Join this channel to get access to perks:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5DH…
Alysia Harris, performing for the Strivers Row.
Do you love Button Poetry? We’d love your support:
https://bit.ly/ButtonMember
About Button:
Button Poetry is committed to developing a coherent and effective system of production, distribution, promotion and fundraising for spoken word and performance poetry.
We seek to showcase the power and diversity of voices in our community. By encouraging and broadcasting the best and brightest performance poets of today, we hope to broaden poetry’s audience, to expand its reach and develop a greater level of cultural appreciation for the art form.
Transcript provided by YouTube (unedited)
0:04
people ask me about the world
0:08
whether i think the world is worth
0:10
saving
0:12
i think the world is first worth
0:16
or it is just a marble
0:19
of the human heart turn it
0:22
and behold all its contradictions
0:25
sometimes it’s azure sapphire
0:28
sometimes it’s downright gangrene
0:32
but always singular a tiny
0:35
gem of life in a fist of the dark
0:38
the earth and the human heart
0:42
people ask me why i believe in god
0:46
why have faith at all just do good deeds
0:50
but this is the pillow on which all my
0:53
fifties
0:53
sleep and it’s not religion just an
0:57
attempt to recover the beloved to your
0:59
bed
1:00
so when i say amen when i say the dawn
1:04
is breaking the bones of your heart like
1:07
twigs
1:08
look at all the falls we’ve taken and
1:10
remember we are still
1:12
obvious consider the tiniest sparrow
1:15
it’s belief in its seeming invincibility
1:18
it’s ringing throats it’s eggshell bones
1:21
a body so people are it has its song
1:26
well there be there may be no gorgeous
1:29
harmony for us
1:30
at the end of the day but predators i
1:33
pray won’t you
1:34
feast on this phrase what i mean is
1:37
creation will kill you
1:38
it is so beautiful look at how brightly
1:41
it unmakes
1:42
all its children so when i say humanity
1:46
is my first
1:47
love i mean 276 girls studying physics
1:53
40 palestinians and a black hole
1:57
when i say very ashes to ashes and dust
2:01
to dust what i mean is
2:02
i saw life today it fasted from sun up
2:06
to sun down and then broke with
2:08
much joy and there is no shroud white
2:10
enough to smother the muscle of
2:12
spring its fatness its pink so when i
2:15
say
2:15
feast i mean quits parabolic hair or
2:18
peach or perhaps
2:19
my tongue or lower my breasts or lower
2:22
my flesh a clarity ribbon in your mouth
2:24
because
2:25
it’s all love and it tastes good to me
2:28
it tastes good to me to me it tastes
2:30
good to me i mean i mean when the fruit
2:32
becomes
2:33
red meat in your hand what do you need
2:36
to know
2:37
about the sign or the cosine except the
2:40
apple curves to fit the vivid frame of
2:43
your lips and that’s
2:44
another amen so when i say
2:48
let’s stay y’all let’s stay removed
2:51
marooned in this here
2:52
chapel of a few hours remember we have
2:55
all been
2:55
kissed in the scratched out life
2:59
your lover’s body became a fountain and
3:01
your mouth was full
3:08
look around when i say hell
3:12
look around earth the miracle
3:16
of finally burning and not burning out
3:19
and when i say
3:20
alleged heaven remember the crime they
3:23
have tried to make
3:24
of living remember the body has so many
3:27
things to apologize for for which it is
3:30
not sorry
3:31
it is not sorry for bearing witness for
3:33
loving what i could not love for living
3:35
in the creases of your palms like soul i
3:38
am an excess of your tears
3:40
i’m not sorry for giving up i’m not
3:43
sorry for using words that
3:45
feel familiar we’re trying to use
3:48
language as a prosthetic a phantom limb
3:52
so i can hold this world with extra
3:55
hands
3:56
that is how much i want to keep it that
3:59
is how much i want to keep it safe
4:02
i have stood on the edge of the sea of
4:05
green
4:06
admiring the prenatal architecture
4:09
all on my right all on my left
4:14
we weren’t much but we were humble
4:17
enough to fit
4:18
the smallest anything i remember dancing
4:22
in the rain my shoes were rubber
4:25
my skirt was soaked and everything i was
4:29
was the drug of god
4:42
you
—
This post was previously published on YouTube.
***
You might also like these from The Good Men Project:
Join The Good Men Project as a Premium Member today.
All Premium Members get to view The Good Men Project with NO ADS.
A $50 annual membership gives you an all access pass. You can be a part of every call, group, class and community.
A $25 annual membership gives you access to one class, one Social Interest group and our online communities.
A $12 annual membership gives you access to our Friday calls with the publisher, our online community.
Register New Account
Need more info? A complete list of benefits is here.
—
Photo credit: Shutterstock