Taalam Acey Until 6am or Whenever You Leave

THE "STATE" OF SPOKEN WORD (Bluntly thinking out loud)

2015-09-11T14:34:00.002-07:00

First off, please note that this is a request for your insight. I frequently write in a didactic tone which leads people to believe I am set in my ways. Quite often, I am not convinced I have the answer. Any feedback you have to offer here would be helpful.

Also take into consideration while reading this that rarely did promoters, at any point in my spoken word career, fully cover my expenses. My entire P&L was generally covered (or determined) by the listeners. An unbelievable amount of support from attendees in the form of product sales usually paid for the travel, lodging and made it profitable or at least feasible, after the fact. There were also those, other than the promoters, along the way who provided couches, meals and transportation solely for love of the art form. And, I am not prone to blame promoters. I attempted to accommodate the fact that they were often working with paper thin margins.

Over a decade and a half, while the admission prices to poetry venues and hotel room rates have remained static, the cost of trains and flights tripled and quadrupled. Additionally poetry CDs became an irritant and a suspicious, superfluous commodity akin in many circles to outright begging rather than the on offer to invest in a novel, valued collectors' item as they were considered ten and fifteen years prior. In many markets, selling poetry CDs devolved into a semi-hostile endeavor. One of the last traveling poets I talked to had switched to selling t-shirts and selfie sticks.

It eventually came to pass that the expenses related to sharing my work at any given venue was 3 to 5 times the amount the promoters could (or would) offer which meant I had to sponsor my own performances. Whimsically performing anywhere and everywhere in that climate could deplete nearly any war chest and possibly be economically ruinous; especially for someone who shared the responsibilities for three children.

Even as the glory days were waning, the availability of college shows which had previously been counted on to subsidize open mic appearances and normalize income streams had changed dramatically. Colleges stopped depending on a poet's pedigree and started using other criteria. For example, whether or not one appeared on a television show (with a hot poem, rather than a hot set) could formulate the sole barrier to entry regardless of whether the poet had successfully performed at dozens of colleges prior (including the college in question). This brought in poets who (1) were willing to perform for a fraction of the previous standard fee range and (2) could not effectively hold down an 60-90 minute set. From there, the college organizations began to wonder why they shouldn't just utilize their own talented pools of student spoken word artists and, at that point, college shows became harder to come by and far less effective as an open mic subsidy or income stream smoother.

It may be most important to mention that I am raising a man child here in Los Angeles and it is sacrosanct that he see me most every school morning and night of his young life. Likewise, today when I choose (or agree) to feature somewhere, it is imperative that it be sparse and I am decidedly driven to do so.

Due to the previously stated reasoning (which you are free to challenge), most people who have seen my work in the past will never have the opportunity to see me live again (or, perhaps more accurately, I will never have the fortune of sharing my work live with them again). It mostly depends on where they are and how far they're willing to travel. For instance, many people told me that they flew in from different parts of the country for last weekend's Fly Poet event and I do not foresee a time when John Flypoet Hensley and I will cease to collaborate. I also live in Los Angeles, so though I am emphatic about featuring very rarely while residing here, I may pop up to share a poem or two nearly anywhere that feels authentic. Thus LA, and by extension Long Beach and San Diego, are covered.

There are many places where I may not have the opportunity to return much going forward, if ever at all. I cannot say which places. I do not know. Providence will sort that out. What I do know, is it is likely to be the majority of places I have been.

There are cities where I may always get to share my work. For example, as long as my Brother Li Fe Malcolm holds events in Tampa. Similarly,Salim Adofo and the National Black United Front will always be able to draw me to DC. I also suppose I will visit Alex Jerome Lofton and his crowd in Alabama once every year or two.

Newark, NY, Baltimore and Philadelphia (thus Wilmington) are guaranteed to see me because, even beyond the fact that I have many close friends in those places; and even though the poetry scene in B-more seems to be a bit precarious at the moment; I have enough infrastructure in each place that it is not mandatory to book a show to feature. I could simply lease a hotel ballroom or a theater and organize an event (which is likely to be my primary paradigm soon anyway). In fact, I have self-promoted similar events in each of the aforementioned places that have attracted hundreds of people. Thus they are self contained. I have done the same in LA as well, but John Flypoet Hensley does it better here. In summary, every city mentioned in this paragraph is likely to see me share my work until the bitter end.

My entrenched friendship with the Moore brothers: Terry Moore and (near brotherhood with his brother) Khiry Malik likely guarantees that I will share my work in Sacramento at least once per year. I recently flew there twice in an 8 day period to feature for each of them. Different personalities. Different crowds.

There are places where I have deep, irreplaceable friendships such as New Orleans, Detroit and Miami that do not necessarily translate into the likelihood that I will continue to have the opportunity to perform in those places that I love so much. Still, there is no doubt that I will nevertheless continue to visit my friends there.

Still, I would like to point out that in regards to New Orleans, I am hopefulGreer Goff Mendy (the dancer/choreographer from that "She Conjurez" slideshow) will include me in a show of hers every year or two. The one event I did with her two or three years ago was spiritual, groundbreaking and exhilarating. I would also think that if May Reign or Tracy Anomaly Sumpter chose they could suggest an MIA venue every once in a while or perhaps I will continue to be invited there annually by Alisa Hamilton who is a professional of the highest order.

I love Chicago a great deal (for many years I considered it my absolute favorite city in the world) and regret that I never built up the sort of rapport there as I did in the Northeast. That is, of course, on me. I imagine I will get to share my work there from time to time because many of my Chicago friends and acquaintances (such as Paulette Stinson, Blaq Ice, Armand Armen Rah McWilliams, Corey Walden, Odyssey Lewis/Moe-Mentum Garrett II and Maurice Creativethebarber Scott) tend to also throw poetry events. But again, the uncertainty stems from the fact that I never really built up the infrastructure there to support my own independent events, so the likelihood of sharing my work in Chicago remains predicated outside of myself. I could organize an independent event in Chicago but because of what I failed to do in the past, it would require more resources than I am willing to apportion at this time.

Atlanta has always been a delicate situation for me. I would consider nearly every popular poet in that city to be a personal friend. In fact,Derrick Abyss Graham makes me laugh so hard when we've talked that I have quasi-avoided talking to him for years. It's well known that Bethsheba A. Rem and Tamika Harper are like sisters to me and I could go on to explain my relationships with at least a half dozen others: Cola Rum, Red Storm (a Chi transplant), Sean Shewmake, Jon Goode, Christopher 'Cocktails' Cornell and quite a few more. Nevertheless, I have gone periods of many years without performing in Atlanta. My appearances there have always been more sporadic than anywhere else. I have never really felt a pull to it's viscera as if my work is less lucid there than any place else. Nevertheless, I have and will persist to be grateful for opportunities that arise in Atlanta.

In, St. Louis, for example, I feel as though there are many people who would love to see me again (and I would LOVE to see them). There is a level of comfort I have felt in St. Louis, a pull to the listeners' innards, that is exclusive to that place, but I never took the time to organize my relationships there correctly. The same could be said of the SF Bay/Oakland (Yay) area which used to be my second home and which I still appreciate greatly yet when it comes to poetry it feels a bit anachronistic like trying to visit a former neighborhood. You always want to go back.

I have never had the occasion to share my work in Las Vegas.

I will resist the temptation to detail this city by city even though every city conjures a different recollection and reasoning. There is no telling when (or if) I'll show up in New Haven, Richmond, Indianapolis, Cleveland, Phoenix, Hartford, Milwaukee, Boston (thus Springfield), Minneapolis, Denver, Cincinnati, Seattle, Vancouver, Toledo, Nashville, Pittsburgh, Columbus, Providence or Portland again. One thing is for sure. It will be random (as in, I do not know which I will see again and which I won't). It's interesting that you can trace my relationship to performing in some of those places to periods when my friend Edward P Mabrey Jr. lived in or near them.

To reiterate, it is likely that I will never see most of the cities in the above paragraph going forward (well, I'm likely to pop up in Richmond every once in a while, just because). This is notwithstanding the fact that I enjoyed my time in each and have so many rich experiences and stories surrounding them.

And what of London, Toronto, Germany, Austria and Holland? There are people extremely important to me in London, so I will certainly be back there. I'm just not certain if sharing my work will play a part. If past history is any indication, Dwayne Morgan will bring me to Toronto every few years or so. As for the others, it's anyone's guess. My last trip to Germany may have precluded any further invitations (ask me about that when you see me.) Nevertheless, I am grateful for the beautiful experiences I have had there. And perhaps, in future years, Isabella Isilistening Schrammel will bring me back to Austria and/or Babs Franklin Gons or Sasha Dees will bring me back to Holland.

Texas is an animal unto itself in that I can almost guarantee that I will be there many times per year. I have very close friends in Dallas, Houston, Austin and Killeen (and btw, performing in San Antonio for Kinton Armmer's crowd is a memorable experience every gifted spoken word artist should enjoy). Texas is a big state and I can't say exactly where I will be and whether or not I will perform when I am there. Actually, Ohio might be a similar situation. I'll be there. It's just not clear which city and whether or not I will be performing.

In closing, much of what I've said above could change just by nature of your insight. Nor was anything stated above intended to be offensive; only honest. There's no way I could have possibly considered all the variables and I do not purport to have the final answers in regard to any of this. Furthermore, my circumstances could change drastically in the weeks to come and cause me to reconsider these conclusions. What are your thoughts?

-taalam acey
9/11/2015
Los Angeles

Taalam Acey - "Willie Lynch, LLC" | All Def Poetry x Da Poetry Lounge

2015-08-18T13:48:00.001-07:00

(the words to the poem are followed by a brief essay below)

Willie Lynch, LLC
-Taalam Acey ©2015
(Share as you see fit. Each one teach one)

In these times of poor somewhat righteous poets
and completely coopted Manchurian emcees.
Where your favorite poet is probably all too familiar with Top Ramen
and your favorite rapper’s owner still obligates him
to get back on his knees,
shit be happenin’.
And, when poets act like rock stars we call those
false prophets
And, when rappers act like they’re getting
far more money than they are we call those
false profits.
And, Willie Lynch, LLC
needs emcees
who could be
envied
by BGs
so if you wanna See Gs
they’re willing to put you out
as long as you’re willing to let them turn you out.
Be ‘bout that time tested
destroy our youth
focus group
propagandized company message:
Dear Children,
The key to your success is
in doing anything you could think of
that might possibly get you arrested.
It ain’t about hard work. No!
Stay high.
Stay drunk.
Be disrespectful .
Assault people.
Tote weapons.
Family, Willie Lynch, LLC
has mastered the essence of making sure
most will never be everything they can be.
They attack the weak;
tell’em there’s this savage inside you called a “N#gga”
and it’s just dying to be free.
Then Willie tells it’s cadre of contractor emcees
that they are bound by service level agreement
to make sure they find ways per song to say,
“Free your inner n#gga” at least 25 times.
And, of course, every time you say it,
say it differently and
add in some punch lines and rhymes.
It’s like Willie reads minds.
Because if you’re a potential sell out,
Willie knows how to find out.
First he tickles your chin with that pen,
then he massages your back with that warm contract
then when he slides that rider deep inside ya
if he hears you moan, he know he’s got you configured
to murder innocent children like remote control piloted military drones.
Willie got ample sambos over samples,
they use damn fools as examples,
to confuse self-respect and dismantle
pride.
So, if a decade of negativity helps influence
a young woman to be a gold digger
or a young man to be a criminal
that’s just the result of those Willie emcees doing their job
for the many wealthy people
who would love to see you dead
who know how to use a proxy
to identify and popularize uncle toms
who would gladly serve them your head
on a platter
for little more
than crumbs
on the table.
So, the next time you hear a rapper spitting some ignorance
that based on your understanding of the way things work
don’t make no damn sense.
There’s a perfectly rational explanation, sir.
That Muthf@#‪#‎N‬ laughable abomination must work
for Willie...

Back in the mid to late 90's, when I became serious about spoken word, I had a signature piece with the refrain "Oom sha lock lock"; a term appropriated from a satirical episode of the sitcom "What's Happening." My ndugu John Cox got on me then and there about the laziness and potential irresponsibility of using fake symbolism.

Since then, I have made a point to make sure the symbols I utilize and reference have the proper connotations.

