Witness

Roughly accurate transcription of a slam poem for Slam for Peace 07.

 

I am tired of reading-writing-reciting poems

That are born in obscurity and die no closer to clarity

Then I am to you.

And they can be poems about peace or poems about war, about famine or fortune or family or nature or leaves of grass or whatever else that comes to pass,

But I am tired of poems that only make their point only after the second semester of English 1b.

So the poem I am going to recite to you tonight will be born in clarity

And it may die in obscurity,

Or it may die in fame,

Or, if I am very lucky, it may die upon your lips

Ash upon your tongue,

To be reborn in a bigger, bolder, brighter song.

So here it is,

The point, the punchline, the plot, the promise:

Testimony

T-e-s-t-i-m-o-n-y,

As if something can be defined by the spelling of it,

Like if I can recite the proper combination of consonants and vowels it will mean something other then

The evidence of the countless, infinite tiny tragedies that permeate our lives, that we can’t predict or protect or defend against,

All the lost dogs and lost wallets and car crashes that leave people with broken bones and broken lives and broken hearts-

Broken hearts like that women who broke her nail in the hair salon and you didn’t understand why she cried,

But I am telling you,

It is a testimony to a life filled with more cracks and tragedies then you or I have tried to understand.

And so, since we are surrounded by so many little tragedies that we cannot control, I cannot understand why we create the large ones,

Why there are wars in Iraq and Iran and Sudan,

Why people are killing and dying for things even they don’t understand

And why Science and Religion are fighting in courtrooms and schoolyards when they should be worlds apart.

Our world is full of testimonies of tragedies but we don’t listen.

Because every cup of coffee is a testimony to farmers in Columbia who are starving, who are selling drugs with their coffee beans, not for the money and women, but for their wives and children.

And McDonalds is a testimony that our culture values convenience and consumption over compassion

And every religion in the world testifies to the power of one basic concept:

And it harm none, do what ye will.

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Namaste-I recognize the divine within you.

Om mani padme hum. Compassion.

But McDonalds is still a multi-trillion dollar corporation

T-e-s-t-i-m-o-n-y.

If spelling bee ribbons could save the world, I would never sleep, I would never cease, I would start with A and work to Z. I would spell anything, everything. I would spell until my eyes shut.

T-e-s-t-i-m-o-n-y.

But I can spell that word again and again and my eyes are still open.

Testimony means truth because it comes from a witness

My eyes are open so that I can witness, witness the tragedies of the world.

And I am not saying this poem to proclaim that the sky has fallen, the fields are fallow, the cows have gone dry—go home, wait for the Armageddon.

I am reciting this poem because you cannot change what you cannot see.

Witness the tragedies of the world.

Witness what Pandora’s Box has brought upon us.

Witness what she left for us—hope.

Witness you and me and all our lives

Witness this generation.

Witness the power to change the world.