.

      A woman shows me her favourite poems at The Stratford Unitarian Church.

  We showed up & rocked Royal Holloway Uni until I collapsed with Flu Symptoms. 

                                                          Poeticat also rocked Chill Pill. 

I can now brag about my ability to cook a traditional Jamaican dish of Ackee & Salt Fish.

Apparently you should know this.

                             

Lastly you should check out these films.

A Capitalist At Dinner by Claude Mckay

In honor of all the people who are currently occupying London’s Stock Exchange, Wall Street and other significant locations in Rome, Vancouver, Oslo , Sydney, Tokyo, Brussels, Amsterdam, Madrid, Athens, Frankfurt, Stockholm, Hong Kong, Seoul, Taipei, Zurich etc. 

As part of the Occupy Movement/Protests I give you this poem by Jamaican poet Claude Mckay.

An ugly figure, heavy, overfed,

-Settles uneasily into a chair;

Nervously he mops his pimply pink bald head

Frowns at the fawning waiter standing near

The entire service tries its best to please

This overpampered piece of broken health

Who sits there thoughtlees, querulous, and obese

Wrapped in his sordid visions of vast wealth

Great God! if creatures like this money-fool

Who hold the service of mankind so cheap,

Over the people must forever rule,

Driving them at their will like helpless sheep-

Then let proud mothers cease from giving birth;

Let human beings perish from the earth.

This poem was written in 1919.

Oct 13th Dream Journal Entry / Conversation With A Woman At A Train Station

There is a particular road that keeps showing up in my dreams. It’s on the side of a hill and it swirls around it. The road is paved with cream colour stones. A row of red bricked houses runs along both sides of the road but I’ve never seen any people. I always pass the road on a double-decker bus. I sit on the left hand side on the top deck and peer out the window onto it.

As soon as I see this road I know I’m dreaming.

Most of my dreams involve some form of transportation. I’ve steered a huge wooden ship through a sleepy ocean, I’ve been a passenger on a plane (in-aisle-eight) and I’ve gone on road trips across deserts with talking coffee cups. But usually I’m either on a train or waiting for one.

I wonder why there are so many transportation services in my dreams when I have the ability to teleport.

Last night I dreamt I was on a platform of an old fashioned train station. The railway tracks were made of rusted steel and thick brown wood which ran across a sea of black pebbles.

I sat on the gravel floor of the platform next to an old woman in a baggy red coat. We were the only people around. The wrinkles in her face were thick like lightning bolts stuck in the sky. We started talking but every time I asked for either her name or what she does for a living her voice and the weather would distort.

This is what she said.

Should’da got a taxi. My father drove a taxi. He used to grow peppermint in the front seat and apricots in the back. He loved nature but hated cyclists. The sky kept falling into his hair. He was full of electricity and if it came with a bill my mother was paying it. The world could have turned off and my mother would have stayed on. She didn’t die, she just stopped running. She walked out of her body for a cigarette and didn’t come back. At the funeral my father said we were sharing a house with too much fire. I only wore red from then on; I was trying to show my father what it felt like to look like him. That’s why I didn’t get a taxi I guess, I might have had to sit in the back seat with apricots.