Today, I often wonder how many catch it. There is almost always something more behind my mentions and graphics and nearly everything is deliberate. For example, who caught that the logo I made for the mythical Willie Lynch, LLC was built around Sir John Hawkins' infamous bound slave crest which was demonstrative of his pride in being the first slave ship captain of the Triangular Trade? or that the diagram beside it was the seal designed for Hawkins' family (again with a bound African) after he had been knighted by Lord Effingham on behalf of Queen Elizabeth? To the point of his significance, Hawkins was said to be a man most comfortable when wading shin deep through African blood in the hulls of slave ships and unlike Willie Lynch, he actually existed.

The fact that Willie Lynch did not exist is far from the point. The point is that Willie Lynch exists today in the form of PACs, media conglomerates and think tanks that continue to perfect and modernize the methods by which the oppressed are blindly enslaved "in these times of poor somewhat righteous poets and completely coopted Manchurian emcees..."

On Cops and Staying Alive

2015-08-04T07:02:00.000-07:00

A couple of months back, I pulled up to the gym right when it opened, and the burglar alarm was blaring. A cop car was outside and a facility worker, a young white woman, trailed behind me up the path. I paused, looked at the cop car and looked at her as she smiled and said, "It's ok."

I skeptically swiped my card, we entered the gym and noticed a middle aged Ben Stein looking guy looking at his cell phone while using one of the exercise bikes. When the worker asked him how he got in, it dawned on me the guy must have entered before the gym opened; thus the alarm.

After ignoring her for about 8 seconds, the gentleman looked up from his phone indignantly and sighed, "through the door," as if she were an imbecile. The worker sternly retorted, "but the door was locked, sir." This time, he didn't even look up from his phone and replied, "Oh, I thought it was just stuck." He then continued to scroll through his phone and pedal. She stared for about 15 seconds as he ignored her and eventually walked away. I was there long enough to see him complete his workout then leave the gym of his own volition.

I have witnessed people curse cops out for even approaching them. I have seen people get out of their cars during traffic stops and damn near run up on the cops to tell them what's what. I believe such interactions are part of the difference. At each occurrence I think, "If I behaved like that, my last poem would have been my last poem."

Many black men stay alive by nature of the acute detail by which we move. When I choose not to leave the house at 3am, it's not due to any concern about "thugs." I have had a cop aim a gun at my head presumably due to my glare while we idled adjacent at a traffic light. I was unmoved. No cop has ever otherwise violated me. I am always unmoved, polite and calm. Police interactions with black men generally seem to initiate in fear and escalate from there.

I have been on a stage once or twice. My understanding is that entertainers who appear most at home on stage tend to put the audience at ease. I do not want my brothers and sisters to feel obligated to put police officers at ease. However, I would like them to recognize fear and anxiety when they encounter it and demonstrate a calm, respectful confidence in its face. Never assuming the role of victim is perhaps an ingrained logical flaw of mine. If there was a smarter, principled way to move and I am affected then, in my way of thinking, I am at least partially to blame. Every situation cannot be prevented but surely, with a level head, some may be mitigated. As Q-tip said in Steve Biko (Stir It Up), "We gotta work hard, you know the damn card/Try to be the phattest is the level that we strive/Try to be the phattest also to stay alive."

-Taalam Acey
Los Angeles, CA
8/4/2015

Humbled by what people are saying about - Affirmation for Black Men

2015-08-03T08:14:00.001-07:00

I am humbled and grateful.
Read below to see what people are saying about
Affirmation for Black Men (Young Gifted and Black)

"Speaking for the people and well. Love me some Taalam Acey baby!!...My absolute favorite spoken Word artist! Hands down."
-Phire White

"Damn I needed this even if it's meant for Men~"
-Rena Gee

"Do THAT thing... Until My Spirit is "FREE" ...SPEAK!!!"
-Ololara Never-Ending

"Peace brother and thank you for sharing this with us! Amazing as always!"
-Rob Saddler

"that was amazing"
-Mouramani Kaba

"Thanks for sharing your talent."
-Mike Jones

"Moving. Powerful. Inspirational. Thanks for sharing, Taalam."
-Clarissa Bolding

"Taalam Acey...awesome as always"
-Monica Tucker

"Snap, snap, snapping fingers!"
-Veronica Hamilton

"That's what's up. Most definitely "each one teach one"
-Michael Taylor

"Still Dope homeboy!!"
-Buni David

Thank you!!!

Watch Here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIR51Oy4kcU

A Noteworthy Lesson Learned from BET: An Open Letter to Nene Ali and Autum Ashante

2015-08-01T13:15:00.003-07:00

“When we started BET, it was going to be the Ebony magazine on television. We had public affairs programming, we had news…I had a show called Teen Summit.” – Sheila Johnson, former BET Chief Operating Officer

On March 9^th of 2014 while in Massachusetts to present my work at Greenfield Community College, I purchased a notebook to pen this very essay. The following morning, I began compiling notes. Yet, I never wrote the essay. The notebook has traveled thousands of miles since then and is in front of me now. I am prepared to begin.

BET (Black Entertainment Television) has challenged my understanding of the way things work. I have learned to turn a great deal of blame away from them and toward myself. This is specifically why that came to be.

I am sure you’re both already aware of our internal locus of control. The two of you and many others are magnets that attract souls, energy and vibrations. BET has demonstrated a certain attraction to my work over the years and has seemingly used it as an experiment to see how those lost in the wilderness would respond when exposed to what we have continuously blamed propagandists for having denied them.

It feels like a cop out that BET, like many others, claims to have had little control over what the youth in particular and black people in general gravitate toward. Their argument is that: had they not veered away from their previously chartered positive course, they would have gone bankrupt a decade or more ago. Presumably, the masses crave negativity. By watching BET demonstrate varied and conspicuous support of my work, I got to see firsthand that the onus might fall far more on the shoulders of us conscious artists than previously believed.

The airwaves are, to an extent, a utility that propagates messages commensurate with the demand for them. The amalgam of all channels resembles the water or electric utilities. They provide a current based on demand largely without regard to who is receiving it and what they use it for. We have insisted that black art is a seller’s market and the producers (who either operate the utility or pay for its use) have all the power. However, it is possibly quite the opposite.

It is intuitive that consumers themselves may drive which black art is allowed to excel and which does not. The typical criticism of the channel is that it perpetuates stereotypes and affects the psyche of young viewers through negative images. This does not speak to the negative images the young viewers are bombarded with in real life and the stereotypes that cognitive dissonance does not seem to allow it viewers to move beyond. The market is already brainwashed by officially sponsored miseducation (i.e., public schooling), hopelessness, poverty, opiates, coopted religion and think tank devised propaganda which pervades throughout the medium itself.

“If you make a man think that he is justly an outcast, you do not have to order him to the back door. He will go without being told and if there is no back door, his very nature will demand one.” – Carter G.. Woodson, The Mis-Education of the Negro

Please recall an earlier point: We have an internal locus of control. Think tanks and governments, regardless of their wealth, are incapable of preventing us from defending the minds of our brethren. In fact, the success of their hegemony is dependent upon us denying our own power to change the status quo. How can we be less capable of saving minds now than David Walker was during slavery?

What most do not seem to see is this is spiritual war and money is just one resource in a universe of infinite resources. Money is the physical representation of the output of other resources and is obtained, stored and utilized for its convenience and common unitary value. Indeed, the “omnipotence” of money is promoted incessantly in hopes of obscuring the fact that there are far more powerful resources afoot. It makes sense that those who control money would promote it as the master of life itself since the illusion helps to maintain their hierarchical world order.

In 2001 BET was purchased by Viacom, a CBS spinoff and global communication conglomerate with 170 networks and an estimated 700 million subscribers in 160 countries (#6 in the world). BET, itself, reaches nearly 90 million households. The channel originated in the early 1980’s when Robert L. Johnson, a cable industry lobbyist, launched his own cable network with financing from John C. Malone (currently considered the largest individual private landowner in the US).

It was a largely positive endeavor at the outset. BET News, which covered African-American social issues and popular culture, began in 1988 with Ed Gordon, the former host of the Detroit Black Journal, as its anchor. He hosted BET specials such as Black Men Speak Out: The Aftermath and interviewed the likes of Whitney Houston, President George H. W. Bush, Sidney Poitier and President Bill Clinton. The following year (on my nineteenth birthday) BET premiered Teen Summit, which was conceived by COO Sheila Johnson and dealt with the everyday issues of black teenagers. Teen Summit boasted an uplifting and motivational spin. Then in 1996, BET launched BET Tonight with Tavis Smiley.

In 2002, during the final season of Teen Summit, a BET producer saw the video for my poem, “When the Smoke Clearz” which refers to BET as “Nigga Entertainment Television” and mentions:

“BET don’t seem to see as well as Univision

99% of the time pimping the worst parts of capitalism

through record company hoes platinum coated egos

putting out bulllsh*t lyrics hyper-marketed to supersede those

revolutionary mantras of yesteryear.”

Rather than (or in addition to) getting offended, BET decided to air the poem on Teen Summit and interview me about it. I expected a hostile interview but instead they gave me as much room as possible to discuss my point of view. (note: all BET references were edited out of the video when they aired it). The segment was aired multiple times to their entire viewing audience, but it was if no one who had seen it paid it any mind. The only time I ever heard mention of it, was in spoken word circles.

In 2007, when Janks Morton filmed “Market for Niggas” for his film What Black Men Think, BET took an even greater interest in my work. On Monday, June 18, 2007, BET introduced a show called The 5ive aimed at counting down the five hottest people, places, events, gadgets and websites. The first show of the series listed my work in the #1 slot and used “Market” as an example. A future episode listed the then three year old “True Lies” video produced by the Guerrilla News Network and Haik Hoisington. Lastly, they invited me to their office in midtown Manhattan and produced, shot and edited a segment based on my poem, “Troubled Soul Refinery.”

Not only did The 5ive include me in three segments within the few months that it aired, but they aired each episode no less than three times. It is notable that on June 26, 2007, BET aired “Market for Niggaz” (which talks about the buffoonery and cooning in hip-hop) and called it #1, immediately before the 2007 BET Awards. Again, there appeared to be mass cognitive dissonance, it did not match with what was happening in people’s minds and, likewise, though nearly 4 million people were exposed to it and presumably watched it that night, it seems nearly no one actually processed it.

The following year, BET included me in their BET J - Lyric Café show hosted by Ledisi and Raheem Devaughn and featuring several well-known poets such as the late Will “Da Real One” Bell and live performances by musical acts such as Chuck Brown, the late Godfather of Go-Go. By this time, I had already arrived at the conclusion that very few people were open to processing that which is counter to nearly every other image and idea they are exposed to daily.

In the end, a BET producer asked me for a show idea that would involve spoken word. This fizzled out largely because they were leaning toward a reality show and I was (and still am) of the opinion that reality shows embarrass people and, one based on spoken word held the potential of relegating our art form to something to be dismissed as laughable or pathetic.

Our problem has not been the lack of opportunity or exposure per sé. If the masses had shown wide interest in my work as a result of any of the aforementioned opportunities, spoken word would have been afforded even greater exposure. No, our issue is figuring out how to develop work that communicates directly to the masses and that is creatively engaging enough as to be considered compelling. I focused on BET in this essay but other networks such as the Documentary Channel (which aired “Market” even more times than BET) have provided similar opportunities. I doubt any network can be held responsible for the fact that our “product” has yet to compel consumers to demand more of it.

I bring this to you two because this is about infrastructure and you represent the next generation of spoken word pipeline engineers. The generations prior to mine cleared the forests and left us with passable roads. My generation has been working to pave those roads but we have a long way to go. We can and will do much more. The only tasks that should be left for your generation are navigating the paved roads and perhaps creating a spaghetti junction wherever necessary. There are no impediments (besides the artist themselves) to making spoken word increasingly compelling and, by extension, widely available. We must demonstrate our abilities as architects of creativity and, even more important, manifest our innate internal locus of control. I am on the job now so that you may be to an even greater extent, later.

-Taalam Acey

Los Angeles

August 1, 2015

Affirmation for Black Men (Filmed Performance). Now it's about change!

2015-07-31T18:49:00.001-07:00

May this message find you well. I went to this year's INK SLAM Indy Championship to spectate and watched my boy Ed Mabrey take the win against some of my faves. When the smoke cleared, I was given the honor of closing out the session with a piece. Here (in it's entirety) is, "Affirmation for Black Men (Young, Gifted and Black)" *Please be sure to share it with someone who needs to hear it. It ain't about dollars no more. Now it's about change!"*

Select the video image above or: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIR51Oy4kcU

As always, if you'd like to reach out and talk, please do. Peace and innumerable blessings unto you and yours!

-Taalam Acey

Perhaps the Less Confrontational of Us Have No Place in Relationships (Why do I suddenly feel cynical?)

2015-07-29T13:39:00.001-07:00

During a conversation, a friend said, "Black women are not protected. We are left out here to fend for ourselves in this wilderness."
(Warning: Stop reading now!! I am about to openly meander about relationships, love and commitment).

Does this mean my being single could be considered a counterrevolutionary act? Should I be protecting someone? someone in particular? I am not being facetious here. I really do wonder: Is it conscious for a man to choose to be single amidst an oppression perpetuated man shortage?

Further, my relationships with my three children are among the most fulfilling aspects of my life (to say the least). I would hate to have arrived at middle age without their love, connection and the memories we've shared. By extension, I cannot help but wonder if I will eventually look back and wish I had successfully built a similar bond with a "soul mate."

Sadly, relationships have consistently served as a means of self sabotage for me.

Some men (and women) can wax torrential in a relationship in order to demand (or even bully) respect, while others move in the direction of domestic docility. I have been confused for the latter (docile) because even though I am proficiently firm in my interactions with men, I am gentle within those with women. Honestly, I have often thought, she's too wild and cannot thrive with someone like me, she needs someone menacing. I don't catch a fire when neglected, wrongly perceived or taken for granted. I eventually just depart, forever.

I am single, insulated and thriving. But am I living for the socioeconomic present and future while not taking into account the personal bond long run? Sewing the seeds for an imminent intimacy crisis? Who shall I travel the with? Who wants to become THAT later year dad who forces his children to be constantly aware of his loneliness just by the nature of incessantly contacting them? When you have trouble recollecting a memory, who will be there to help?

I was out with my "sister" Daimyo Damnyo Lee last night. I told her, at this point, I would prefer to just "sparingly date." My son's with me so if I am not working on a life long relationship, then I would prefer to just get out there every once in a while. She shut me down saying it's too late for that, "women in your age group are trying to seal the deal; not date. They are past the idea of good times for good times sake. It only matters now if they are building something." My sister was an eye witness to my olden promiscuous days and hopes I have truthfully accepted the fact that they are gone forever.

Maybe the solution is someone who is extremely busy.

I sometimes think back to how my first apartment (a quarter of a century ago) was a veritable Jurassic Park of bugs and worse. I didn't have much to offer and my intimate interactions were just as cut and dry. Eventually, I moved into a luxury condo with a balcony overlooking Manhattan. Nothing was cut and dry after that. Every visitor suddenly saw the capacity for more. I was missing a wife and "nature abhors a vacuum." This brings up another side issue, I tend to hemorrhage belongings in break ups but methodically amass them when single. Apparently I can amass belongings over and over again and perhaps the risk is worth it...but the hassle.

The pursuit of making someone else happy can feel like an endless treadmill. You may have made him/her happier than anyone else ever has, but, they wonder, have you really made them as happy as YOU possibly can? What was once everything they were looking for eventually turns into, "What else you got?" And as everyone knows by nature of the 80/20 rule, if you provide someone with 80% of their wants, they sometimes bargain with someone else to supply the remaining 20%. You pay rent. The sidepiece pays for drinks. (Why do I suddenly feel cynical?)

In the end, there are always alternative solutions...like celibacy for instance. I hear the first 11 and a half years of celibacy are the hardest but if you can get past those it's smooth sailing...

Taalam Acey
Los Angeles
7/29/2015

Early Social Network Faux Pas

2015-07-26T05:45:00.000-07:00

Years ago on My Space [switch image from color to flickering sepia tone], a woman whom I'd never met before sent a message saying she'd like to see me perform my work one day. I responded:

"Honored. look forward to performing for you when we're in the same venue." 

Less than an hour later, her boyfriend (or a facsimile thereof) hit me up:

"Dude don't be tryna get at my lady! Whatchu talking about with some "perform for her??" AND COME ON HOMEBOY, I know that "venue" sh*t is some kind of  coded metaphor. YOU DIDN'T HAVE TO SAY VENUE!! You poet dudes think you're so damn smart, SO DAMN SLICK! Don't message her no more! Even if she messages you DO NOT respond!"

(I never heard from either of them again but, ever since, when a woman I do not know sends a similar message, this episode often plays in the background. lol!)

An Open Letter to Jared Paul

2015-07-24T16:59:00.000-07:00

An Open Letter to Jared Paul

Excellent Poetry Lounge performance.Yes! I still remember the young man who made me a fan at AS220 in Providence, RI back in early 2000 (a decade and a half ago!); the young man who, later that year, skateboarded throughout the NPS in Providence; You must have been in your teens then, or close to it.

I, of course, also recall the grown Jared who blew minds (mine too) at Lily Pads in Peace Dale, RI in 2012. Do you recall educating me backstage about protests, soy farmers and the irony of obtaining one's organic footprint via Pepsi and Kellogg aka Monsanto (What's up Kashi, Sun Chips and Morningstar Farms [and damn near every other product in the supermarket]?? I see you!!)?

Yeah, every time I see you, Jared, I think, "doesn't he know life doesn't have to be that hard?" But then, if it weren't, would your message be so powerfully authentic?! How many poems of yours were born on cold, putrid Jail cell floors? Do they know? It's kind of like Edward P Mabrey Jr., Buddy Wakefield or Sunni Patterson and those are just the first three names that came to mind, there are quite a few others...will the listeners figure out who they were listening to in time to give you all your due? Yo! That was Stevie [Ray Vaughn]...that was Jimi [Hendrix]. Yo that was Janis! Next time you're in LA you've got to let me know. I love you and I love our legacy. Hopefully, I'll still be doing alright by then. If not, mi alley is su alley. lol!

I classify myself in many ways, but I am not necessarily a protest poet. I have slept in bus stations and spent full nights on foot in the cold for the sake of poetry. I have spent nights in jail cells, but never for protest, only for being a black man in America (ha! "In America" as if racism ain't global. There's a 500 year old lie!).

I am sincerely me and most know I'll grab the freshest hotel room I can find in a second (still far too gully for Limos though. ‪#‎ijs‬). F*cking part time poetry snob, me.

I know what it's like to be uncomfortable (sometimes in the extreme). Nevertheless, I am not a protester. I have hardly ever volunteered for discomfort for the sake of a cause. Nah, that discomfort sh*t just finds me.

You, Sir, are one of the few who have passed through this human experience who, to my knowledge, embody protest both in your life story and in your work.

I salute you, My Friend!

-Taalam Acey
Los Angeles
July 24, 2015

A Friend Says I May Share Our Conversation On Deep Depression. May It Help Someone.

2015-07-01T15:55:00.000-07:00

The following is a portion of an email conversation regarding deep depression I just had with a friend who told me I can share it. May it help someone:

I have struggled in the past with feeling depressed and yet been completely unable to identify any specific immediate issues that might be at the root of my feelings. I've struggled most when life was peaking. When there are problems, I have been fortunate to be occupied by them and distracted from the sadder feelings. I am also familiar with the exhaustion you speak of and it's not just common to you and I. A friend's FB status yesterday was simply, "Overwhelmed..." which received responses such as, "me too."

Just because rising in the morning has felt mechanical for an extended period, doesn't mean it always will. I know what it is to feel that and at one point frequently self-medicated out of perceived necessity.

To your point, this that I feel is concern not curiosity. I'm not curious about much beyond this full plate that leaves me always feeling like there is not enough time. Hell, I've been trying to get back to watching the same Netflix show for over two weeks now. lol! Please continue to keep in touch.

One reason for living is because perhaps I have helped you even if only a bit thus far. You have definitely helped me. Our interaction may help others. In this way we contribute to the collective whole.

I mentioned this pain could be common only to point out that struggling to justify life, at times, may simply be a part of the human condition; how we're built (at least for a few special ones). Many of us point to our children as reasons to push on. The "American dream" includes the hope our offspring will suffer less (and propagate) due to our efforts. Some, without children, inject themselves into the lives of others and worthy causes as mentors and such. In a genuine relationship the mentor benefits just as much as the mentored. I have also noticed lately that my mental health corresponds to my physical health. The more consistent my exercise, deliberate positive outlook and nutritional self-control, the better I feel about living. I didn't feel it immediately. That is why consistency is key.

The pendulum of the saddened swings wildly. Those whose manic pendulums barely swing may never know or imagine anything like the seemingly (in the moment) near absolute pain; and never realize the contented peace on earth for which past pain provides potential. Every humiliating, disparaging dark day (year...decade) I have suffered was nothing compared to the beauty of the moment I find myself in right now. This remarkable moment in and of itself dwarfs my past. And, today I understand that if and when this moment passes, I will have learned from it's passing and somewhere down the road promises the potential for moments far, far better than this which (like this moment) will be amplified in beauty by the suffering that preceded it.

It is your existence and our interaction that brought me to share these words. It is only because we are still here (interesting...a friend of mine refers to herself as "Still Here"); It is only because we are still here that these specific words can be shared with the collective consciousness and perhaps help one...even one would be enough. Our purpose continues to unfold sometimes even despite us.

Taalam Acey
Los Angeles
7/1/2015

If I Have a Place in Spoken Word, This Is How Technology Helped to Secure It

2015-06-16T10:25:00.003-07:00

When I began using computers at 11 years old, there were no USB drives physically smaller than a Lego yet capable of storing 8,000 songs. We stored files on regular cassette tapes and if you wanted a file directory, you had to write one on the inside cover. In 1984, when the dual-sided 5.25 inch floppy disk revolutionized computer storage, the entire disk about enough storage capacity to hold a 1 minute mp3.

I began taking free computer classes in 1982 at an aging, ivy covered church located next to the YMCA on Main Street in Orange, NJ. A middle aged, grey bearded, slick talking, black computer geek trained us to program in Basic on TRS (i.e., Tandy Radio Shack) 80s. The following year they offered similar classes at Orange Middle school where we used Apple II computers.

My mother was the impetus for my interest in computers. She was a full-time computer programmer who eventually offered to buy her son a Commodore Vic-20 to cultivate his interest in computing. It had been the first computer to sell over a million units. To put that in perspective, today's iPhone 6 sells over a million units every 2 days. The Vic-20's popularity notwithstanding, by 1982, the year after it was released, the Vic was already ancient technology. The Commodore 64, with it's whopping 64 kilobytes of RAM was a must have, so I pleaded my case until my mother got me one in 1983.

By the time I got to college in 1988, I was pretty familiar with computing. I started out at the New Jersey a Institute of Technology in Newark. Freshmen were expected to (to an extent) put together their own IBM 386 PC. Also during that time, I had a friend named Azar, who's group Raze (spearheaded by Vaughn Mason of "Bounce, Rock, Skate, Roll" fame) had created a soon to be hit song called, "Break for Love." Azar introduced me to Queen Latifah's demo tape and eventually to both her and DJ Mark the 45 King. Where Azar and Vaughn had introduced me to mixing consoles, SMPTE time codes, Linndrum's and Roland TR-808s and TR-909s, The 45 King introduced me to Akai S900 samplers and how, using MIDI, Apple computers could be used as sequencers. Soon, a chance encounter in Queens spawned a relationship between Cut Master DC (of 'Brooklyn Rocks the House" fame) and I. DC went on to introduce me to other technologies like the e-mu SP-1200 and Emulator.

Before I knew it, I was hanging out and scoping samplers and other computerized recording tools along "Music Row" on 48th St., where Sam Ash had a half dozen music stores. I stocked my mother's basement with a few basics like a pre-owned Akai S-950, a turntable, a sequencer and a cassette based 4-track recorder and went to work.

I had thought of myself as a rapper since 1979 when my 8-year old self had memorized, then eventually, switched up the words to, "Rapper's Delight." Twelve years later, in 1991, I released my own rap records which were lyrically far more akin to the "Last Poets" than traditional rap. As a comparison, in 1993, the now deceased rapper Apache (who also hung out with us in The 45 King's basement) would release a song called, "Gangsta Bitch." I recorded a rap called, "Destination Unknown," clearly rap was not to be my final destination.

In 1991, I was busy releasing my work on wax independently with titles like, "It's a Political Thing" and sampling Dr. John Henrik Clarke whom I had the pleasure of knowing and gaining direction from. The records had to be released independently because even with Latifah's pull, we couldn't interest record companies in work which could be described in retrospect as incipient spoken word. It was too conscious and respectful. Interestingly, according to Discogs.com, my early work sells now for about $100 per record plus there's a waiting list.

I grew up listening to the Last Poets and Gil Scott-Heron, but I had never considered spoken word to be a plausible medium in the 1990s. Then in 1997, spoken word artist Jessica Care Moore changed that perception by winning "Showtime at the Apollo," five times! Also that year, the film "Love Jones" was released. I enjoyed the bohemian aesthetic, but it seemed like a fantasy world that would be incapable of holding my attention if it were real life. Not long after, I reluctantly stumbled into a poetry venue in East Orange, NJ because an old friend said it would mean a lot to him (and I had let him down in the past). Bogies was not Love Jones. It was far grittier and held a live, vocal crowd that remarked above the poetry with evangelical undertones. I began my full fledged pursuit of spoken word there and soon gravitated to the artsy Nuyorican Poet's Cafe who's poets had somewhat adopted Bogies yet, dare I say, often seemed uncomfortable there.

At this point in time, it was customary to sell make shift "chapbooks" of your work. I saw the potential for something different. I returned to Sam Ash on Music Row to talk with the experts and explore the possibilities. I learned about a new upstart called Sonic Foundry and their brand new Acid and Sound Forge applications. As I suspected, samplers and sequencers were no longer necessary. Nor did I have to send my work out to be pressed on vinyl, I could purchase CD-R recorders that could be installed in one of my computer's 3.5 floppy disk bays. Yes, this meant I had to unscrew the computer covers, pull out the wires and install them. It would be years before CD recorders would come standard in computers. In fact, less than 10 years prior to this, the first CD-R recorders had been released. The Meridian CD Publisher and the Yamaha PDS were the size of washing machines and sold for about $35,000. By 1995 CD-R recorders were going for less than $1,000.

In 1999, I was also the co-owner of a fledgling small business consulting firm with plenty of computers and a small computer lab. I eventually installed a CD-R burner in each computer and there was enough excess capacity to produce and burn CDs for many of the other popular New Jersey poets.

As the market saturated, I believed the next step would be to travel and see if I could sell similar quantities in places where people had yet to hear of me. I began using Yahoo's search engine to locate everything from poetry contests to open mics. At this time, Google was just being commercially released and was still virtually unknown. I wouldn't learn of it until 2000 when Bay Area poet Nisa Ahmad began to sing it's praises in online poetry chat rooms and still, it would be a couple of years before people really began to take a gasp of it.

My travels were simplified by a company called Cheaptickets.com which had launched in 1997. It's hard to imagine now, however, back then, I would find tickets online through Cheaptickets.com just like travel agents did with SABRA, but without being able to print them. I had to physically get in the car (or hop a train) and head to Manhattan to stand in line and show ID to pick up my tickets. Back then, that was considered modern convenience.

Perhaps the only area of technology I could be considered a laggard in, as it applies to spoken word, is social networking. I had maintained my own website even before I put out my first poetry CD in 1999. Yet, I did not have the vision to see that social networking was an entirely different animal.

Back in the days of Bogies, Faraji Salim, my then partner-in-crime started (and moderated) an email group called Poetry Nation. For a time, he was like the NY/NJ version of a major periodical editor. I participated in the dialogue (and often served as an agitator) but never attempted to create a group of my own. Tamara Davis of the proto-spoken word group, "A Touch of Reality," mentored and advised me on poetry dos and don'ts back then. She was an avid Black Planet user who never missed an opportunity to tell me about all the networking, performance and merchandise sales advantages Black Planet had afforded her, but, nevertheless, I refused to join.

Years later, I would come across the My Space pages of Saul Williams and Philly poet Black Ice. I had great respect for them both, but at the time, believed their respective My Space pages to be overt indications that they were too lazy to maintain websites. I was monstrously wrong.

In the end, it took a plea from poet Ainsley Burrows to try My Space. He was certain I had no idea what I was missing. Unfortunately, I arrived too late. By the time I got involved and started to master it, My Space was superseded by Facebook. Whereas My Space was more of an open atmosphere without ceilings, Facebook, on the other hand, feels regulated and controlled. For instance, I am friends with myself on Facebook and am still sometimes unable to see things I know I posted. There is never a reasonable expectation on FB that everyone in your network could even have the possibility of seeing all of your posts; even if they wanted. That's not a gripe though. I see it more or less as a challenge.

Like many of my peers, spoken word has led me to learn more applications than I can recall, from Audacity to Photoshop. When required, I have edited videos with applications such as Vegas and laid out books with software like Pagemaker. Today, my technological interest, as they relate to spoken word, lean more toward discovering new cloud offerings and finding ways to leverage clever platforms toward the realization of what has always been and persists to be the point: Publicizing my indwelling ideas in hopes of stirring positive attitudes, inspired responses and revolutionary thoughts.

Taalam Acey
(most likely my last post from) Tampa, FL
6/16/2015

Affirmation for Black Men: Young, Gifted and Black (NSFW) Essay, Live Audio Track and Words

2015-06-09T13:04:00.000-07:00

What song has been recorded by three of soul music’s great legends: Nina Simone (1969), Donny Hathaway (1970) and Aretha Franklin (1972)?

The song, “(to be) Young, Gifted and Black,” was written by Nina Simone and Weldon Irvine as a tribute to Nina’s good friend (and daughter’s godmother) Lorraine Hansberry. In addition to being the niece of the illustrious Pan Africanist scholar and Howard University professor - William Leo Hansberry, Lorraine was a Broadway playwright famous for the late 1950s play, “A Raisin in the Sun.”

At the time the song was written, Nina had just attended a play entitled, “To Be Young Gifted and Black,” adapted from the then deceased Lorraine Hansberry’s writings. Ms. Simone came up with the melody then asked Irvine to create lyrics that, “will make black children all over the world feel good about themselves forever.” When he completed the words, Weldon recalled telling Nina, “I didn’t write this. God wrote it through me.”

The song would be re-recorded shortly afterward by Donny Hathaway in 1970 as, “a lament for the many young, gifted and blacks who are trapped by lack of opportunity.”

Around the time I joined the Nuyorican Café poetry scene in the late 1990s, it was made clear that Weldon Irvine frequented the venue, but I cannot say he and I ever officially met. He was talked about as a sort of next step for poets and, at the time, I was only slightly familiar with his past. I was also ignorant of the fact he had written twenty plays, produced five hundred songs and had worked with legends like Miles Davis and Stanley Turrentine. What had been made clear to me was that Weldon had recently done work with Saul Williams, the most imitated Spoken Word artist at that time, for an album called “Spoken Melodies” (1997). muMs the Schemer also mentioned in passing one day that he was in the studio working with Irvine. Apparently, he was providing music lessons to Common and Q-tip then as well.

I gained an even greater respect for Mr. Irvine’s abilities after hearing his work on Mos Def’s, “Black on Both Sides” (1999), where he played keyboards, strings and piano on various tracks. Irvine also played the Hammond organ on my favorite song from the album, “Umi Says.”

By April 9, 2002, the day Weldon Irvine took his own life, I was all too aware of who he was. I cannot recall who, but someone contacted me a couple of weeks afterward to say he had used a rifle to shoot himself on the front lawn of EAB Plaza (now RXR Plaza), Long Island’s largest office building. Everyone speculated that it had to have been some sort of extreme protest, but no one claimed to have found a note, or even a clue.

I wrote the poem, “Young, Gifted and Black” to be an affirmation for young black men, to remind them of their power and potential. It is dedicated to the memory of Weldon Irvine.

**************

Sources that helped me to augment my information include: the writings of Jason Ankeny and Eric Sandler and the Donny Hathaway quote was per Ric Powell

*************

Affirmation for Black Men: Young, Gifted and Black

by Taalam Acey (the words are below)

Free music player widget at ReverbNation.com

I am young, gifted and black.
In any environment, I can adapt.
If you throw me in an office, I will Access
my PowerPoint to Excel…Word!
My Outlook ain’t bout bein’ shook.
They done put me in jail cells.
When it comes to Hell;
I take it like I give it.
When it comes to life;
I often live it like I’m livid.
Ain’t on no DL.
I’m on my DHL.
My every message gets delivered.
Shit’s serious.
Grown man,
got no time for the delusion nor the delirious.
I came to live a memorable life
and die an honorable death
and in between do what I can
to make the best of this experience.
Productive, not counter
Not self-destructive, I be ‘bout balance.
Some people be ‘bout frontin’
Some people be ‘bout violatin’
That’s why I try to be ‘bout patience
‘til it’s gotta be ‘bout violence.
Talent and incredible focus,
internal locus of control.
Good thing this earth suit is somewhat attractive
‘cause most cats would be taken aback
if I had to bear my soul.
It’s beautiful and it’s grizzly
please forgive me if I don’t Fuck around.
Life ain’t playin’
and yet it’s a game
and I got a few seeds with a stake in my name
and by the time they have seeds
needs to be no mistakin’ my name.
And, I love my blood, sweat and tears;
lacin’ up my boots tight and outpacin’ my pain.

I am young, gifted and black.
I can adapt to wherever you throw me at.
My demographic means I have to be versatile.
Rock an ice grill and still be able work a smile.
Being a hundred percent hood is virtually worthless now;
Besides, there’s too many rings up in this circus now.
So whether it’s that juke joint jumpin’
or that corporate function;
You can put me in a workshop all day
or throw a Black and a 40 in my hand
and put me in a project hallway.
Then afterwards interview all the executives
and all the dope boys
and I guarantee you they all say
that wherever I choose to fit in, I lay
like wallpaper.
Air tight.
Body healthy, head right.
Stretch’em both out e‘er night.
When I fall down I begin again,
I’m my own life coach, I be like,
“Muhfucka you better win in the end.”
Fake friends, I brush off.
Failures, I dust off and evolve.
When I’m afoot in my yard I build fences
‘cause cats wanna act like they measure up to rulers
but ain’t even half inches.
When I look to my God, I begin with,
“I promise to change problems into opportunities
until you see fit my life is ended.”

I am young, gifted and black
and I will tap into whatever it takes.
Available time determines available breaks.
So when there’s no time, there’s no resting.
Just like when you show no grind, you get shown no blessings.
And, God made me gifted so how could I not personify presence?!
My essence is Earth, wind, fire, water and ether.
Be the medium darkness or light, my light still permeates through either.
I’ma be the best me that I can.
Anything that test me I plan
to aggressively withstand
so Yo, any soul that tries to oppress me be damned.

I am young, gifted and black
and I will adapt until my spirit is free.
And, until they execute my will;
my will – will execute my world
thus anything
and everything
I choose…
It shall be.

Of Suicide and Hope: For Those Not Afraid to Die Yet Scared to Live

2015-06-06T19:07:00.001-07:00

photo: Nickai Peters

(*please share as you see fit. perhaps we may save a life*)

A couple of years ago, a New England college administrator told me a student who recently committed suicide was in attendance. I interjected that she must have meant, "attempted to commit suicide," as there were no corpses in the crowd. But no, she was firm.

The administrator, herself, was an admittedly lonely, bored, single mother who had long since determined that life might be a cruelly overrated exercise. She also went on to tell me that at least one event attendee had previously attempted suicide. Still, there was another attendee who had been actually deemed dead while on the gurney and yet, miraculously revived soon after. She expressed how significant my message had been for him, her and others.

I have been suicidal. In my early teens, I ingested a medicine cabinet worth of, what turned out to be, mostly harmless pills.

In my late teens, the "unbearable" stress of love triangles (some involving husbands and wives), saw me selecting a knife and penning a note before it dawned on me that I couldn't give my adversaries the satisfaction. I had to stay here and struggle to live longer and better; rather than succumb to a legacy of coward references or being disregarded (as if never having been here). The shock of suicide tends to be fleeting. I visualized the temporal, would be, forthcoming smirks of satisfaction afforded those who did not deserve to outlive me. Perhaps pride alone kept me alive.

In my late twenties, a chronically dysfunctional marriage saw me sitting in the dim basement, listening to bluesy jazz with one of my 9 millimeter pistols (clip removed) resting in my mouth. It was a routine practice until I inexplicably pointed at, then shot the wall and the "click" I expected, was instead the "Crack!" from a bullet inadvertently left in the chamber. That was the last direct suicide attempt.

I visited my first spoken word venue later that night. The life(style) that ensued from poetry could be arguably described as a reckless, sexy, meandering form of suicide that devolved into showing up to cities and countries broke and with the intention of inebriating a place to stay (or at least a lack of care). People who honestly feel they have nothing to lose may as well perservere in that fashion; and boldly defy death rather than life.

A few days ago, I showed up to an intimate poetry gathering in Oklahoma attended by a subset of the usual African American crowd, but augmented by four 30-something year old, seemingly obnoxious, white, chain smoking, scatagolical, self-professed Gypsies.

Prior to the start of my set, I was concerned their energy would inhibit the effectiveness of my message. Later, I would learn the four men were perhaps the very reason I had been "called" there. Each man was suicidal and two showed me the scars that proved it. They professed to having seen needed hope in my words. I independently conversed with and hugged the four of them before the end of the night.

This is God's work.

I have known quite a few people who committed suicide. Some people simply mistake the middle for the end. There was the popular college jock who was having a bad month; an acquaintance who felt destroyed by child support debt; the long lost, single mother, I had just reconnected with; the seemingly financially well off motivational speaker and cosmetologist; the proprietor of a popular Los Angeles cafe and poetry venue; and there are still others.

I am especially sensitive to the matter; so much so, that I have been known to engage strangers regarding their questionable social network posts when they appear to be cries for help. I have made myself available to speak life back into others somewhat selfishly, because, if I have to work to manifest reasons to stay here, then no one else should be able to take the easy escape to heaven, hell or oblivion. I believe if I can hang in there, then anyone else who doesn't is cheating.

The "moment" is frequently a bold faced liar. Immediate feelings of dire straights cannot be trusted because life ALWAYS gets better.

Google an image of the Dow Jones average over the past 100 years. You'll see peaks, dips, inclines and valleys, but the general trend is always...always upward...and c'est la vie! Day traders tend to lose everything due to a limited scope. Long term investors always make out over time. In fact, quite frequently, things improve more rapidly than imaginable. Life has been known to positively progress suddenly, vastly and without warning.

The process of working toward and realizing our dreams is often accompanied by seemingly unbearable pain. I'm told most births are like that. Plus, the variance between how we're doing and how we intrinsically believe we should be doing is really just a timing issue. The "better days" that we imagine we missed are simply around a soon to come bend. But that's the thing about bends; you rarely see them coming and you certainly can't see around them. Most accept that tragedies may happen suddenly; yet have not face the idea that one's life can drastically improve in a matter of days.

Those of us who repeatedly refuse to abandon ship during the busts have since lived to reap the benefits of many and far greater booms. The secret to contentment is to stick around. Besides, how is it that one could not be afraid of death while at the same time scared to live?!

-Taalam Acey
Charlotte, NC
6/27/2015

Spoken Word: The Origin and Evolution of the Djele

2015-06-03T20:14:00.001-07:00

The following was drawn from my presentation and related interactions during the South-North Griots Summit at the Harbourfront Centre in Toronto, Ontario on May 31, 2015. The objective of my talk was to contextualize spoken word’s past, present and future as it relates to the origins, evolution and outlook of the djele (aka griot). I apologize in advance because what follows somewhat narrowly centers around the African origins of African American spoken word primarily because that is my personal vantage point.

During the Summit, Bajan Spoken Word artist Adrian Green stated that consciousness, whether individual or collective, is an abstract concept. It is reported to flow like vapor with no discernible location within anatomy maps of the human brain. Likewise, identity is fleeting and requires constant reminders of who you have been in order to continuously define itself. Moreover, recollections of past greatness often motivate future achievement. The job of the spoken word artist is to remind you who you are.

It is said the ancient Ghanaian Empire had no birth record. Spoken Word can stake an even greater claim to such. It is believed the universe was created with, “The Word.” For Example, as stated in James Weldon Johnson’s poem, The Creation:

“And God stepped out on space; and he looked around and said, “I’m lonely. I’ll make me a world.”"

The earliest poetry in Egypt was spoken. UCLA Egyptologist Jacco Dieleman estimated that only one person in a hundred, in ancient Egypt, could read and write. Per National Geographic, archeologists have uncovered poems dating back to well over a thousand years before the Christian era in an excavated worker’s village on the outskirts of The Valley of The Kings.

A piece of one inspirational, ancient poem (written on the tomb of Ikherkhawy) went:

“So seize the day! Hold Holiday!

Be unwearied, unceasing, alive.

You and your own true love;

Let not the heart be troubled

during your sojourn on Earth

but seize the day as it passes."

On a visit to Nubia for the PBS television series, “Wonders of the African World,” Harvard’s Dr. Henry Louis Gates, Jr. interacted with a tour guide who quoted an ancient Egyptian poem: “I wish my lover were Nubiani.” Indeed, in Herodotus’ Histories, he referred to Kushites (i.e., Nubians) as the most ancient people on Earth and stated that Egypt was founded from Ethiopia. Nubian Civilization is arguably the world's oldest, beginning around 6,000 B.C. in what is now the Sudan.

In later years, Kush’s capital city of Meroe (800 BC to 350 AD) was home to more than two hundred pyramids. According to Dr. Gates, this is more than were to be found in Egypt. Meroe originated Egypt’s 25th Dynasty; the largest Egyptian empire, in terms of land mass, since the New Kingdom. Black African Pharaohs such as Kashta, Shabaka and Piankhy revived pyramid construction and were considered pious scholars and patrons of the arts of poetry, music and storytelling. Oddly, some claim the 25th Dynasty was Egypt’s only black African dynasty even though Dr. Cheikh Anta Diop proved to UNESCO linguistically, physically, historically and chemically that other dynasties had been black as well.

The tradition of poetry and storytelling permeated each of the Great African empires that followed Nubia, beginning with Kanem-Bornu which surrounded Lake Chad and much of central North Africa; spanning from Libya to Nigeria and from Niger to Nubia. The West African Empire of Mali, which eventually supplanted the aforementioned Ghanaian Empire, was founded by Sundiata Keita and became world famous during the reign of Emperor Mansa Musa; then considered Earth’s wealthiest ruler.

Imperial Mali was also home to the mystical Dogon people who have somehow mapped the stars including Sirius A and Sirius B (which is not visible to the human eye) for centuries in honor of NOMMO, “The Word.” As an example of their astrological knowledge, the Dogon were aware of the existence of Sirius B and its 50 year elliptical orbit for hundreds of years and marked it in traditional semi centennial celebrations. Once Western Astronomers were able to validate the existence of Sirius B through the use of powerful telescopes in 1970, they began to obscure the fact that this information had been previously shared by Africans. Dogon laymen consider NOMMO to be an alien race from the stars. The learned priest class consider NOMMO to be, "The Word." According to Dr. Adisa A. Alkebulan of San Diego State University:

“The Dogon people of Mali believe that NOMMO, the power of the spoken word carries a life force that produces all life and influences everything. By human utterance or through spoken word, human beings can invoke a kind of spiritual power…if the Word did not exist, all life forces would be suspended.”

Songhai, the last West African empire, was roughly the size of Mexico. Much of what remains known about it is due to a 14th century djele named Balla Fasséké. The Empire housed the metropolitan cities of Timbuktu and Djenné as well as their respective famous universities. Upon the death of Emperor Sunni Ali Ber in 1492, the Songhai Empire began to decline.

1492 was also the year Ferdinand and Isabella conquered Granada, the last Muslim (and Moorish) stronghold on the Iberian Peninsula, and sponsored Christopher Columbus’ August 3, 1492 trip to the New World. He brought his “personal African slave” with him and, as has been argued, several others. Half a century prior to Columbus’ first voyage, Portugal had established trading relations along the West African coast and began purchasing enslaved Africans. With the untimely death of Sunni Ali Ber, the Portuguese were able to procure larger and larger numbers of enslaved West Africans from the interior.

The Mande term “Djele" was born in that region of Africa and translates to “blood” and more specifically, the human, spoken word vessel of histories and traditions that acts as blood to the society. During American slavery, these same ancestors would be prohibited from reading and writing or even speaking in their native tongues.

“Whereas the teaching of slaves to read and write, has a tendency to excite dissatisfaction in their minds, and to produce insurrection and rebellion…Therefore…any free person, who shall hereafter teach, or attempt to teach, any slave within the State to read or write…shall…be fined not less than one hundred dollars…and if a person of color, shall be fined, imprisoned, or whipped at the discretion of the court, not exceeding thirty nine lashes, nor less than twenty lashes….”

-General Assembly of the State of North Carolina (Raleigh:1831)

In Latin America and the Caribbean, as early as 1512, many of our ancestors escaped slavery and formed independent settlements pejoratively referred to as, “Maroon” colonies. In fact, a Haitian “maroon” named Boukman, well versed in African spoken traditions, along with Jean-Jacques Dessalines and Toussaint Le’Ouverture defeated Napoleon in the Haitian revolution (1804) after causing him to sell France’s territory in North America as the, “Louisiana Purchase,” to help fund the war.

Independent “maroon” settlements occurred primarily in places where African languages, culture, drums and religion had not been stringently forbidden by enslavers such as had been the case in the United States. Still, independent African colonies begun by American escaped slaves were documented including: the Black Seminoles of Florida, colonies on the shores of Lake Borgne and Lake Pontchartrain in Louisiana and the Great Dismal Swam in North Carolina and Virginia.

In 1760 Jupiter Harmon would become known as America’s, “1st black poet,” although it is obvious that many Africans brought to America in the nearly three hundred years prior to Mr. Harmon, were djeles. In 1773, an enslaved Senegalese woman named Phillis Wheatley would become the first African American to publish a book of poetry. In the 19th century, Frances Harper became a well-known poet and abolitionists. In the mid 1800’s, an enslaved man named George Moses Horton, self-proclaimed as “The Colored Bard of North Carolina,” penned two tomes of poetry with the not-to-be-realized hope of using the proceeds to purchase his freedom.

The “New Negro Movement,” which would later be called the, “Harlem Renaissance,” was considered to be a rebirth of African American arts. It began sometime around 1918 and continued on until the mid-1930s. The players included such well-known luminaries as Jean Toomer, Alain Locke and Countee Cullen. The jazz influenced Spoken Word of Langston Hughes, who become the first African American to support himself from his writing, disturbed the academic Countee Cullen who preferred more structured poetry. Jamaica’s Claude McKay was also known for his Caribbean influenced, lyrical poetry. His poem, “If We Must Die,” became world famous and was reportedly quoted many years later by Winston Churchill during World War I. In true djele spirit, Langton Hughes’ good friend, anthropologist and author Zora Neale Hurston is known to have travelled across Florida, Georgia, the Caribbean and Honduras between the 1920s and 1950s collecting black folk tales and becoming an authoritative repository of African lore and traditions.

In the 1950s, Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem Annie Allen made her the first African American to win a Pulitzer Prize. In the late 1950s, Everett LeRoi Jones (later known as Amiri Baraka) emerged as a Beat Poet along with Frank O’hara, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and others. Following the death of Malcolm X in 1965, he founded BARTS (i.e., the Black Arts Repertory Theatre School) in Harlem. This was the beginning of the Black Arts Movement which included Sonia Sanchez, Marvin X, Nikki Giovanni, Don L. Lee (later known as Haki Madhabuti), Harold Cruse, Ed Bullins and others.

In the 1960s, A Gambian djele gave Alex Haley, the author of Roots, an oral account of seven previous generations of Mandinka tribal history which corresponded with his own family’s passed down oral account of their first American ancestor whom they referred to as, “The African.”

In 1968 the legendary Last Poets were founded in New York City and in 1969 The Watts Prophets from Los Angeles released their first LP entitled, “1969’s The Back Voices: On the Streets in Watts.” In 1970, a Bronx Street Poet named Gil Scott-Heron released the percussive spoken word album, “Small Talk on 125th St.”

This brings us to the bridging point where my generation of djeles coexists and interacts with our contemporary elders. I and several others have learned from, performed with and personally paid homage to many of the djeles listed in the last few paragraphs. Once, I gave up a first class seat to one of them because she helped create the path that I walk upon, among other respectful reasons. It was my honor. As is our tradition, I have asked many of them for permission to speak.

We now live in a world of rapid technology. Where our elders required sponsorship, publishers and record companies, we are now able to publish, record and promote ourselves, independently. My generation drives, rides and flies from city to city and country to country with bags of books, CDs and other merch to sell after performances.

Even that is no longer necessary. Today, it is possible for everything to be done virtually and remotely.

We can provide our listeners with an entire catalogue of albums via email linked to a cloud such as Dropbox or Google. We can offer our work through clouds such as YouTube, Vevo, Reverbnation and Bandcamp. It is streamed on Spotify and Tidal. We can sell poems through virtual stores such as iTunes and Amazon.com.

However, it should be noted that the human condition will never allow us to EXCLUSIVELY do that which is possible. No, the human condition demands interaction. Just as shopping malls are no longer necessary but nevertheless coexist with internet retailers, today’s djeles must find the blend of personable live experiences in addition to our evolving use of digital files and clouds providers. In the end, it is all about the people. We are their blood and as such we must continue to mix the traditional with new and innovative methods of reminding them exactly who they are.

-taalam acey

Tampa, FL

June 4, 2015

(Please feel free to share as you see fit).

Note: Thank you to all of the attendees of the 2015 South-North Griot Summit. Our discussions and your presentations augmented my thoughts. In particular, thank you to Klyde Broox, Adrian Green, Andrea Thompson and Eddy Garnier. #griotsummit2015

When the Smoke Clears: Why I Had to Quit Smoking

2015-05-28T18:34:00.001-07:00

I stopped smoking a year ago without realizing it. I would not have been surprised if I had chose to light up later that evening. However, the last Friday of May 2014 was to be the last time.

I enjoyed smoking. Although tobacco is a stimulant, it was always spiritual to me as with the Babalawos and Iyanifas/Iyalawos who puff cigars while divining destinies.

The threat of agonizing cancer and the idea of my family losing me to near certain illness were no deterrents. In fact, I was cancer proof and determined to become a living example of how one could smoke and drink all he desired while maintaining good health. I may have been clinically delusional.

I hadn’t even begun smoking until I was nearly thirty. Prior to that, I smoked the occasional cigar. However, in the late 90’s, I became heavily involved in the Spoken Word poetry scene and frequented the Nuyorican Café in Manhattan’s Lower East Side. We, the enlightened ones, shunned regular cigarettes. We smoked "alternative cigarettes" like Djarum and Nat Sherman cloves (made of tobacco, cloves and sweeteners) or Bidis (i.e., beedees - hand-rolled temburni leaf Indian cigarettes) which unbeknownst to us contained more tar and nicotine plus held a higher likelihood of cancer, heart disease and bronchitis than regular cigarettes.

The next and lasting stage of my smoking would come in 1999 when I developed a deep attraction to Chicago Spoken Word venues. New York’s East Village artist swag was unsuited for places such as “A Touch of the Past” located out west at 947 Mannheim. ATOP and “Some Like It Black" (in the Swift Mansion on 45^th and Michigan) were nothing like the Nuyorican which was filled to the rafters with tourists, artists and college students. Chicago venues were gruff and gritty like Bogies in East Orange, NJ where my love for contemporary Spoken Word had originated. At ATOP, poets and patrons stood in the freezing cold like soldiers and smoked Black & Milds pipe tobacco cigars; and back then, we could (and did) smoke inside venues as well.

I smoked Black & Milds for fifteen years and even packed (un)healthy quantities for overseas trips. For a decade and a half, I stood outside hundreds of poetry venues (and sundry other places) here and abroad, smoking for relaxation.

In the end, smoking became far too inconvenient. First, I began to realize that my attempts to mask the odor were pathetic. I noticed even I could stand in corridors and tell smokers had recently been there; and was able to discern non-smokers from smokers whenever people were close enough. I’ve looked below from windows and watched people leave office buildings to drive a block or so away from their coworkers and smoke, then get back in the car and pointlessly spray themselves with something that might allow their coworkers to feign ignorance.

I started to wonder how many had decided against coming anywhere near me –at meetings, in lounges, at merchandise tables- because of the scent of smoke. I became self-conscious when people coughed. I worried that smoking could impact my social and economic mobility; that smokers were like detached socioeconomic lepers. I have passed retail stores and fast food restaurants with workers standing out back beside the denigrating stench of refuse glazed trash bins taking “breaks.”

The idea that I could not, most times, go anywhere unless I paused to smoke became a problem. It was more important to smoke first than to get wherever quickly. Time was reserved for smoke breaks during road trips. I delayed going through security at airports or contacting my ride to let them know I had landed.

Whenever the sky was overcast, I smoked ad hoc to beat the rain. Extreme heat or cold were usually worth the unnecessary discomfort as long as smoking was involved; even during winter visits to Anchorage.

Parents are largely concerned with keeping their children comfortable. Most children find little comfort in observing their parents’ irrational, voluntary, imminent demise.

I imagined that a two hour window was enough time for the odor to leave my person so I began waking up earlier to smoke in hopes my family would be unaffected. Still the neighbors looked at me weirdly; I tried to find places where I would be unseen. I only smoked in cars with non-smokers and only when they brought up that it was ok. I never smoked with a child in the car. One day, I noticed I could smell the tobacco from nearby cars while I waited at a traffic light. Consequently, I realized that whenever I smoked in a car, I was possibly poisoning the children (and anyone else) in nearby vehicles; breaking the social contract.

In 2014, being without health insurance became a crime in America. Smokers are anathema to the international healthcare community. In fact, you don’t even have to smoke, prohibitive premiums are doled out just because you happen to share a residence with a smoker.

On a visit to the Museum of Science and Industry (MOSI) in Tampa, I took in a far less than flattering pictorial exhibit regarding the way smoking affects your skin as you age. It served as a colossal wake up call for my vanity.

I put out my last Black & Mild on the afternoon of May 30, 2014 and the more time passes, the more I lack ways to justify or comprehend how I was able to rationalize smoking. I did not wean myself off or use patches or counselors. One day, I had simply had enough. Nevertheless, if you wish to stop and require a ramp down, then I strongly recommend you do whatever it takes.

Being smoke free/

has to be/

the simplest way/

to stay alive.

-taalam acey

May 29, 2015

The last Friday in May - one year from my last smoke

Tampa, FL

(feel free to share this as you see fit)

Of Walter Rodney, Walter Scott and Dread Scott

2015-05-13T02:19:00.001-07:00

"Actually, if ‘underdevelopment’ were related to anything other than comparing economies, then the most underdeveloped country in the world would be the U.S.A, which practices external oppression on a massive scale, while internally there is a blend of exploitation, brutality, and psychiatric disorder." -Walter Rodney, "How Europe Underdeveloped Africa" (1972)

When we are biased, self-righteousness and oversimplification become seductive Sirens. And, I am biased because I belong among the fatherless living. More accurately I, like many, have a biological father...but no dad. This, however, has not rendered me completely unsympathetic to deadbeats. It has, however, hindered me from being especially corcerned about their fates. The idea that a father could muster the strength to raise a fork to his mouth without regard to whether his children have eaten, at best, seems counterintuitive.

Now if you believe the above applies to you, it probably doesn't. The males to whom I refer are too selfish to care. It is highly unlikely that an essay regarding responsibility would find its way to them, as they consider accountability far too abstract a concept; both needlessly encumbering and dull. They affirm instant gratification and self indulgence, strictly. Since our discussion here has not yet promoted mindless entertainment, excessive spending, baseless accumulation, insobriety or random sex acts; it is already incomprehensible to them.

"...when any given African did break from what were proving to be onerous extended family obligations, what freedom did he acquire? His choice of alternatives were narrowly dictated by the colonialists, and he was only ‘free’ to participate in the money economy and in the European-oriented cultural sector at the very lowest and uncreative levels." -Walter Rodney, "How Europe Underdeveloped Africa" (1972)

It would be an oversimplification to conflate men who are sincerely trying to do for their children with the blissfully apathetic. This harangue has nothing to do with the man who breaks his back to pay child support but, due to extenuating circumstances, is simply behind...yet still resolved to try. The man who struggles within his means to do his part to ensure his children are provided for should be justly applauded.

Have you ever ran from your car when pulled over?

On August 5, 1962, Nelson Mandela was pulled over by police and, with all the uncertainty he faced, still understood the futility of giving them any added excuse to summarily execute yet another black man. I have spent nights in jail and never found it to be a particularly comfortable experience, but it is definitely preferable to turning my back on an armed, racist coward and running. In fact, if I felt otherwise, it is likely I would not have made it this far. I am black and male. The idea that police officers tend to be unstable toward us was clear long before I was old enough to question the authenticity of Santa Clause. I pray no man actually ran from a cop simply to avoid answering to child support, as has been reported.

It was wrong to kill the gentleman even beyond the ridiculous cover up attempt. "Tennessee v Garner" ruled that police may not use deadly force to prevent the escape of a fleeing suspect who does not appear to be a threat to the officer or others. The suspect in question had been in and out of jail for failure to pay child support. Perhaps, at some point, running from the unstable and trigger happy had begun working out for him. Still, it is ironic to be pulled over for a broken brake light on your new-used Mercedes while driving into the lot of the auto parts store. Please forgive the digression.

I cannot imagine running. Child support is temporal. Death is not.

I have had several female friends who rarely if ever received child support. They no longer seemed to care. Instead, they struggled relentlessly to do everything they could for their child(ren) and accepted as an incomprehensible (and irreversible) reality that the father would not.

In fact, my own father saw no compelling reason to provide for me and left my mother to face twice the responsibility he ran from. My mother, thus burdened, could have given me to one of my grandmothers. She instead dug toes in ground and carried her child into adulthood...alone. And now, my biological father seeks some sort of relationship with the child he metaphysically starved to death decades ago. Go figure. Resurrection, I'm told, is possible, but unlikely.

My frame of reference includes having paid six figures in child support over the years. And, so what! some will pay six figures over the course of the next few months. All things considered, it's nothing.

Name one thing more deserving of a parent's resources than the well being of his/her children. There were times when I wondered if the money I sent for my children was going toward their highest good. However, if I had not sent the money, I wouldn't have had to wonder because I could then be certain it was not. My son resides with me and my daughters are at (or past) the age of majority. Child support is becoming a memory. At times I was behind even though I skipped meals working to pay it. It's of no matter today. Every dime has been paid, my children are healthy and, likewise, I have no regrets.

It is noteworthy here that many historians argue the final nail in the coffin for the institution of American chattel slavery was one enslaved man's desire to directly provide for his family. This desire lead to bloody riots (e.g. "Bleeding Kansas" (1854-1861)), the savage beating of U.S. Senator Charles Sumner by a Congressman while in chambers (5/22/1856), Abraham Lincoln's election (11/6/1860) and the Civil War (1861-1865).

In 1846, Dred Scott offered to purchase himself, his wife and his two daughters from his master's widow. When she refused, he took the case to circuit court, state Supreme Court, federal court and finally, the U.S. Supreme Court where he lost because, "Any person descended from Africans, whether slave or free, is not a citizen of the United States, according to the Constitution." Scott's love for his wife and children ultimately became the impetus that raised the mandates which destroyed America's, "Peculiar Institution."

Freedom for Scott and his family was purchased two months after he lost the case. Tragically (or poetically), Scott worked long hours carrying bags in a hotel to support his wife and children until his death of tuberculosis 18 months later.

Throughout this essay, I have tried to exercise some level of compassion for precarious position of deadbeats. If it still seems a bit cold, it is because the complications and consequences of refusing to provide for your children do in fact appear apropos to me. Yet, I do not wish to put an undue strain on men facing such a heavy obligation while living in a system which wishes to emasculate them at every turn. An acquaintance of mine recently lost his brother to a suicide influenced by a seemingly impossible child support burden. We can only do what we can and to that end we must claw to provide for our children until the bitter end. Clearly life is not an immortal condition and, thus, offers no wiser investment than that which we sow into the futures of our living legacies.

"You can run but you can't go far. No matter where you go...There you are." -Anthony "Treach" Criss from Uptown Anthem (1991)

Dedicated to historian Walter Rodney, assassinated on June 13, 1980 leaving behind a wife and three children whom he struggled for.

-Taalam Acey

May 15, 2015

Tampa, FL

A Lesson Learned from Imamu Amiri Baraka: a brief hagiography

2015-05-06T02:48:00.001-07:00

In 1968, Everett LeRoi Jones began refering to himself as Amiri Baraka which translates to, "Blessed Prince." By this time, he was already an Obie award winning playwright, Greenwich Village beat poet and a principle figure of the Harlem Black Arts Movement.

In 1966, Baraka helped form a community arts group called the Spirit House Movers and Players. The Spirit House, itself, was located at 33 Stirling Street in Newark's Central Ward. Not long afterward, he became affiliated with Los Angeles based scholar Ron Everett (known by then as Maulana Karenga) who arrived unannounced one day at The Spirit House. The name "Mualana Karenga" translates to Master (in a pious sense) and Keeper of Tradition. Anecdotally: Dr. Martin Luther King would show up to The Spirit House, in a similar fashion, in late-March 1968, just days before his tragic assassination.

Swahili, an east Afrikan lingua franca which shares many words with Arabic, had been among Dr. Karenga's college studies. Baraka's relationship with Karenga's US (i.e, as opposed to THEM) organization and Afrikan traditionalist Kawaida Theory (from which Kwanzaa's Nguzo Saba is based) may have influenced him to bestow Swahili names on members of his own group, CFUN (Committee for a Unified NewArk).

Baraka accepted an invitation to teach at San Francisco State College during the Spring semester of 1967. While there, he lived in the residence of Eldridge Cleaver, Ed Bullins and Marvin X; known then as "The Black House." It was during this period that he became acquainted with Oakland's Black Panther Party (BPP).

Eventually, a schism developed between the Marxist political mindset of the BPP and the Afrocentric (i.e., Afikan traditionalist) views shared by the US organization and The Spirit House. Ironically, in the mid-1950's, Baraka had been dishonorably discharged while a sergeant in the U.S. Air Force for his alleged Communist leanings. However, in the late-1960's, far leftist politics was seen to be in direct conflict with Afrocentrism. Amiri blamed "white led, so-called radical groups" for fanning the flames during the 1967 Newark rebellion in which he was badly beaten (and nearly given a 3 year sentence) for allegedly firing a weapon at the police. The rift tween US and the BPP was eventually seized upon and exacerbated by the FBI's COINTELPRO (as evidenced later during the 1975 Church Committee hearings and in an FBI memo dated November 29, 1968) to the point of bloodshed including the January 17, 1969 UCLA deaths of Black Panthers John Huggins and "Mayor of the Ghetto" Alprentice "Bunchy" Carter.

Newark, where Baraka was referred to as "Imamu," Swahili for "Spiritual Leader," was decidedly Afrocentric with regard to community organization. The Black Panther Party and Trotskyism were not major factors there. In The Spirit House, where police had at times confiscated theatric scripts and threatened to lock up poets for reading their work, three organizations combined: (1) The Spirit House joined forces with (2) the Kempo self-defense group "Black Community Defense and Development" and (3) United Brothers/Sisters. Karenga suggested the amalgamated organization be named "The Committee for a Unified NewArk." This group unsuccessfuly backed several Essex County political candidates in 1968 and then went on to strongly support Kenneth Gibson, who would be elected as Newark's first black mayor in 1970. Baraka moved his organizational headquarters to the House of Unity on the corner of High Street and Springfield Avenue.

In 1970, Baraka published the book, "It's Nation Time," and I was born in Newark to Black Nationalist parents. Afrocentrism was black Newark's zeitgeist and "Slave" names were considered anachronistic. Likewise, it followed I was given a Swahili name: "Mtaalamu Weusi," which translates to "Black Scholar." The year following my birth, my parents joined CFUN. Citing my mother's smile, Imamu personally dubbed her, "Tamu," the Swahili word for, "Sweet."

My first recognizable steps were taken in Baraka's home and yet in a lifetime of sundry interactions, I never felt an acknowledgement of our connection. We shared a table at an educational event and I explained to the students his significance to me, but he and I were unfamiliar. Other CFUN children such as Nyota David and Malkia King were close friends of mine who grew up continuously interacting with him, but I had not. I once brought a young woman to his South 10th Street home for a school interview assignment but neither of them were aware of the deeper relationship. Later, I participated in a couple of community poetry readings at his home, but then so had hundreds of people over the years. His son Ras and I have been reacquainted since our 20s and friendly, if not friends. Baraka's daughter Dominique DaPrima assisted the illustrious Stevie Wonder when he was gracious enough to interview me on May 15, 2008. The topic of Baraka, of course, came up during the interview. However, when I would find myself near him, I never mustered the strength to discuss the accompanying proverbial elephant of whom only I was cognizant.

Once, I exhibited at the Harlem Book Fair and watched Imamu walk down 126th street in statesmanlike mode pumping arms, signing autographs and posing for pictures. I stood aside, nearly in awe, watching this Grand Marshall who required no parade. Rather than ask for a picture, I typed a note in my phone that read, "12 books of poetry, 10 works of non-fiction, 3 pieces of fiction and 7 books of plays." It would come to serve as my on-demand reminder of what a solid literary legacy looked like.

On April 28, 2012, a group of Newark schools, city government and organizations hosted the Harlem Book Fair at Rutgers University with Baraka as a guest of honor. I was in Newark that day to perform with Angela Kariotis at the NJ Performing Arts Center, so I stopped by the Fair beforehand and paid homage to Baraka from the stage. I mentioned our connection, recited poetry and then closed by pulling out my cell phone and sharing the aforementioned note and its relevance to me. Baraka was visibly moved.

In retrospect, my hesitance to reach out to him was emotionally costly. I regret not being more assertive in our interactions, especially when I stood to learn so much. One particularly memorable regret can be traced to a night at the 2012 Geraldine R. Dodge Poetry Festival. Baraka Sele, a respected theater producer and namesake of Baraka's, had invited me to curate an event called Sacred Circle Cafe which, among other amazing poets, included Ras Baraka. While walking to the event, my mother and I encountered Imamu resting at a table. He sat looking at us with large eyes and an even larger smile. Still, I did no more than wave and speak a reverent,"Hello" while barely breaking stride. Part of me believed he was smiling to be cordial and had no idea who we were. It never dawned on me that, for one, he might have recalled the smile of the woman he had once termed, "Sweet."

On May 1, 2013 Poetry Magazine published Baraka's scathing critique of Callaloo editor Charles Henry Rowell's, Angels of Ascent: A Norton Anthology of Contemporary African American Poetry. Baraka noted, "It is obvious, as well, looking through this book, that it has been little touched by the last twenty years of Afro-American life, since it shows little evidence of the appearance of spoken word and rap." He goes on to mention a few contemporary poets who are "missing" and among them he mentioned Ras and me. I could no longer conveniently convince myself that Imamu had no idea who I was. Now (I believed) there was finally enough context for us to speak. Yet, by the time the critique came to my attention, Imamu was already hospitalized and I was never to see him again. Imamu Amiri Baraka transcended on January 9, 2014. Four months later, his legacy would expand. His son Ras was elected Newark's 40th mayor.

"There is but one simple thing wrong with you - you think you have time." - Carlos Castaneda

Taalam Acey

May 9, 2015

Santa Jose, CA

God is the Best Planner: a firsthand account of the Baltimore rebellion

2015-04-29T00:39:00.001-07:00

"We plan and God plans and surely God is the best planner." -Quran interpolation

It was "Louder than a Bomb" that brought my daughter and I to Baltimore several hours in advance of my feature on Saturday, April 25th. "Louder" was my friend Chin-Yer's free Baltimore Citywide Youth Poetry Slam. Earlier, I had picked my eldest daughter up from her campus with the intent of the usual face-to-face status report and knowledge transfer over dinner. Rather than take her to a DC restaurant near campus, I decided on Ruth's Chris on Baltimore's Water St. because my master plan was to talk and dine and then volunteer at the youth event. The latter was not to occur.

We approached Baltimore from 95 and, at the point where 395 becomes Howard, encountered what the news media had, at best, inadequately covered. The area around Camden Yard was in control of an evangelical-like revival of hundreds with wailing mouths, flailing arms and bright colored signs of the apocalypse waved in erratic Möbius strips. "Black Lives Matter."

The media had not prepared us for this. We had heard about the protests ignited by the murder-come-near-spinal-separation of 25 year-old Freddie a Gray at the hands of city police on April 12th but this historic response had been irresponsibly underrepresented.

We were forced to make a right on Conway. As we approached the Inner Harbor, things appeared to calm. The closer we came to the city's $102 million per annum tax revenue generating tourist draw with its estimated $2.3 billion worth of economic activity, the more we saw the same brand of police militarization first introduced to many of us in Ferguson footage.

"Those who do not remember the past are destined to repeat it." -George Santayana

I parked on N. Gay Street between Water and Baltimore about a mile away from the Camden Yard demonstration. There, God's sense of humor would patiently lie in wait to greet us. After exiting the restaurant, we were standing across the street at Holocaust Memorial Park. My daughter had just asked me if the train tracks used in the design are merely symbolic, or actual tracks from the Holocaust. (They're symbolic).

Suddenly, a black pickup truck with a bed full of bandana obscured camera men sped the wrong way down Gay St. As the light changed, a vanguard of seven 10 year olds on BMX bikes flew into the intersection in a single file. They dropped their bikes in front of the crosswalk and then each stood behind their bikes and began pointing, waving and yelling at drivers to standstill. Traffic obeyed them. There were no police in sight. Our children were in control.

Seconds afterward, citizens in a formation the size of a military Company marched up Gay Street. It soon became clear this was more-so the size of a full battalion. A few teenagers donning backpacks were distributing printed propaganda complete with a list of demands. Among hundreds filing past us were the people I've sat next to on the light rail, exchanged nods and glances with at Lexington Market and shopped beside at Mondawmin.

Focused. No one chose rest, steamed crabs, Natty Bohs and Empire on DVR. No, this was a deliberate rebellion with Coup De Grace potential. The media would not dare tell this truth. In December 2014, Routers covered a global WAVE study (with an introduction by Johns Hopkins) that revealed, "Poor Teens in Baltimore face worst conditions than those in Nigeria." The seven children on bicycles mentioned above had never required such outside opinions.

With thousands in the street, my daughter and I could not have moved the car if we wanted. We became a part of the demonstration by default. (God's Plan)? We fell in line, while several police helicopters hovered above, and walked the protest route three blocks to War Memorial Plaza across from City Hall. One of many battle lines was drawn there. The people on one side and, on the other, a tense platoon of grossly outnumbered police. I introduced my daughter to my friend Akil Mizan who stood amongst a cadre of Fruit of Islam standing by to protect the people. Next, I introduced her to my friend Salim Adofo, a professional organizer who serves as the National Vice Chair of the Black United Front.

We didn't stay long. My daughter commented about how orderly and peaceful the demonstrators were. I told her the eerie calm was largely why we were leaving; These occurrences draw dispersed agent provocateurs, actual unstable/suicidal sociopaths, professional Anarchist agitators and oppose a police force that knows how to deal with chaos far more efficiently than order and add their paid confidential informants who can be instructed how and when to SET IT OFF.

This initially beautiful civil action, though well organized, today seems doomed to perversion and thus that much more likely to be undervalued by posterity. Obfuscation is the Oligarchy's primary tool for maintaining the status quo.

-Taalam Acey

Tampa, FL

April 29, 2015

Recollecting the Future

2015-01-31T06:33:00.001-08:00

Going forward, I intend to observe and absorb more from those visions I gravitate toward in hopes of enhancing aspects (such as atmosphere and synergy) that I've undervalued in the presentation of experiences. There are many venues that are dear to me such as Austin Neo Soul, Bogies, BOBR, The Nuyorican, Da Poetry Lounge and Warm Wednesday's. They have served as home and family to me but are different than what I'm discussing here.

My interaction with such entities as the Brooklyn Tea Party, Fly Poet, Riders Against the Storm, Mecca, Skorpio Blue, Short Man (UK), Poetry in Motion (UK), Some Like it Black, Crime Jazz (Holland), Pozazz, Tourette's without Regrets, Literary Cafe and Poetry Lounge, Sankofa, Wild Child Cafe, Urban Safari, Legacy Books, Jus Words, Sacred Circle Cafe, Euphoria, Akoben, Gangsta Rainbow, Substanz (Munich), Brownstone on Main, When Brothers Speak (Toronto) and a few others have shown me something of a neglected portion of my purpose.

Exposure to these spheres has augmented my potential beyond the inate delivery of channelled words...and yet I've still chosen to do little more than isolate and deliver the words. The above inspired me to channel more than the words, but as of yet I largely have not. Knowing that one has the ability to access and communicate akashic records while never even attempting to create visuals commensurate with the verbals may be irresponsible. It is akin to having access to a divine database but refusing to review and communicate certain key attributes.

Allowing potential to remain as such is to cheat life. When capacitors amass energy, they are supposed to eventually discharge what they have absorbed or else the circuit will break. It's worth noting how easily we can gravitate toward becoming black holes by refusing to manifest our light potential. For what other purpose have we been charged than to shine?!

Sagacity Spindles

2015-01-24T06:30:00.001-08:00

Sagacity Spindles

-Taalam Acey
You Tube link: http://youtu.be/11d_gTlcQ0o

Yo,
This was encoded with zero degrees of encryption
so if you got any game with the English language
it should be easily understood.
It's part Treme, part New Jersey Drive, part Boys N Da Hood part
The Wire.

This is insomnia induced enigma.
Bigger than a Jim Crow rockstar trying to sing the blues
with BB King and Howling Wolf in the colored section
and John Lee Hooker and Muddy Waters in the back shining shoes
with Little Walter and Sonny Boy Williamson
working as attendants in the restroom
and the junkies in the alley fixin'
to nod off to Etta James and Willie Dixon.

Y'all ain't listen'n.

Y'all can't envision.

This is the future of hip-hop as prophesied
by Melle Mel and T La Rock
provided we had decided to separate
trap music from rap music;
thus and ergo,
before souls became predisposed
To imagining themselves as superficial
materialistic killers
and thinking of women as
superficial materialistic hoes.

Alas, it came to pass
that ass was willing to trade potential for glamour
providing incentive for record execs
to become circumspect
and invest in Arm & Hammer futures,
graveyards, ammunition, HMOs, sutures...
anything death-related
to the point they investigated
which D&C equipment providers
could be publicly traded

and made it popular to become a defendant
then took long positions in CCA prisons
since legalized prison slavery
was written into the 13th amendment.
So, who picked cotton for free?
Our enslaved ancestors.
Who sews cotton into jeans for free?
Their imprisoned descendants.
While producer DJs study sound waves
in order to modulate 808s to create confusion.
This is the Simon & Garfunkel, "Sound of Silence"
mixed to the music of Stevie Wonders, "Contusions."

Not quite an illusion but alluding to the fact
that I have to keep reading
because an idle mind will make his idols mine
and self-respect is a vital sign
and figurative sleep walking

is how losers bide their time
and I'd rather be a scholar and a bon vivant.

So whatcha whatcha watcha want whatcha want?!!

You can predict your future by what you flaunt. What you flaunt?

This is self-inflicted contextual meningitis

all transformed through brainstorms

in the old haunts of dead Harlem Renaissance Writers.

I guess I just understand that, "Life is 'Code Blues'"

cause strife is old news.

It's like I sold jewels

to the already initiated,

the already bored and satiated

in poetry venues

while the masses remain emaciated

and the struggle continues

and spoken word artists are like sweatshop workers

with sagacity spindles.

Our pen moves from right to left

as we reach out to the forlorn and bereft,

And, after I finish rockin', after I finish rockin',

after I finish rockin';

Your own soul is up next.

Thoughts on the Divinity of Gifts (and stepping over common barriers)

2015-01-16T16:54:00.001-08:00

A while ago I wanted to sell a piece of jewelry and was in no rush. I patiently collected quotes from various stores and received a perplexing range of offers. The trend seemed to be: the nicer the store; the better the offer. Some of the lower-to-mid-level stores even said my piece was counterfeit while nicer stores complemented the brilliance and clarity of it. In the end, I sold it for over three times what one of the lower-to-mid-level shops had offered.

Life is frequently like that. Lower-to-mid-level people attempt to convince you that your gifts are common, invalid or lacking, simply due to an inability to properly appraise their magnitude. Add to that the fact dishonest people are usually not even clear as to their own murky thought processes and cognitive dissonance.

It is a grave mistake to allow anyone (at any level) to negatively impact your self-worth. None but yourself can stop you. Judgmental people tend to be far more ridiculous than they could possibly realize. Gifts, on the other hand, are divine. Their bestowal implies an inherent debt. Thus, in appreciation, we indefatigably step over the lower-to-mid-level roadblocks as to maintain, honor and affirm our blessed pact with the Divine.

2 Things I Would Tell the 20 year old Me

2015-01-15T02:58:00.001-08:00

1. If you were to give a word of wisdom on any topic in life to a young adult, what would it be?

I wrongly believed having children in my mid-twenties exemplified patience. Many of the people around me, at the time, began having children before they reached twenty (some even in their mid-teens). In those years, I believed thirties was old and forties was damn near geriatric. My goal was to have children while I was still young enough to physically interact with them.

In retrospect, my thirties would have been the perfect time to begin having children. Had I done that, I would've given myself more time to gain a foothold on life as in s-a-v-i-n-g-s and i-n-v-e-s-t-m-e-n-t-s.

Prior to the birth of my first child, I had finished graduate school, began a career and purchased a home. Likewise, I was in better shape than many but in nowhere as good a shape as I would have been had I waited five years or so to truly solidify my finances. It was not unlike beginning a business with little-to-no working capital. Ask any person who has ever failed in business if unimaginable contingencies occur.

Smart people build nest eggs and do not succeed by accident. Other people hope for "luck" while thinking the smart people have it all. "The better you plan; the luckier you get."

Things could have been harder. Many people have children first and then attempt to finish college, normalize their living situation, etc. Short story long: I've been able to do a lot for my daughters (whom I had in my twenties), but I am in a far better position to provide for my son born in my early thirties. And at 44, I still have the physical endurance to outrun him.

2. If you could go back and give your 20 year old self a piece of advice, what would that be?

In my twenties, I purchased an affordable home in a working class neighborhood; in part so that I would be able to send my children to private school. This was backwards. Had I invested in a solid home in the best neighborhood I could afford, I would not have needed to send my children to private school in the first place. Better communities have greater home appreciation and better schools.

Since Most May No Longer See Me Live, Please Enjoy This

2013-12-02T15:41:00.000-08:00

May this message find you well. As time progresses, I travel to present my work less frequently. Likewise, it is likely many will not see me live much anymore; if at all. Last month, I had the opportunity to perform at the anniversary for The Stage in West Palm Beach and just learned that it was filmed and is available on Youtube. Please find links to the segments below for your viewing pleasure:

Part One: Market for Ni$$as
Part Two: Live from the VD Clinic
Part Three: 5 Women/Every Man in Here
Part Four: Scarz/Aura No 3
Part Five: Picture This
Part Six: Who Made This World
Part Seven: What You Deserve
Part Eight: Sagacity Spindles

The other day someone told me their son studied my work in history class. HISTORY class?? LOL!!

FREE UNTIL YOU DIE

2013-01-14T15:58:00.000-08:00

FREE UNTIL YOU DIE

They don't just want you to lay
in the bed you made.
No. They want you to be a slave
to the system;
an unwitting distracted victim.
They want you to work for free
until you die.

So essentially, they eventually
want you to lay
in the coffin they made
in the hearse they rehearsed
in the plot they got
to be six feet deep
and I keep wanting to tell people
not to sleep
or at least keep one eye open
cause they're hoping
to catch you slipping.
It's like they say.
"The system ain't broken;
it was designed to work this way."
Complete with a prison industrial complex
and they figure if you're
willing to don a uniform
then your time is best spent serving
whether behind bars, as a public servant
or working for Halliburton.
Either way your symbiosis is certain
to help ensure that person after person
will work for free until they die.

The biggest lie is that slavery ended
and I've always wondered
how that was sold
because the richest and most powerful
ain't never giving up control
especially since the way
that most of them got to be
and get to stay the richest and most powerful
is by enslaving poor souls.
And, low and behold,
even your idols are beholden
even your idols are suicidal tokens
and thousands and thousands of years
before Christ
spiritual identities BEEN being stolen.
The weirdest thing about civilization
is that the thieves in the temple
always seem to be able
to keep their pockets swollen.
They assassinate a savior,
re-write their teachings
and have always sold them
back to the followers
and the people feel powerless
like they don't know that love is the message
or can't see what the hour is
and if love is supreme
then you can't achieve anything
meaningful through cowardice.
So your choice is either bravery
or slavery
in a time when companies actually believe
they have runaway employees
so they chase down that seamstress
and chain her to a desk
or chase down that sex worker
and tie her to the mattress
or chase down that share cropper
and tie his entire family's future
to the harvest
and them enemy mind's
assembly lines
go on and on-and-on
and they don't quit
until millions of children in the street
don't realize that only one in 25,000
will ever become a professional athlete
and since most won't learn to hustle legally
and most won't earn any type of degree,
they'll either be
an enlisted man or a convicted man.
Either way, their entire earthly soul
will be controlled by Uncle Sam
so I keep looking for ways to make
more and more people understand
that if you ever feel desperate enough
to reach out for the richest
and most powerful hands,
they lie
until they can figure out a way
to make you work for free
until you die.

My intent is to write works that last forever. And, here are 2 questions for you.

2012-09-27T10:14:00.000-07:00

Blessings

May this message find you well. As usual, my full schedule is below.

(I have two questions for you a few paragraphs down.)

Blessings,

When nothing comes to mind I feel bears sharing; I rarely say anything. That's why I haven't been doing much social networking or emailing lately. However, I have been in deep contemplation. I take time writing because I want my work to resonate in minds forever. I often don't write at all for months and also frequently take a month to complete a poem from start to finish. Fortunately, when inspiration hits me, I tend to work on more than one piece at a time.

I've been re-inspired for a couple of months now and am in the process of completing at least six new pieces. I've completed one called "Sun to Light the Way" and another called "Opportunity vs Pleasure." I've recently begun performing both. If you have purchased my latest book of poems, "Sage" (one of the two books I released last month), then you've seen both pieces. And, if you have yet to purchase "Sage: Modern Meditation for Focus" and/or "Syndic: Modern Paradigm for Family Wealth" (which has replaced "Excellent Exposure: an admission of indiscretions and manifesto of beliefs" as my new favorite tome of mine own thoughts and admissions); yes if you have yet to order these two new future classics then please take the time to order your signed copy/copies today at http://www.taalamacey.tv/store.html. I promise you life long treasures that will surely end up like the tattered, dog-eared favorites in my grandmother's library. One reader told me her teenage son began reading "Syndic" as soon as it came in the mail and thus was able to enjoy and digest it before she did. You would be wise to not let either book out of your sight. People who lend out my work tend to re-order it. Seriously.

"Keep your library locked." - Marcus Garvey

Back to my writings in process/progress; three poems I've completed include: one about a lineage of women artists I admire and am inspired by; another is a pseudo-erotic rant (if you can imagine such) called "Tap Pain;" and the other is a socio-political poem named, "Free Until You Die" that deals with the disguises of modern day slavery. I performed the latter for the first time while I was in Columbus, OH this past weekend and it was very well received.

I'm also working on two other pieces: One tentatively called "Satellites" about the folly of man and the other is about dealing with personal demons. The first two I mentioned are done. The second three are in the editing phase and the last two are in the sketch phase.

In the meantime, I have two questions for you. I'm contemplating two projects and would like to gauge interest in them:

#1 Compiling all of my previous 261 tracks as mp3s and including them on a flash drive with the cover art and revised liner notes from all 15 CDs.

#2 Creating another CD of all new material.

Please share your thoughts with me regarding these two items. I'm curious to see if there is interest for either or both. Also, if you have other ideas, I would love to hear them.

Harambee - "We pull together!"

Don't forget to order your signed copies of "Sage" and "Syndic" at http://www.taalamacey.tv/store.html
. They were written from the heart for those who enjoy (and support) my work and thought process.

My full schedule is below and don't forget the Dodge Poetry Festival. It's considered by many to be the largest poetry festival on earth. I'm curating an event there on October 13th. For more information visit: dodgepoetryfestival.org

Harambee,

-taalam acey

http://www.taalamacey.tv

Taalam Acey Until 6am or Whenever You Leave

THE "STATE" OF SPOKEN WORD (Bluntly thinking out loud)

Taalam Acey - "Willie Lynch, LLC" | All Def Poetry x Da Poetry Lounge

On Cops and Staying Alive

Humbled by what people are saying about - Affirmation for Black Men

A Noteworthy Lesson Learned from BET: An Open Letter to Nene Ali and Autum Ashante

Affirmation for Black Men (Filmed Performance). Now it's about change!

Select the video image above or: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIR51Oy4kcU

Perhaps the Less Confrontational of Us Have No Place in Relationships (Why do I suddenly feel cynical?)

Early Social Network Faux Pas

An Open Letter to Jared Paul

A Friend Says I May Share Our Conversation On Deep Depression. May It Help Someone.

If I Have a Place in Spoken Word, This Is How Technology Helped to Secure It

Affirmation for Black Men: Young, Gifted and Black (*NSFW*) Essay, Live Audio Track and Words

Of Suicide and Hope: For Those Not Afraid to Die Yet Scared to Live

Spoken Word: The Origin and Evolution of the Djele

When the Smoke Clears: Why I Had to Quit Smoking

Of Walter Rodney, Walter Scott and Dread Scott

A Lesson Learned from Imamu Amiri Baraka: a brief hagiography

God is the Best Planner: a firsthand account of the Baltimore rebellion

Recollecting the Future

Sagacity Spindles

Thoughts on the Divinity of Gifts (and stepping over common barriers)

2 Things I Would Tell the 20 year old Me

Since Most May No Longer See Me Live, Please Enjoy This

FREE UNTIL YOU DIE

My intent is to write works that last forever. And, here are 2 questions for you.

Affirmation for Black Men: Young, Gifted and Black (NSFW) Essay, Live Audio Track and Words