By Button Poetry
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Kofi Dadzie, performing at Camp Bar in Saint Paul, MN.
Transcript provided by YouTube:
00:01
You don’t know how little you matter until you’re all alone
00:07
Product of a broken home and the recycled story it came with
00:15
My mom
00:17
Tells me I don’t take care of myself
00:20
She’s right
00:22
There are days when rage be the only tongue I can call my own
00:26
Days where I can’t remember the last embrace of my father
00:29
Self care is a language I’m still learning
00:31
And my life isn’t a scratching record, meant to repeat the same tired tune
00:36
I find myself trapped in, but I’m a man
00:37
whose masculinity is as fragile as the ego I built it on and that must mean that I’m a casket with a scratched ceiling
00:43
My masculinity is a bad religion
00:45
brought me to my knees and asked me why I fell in the first place
00:47
Meaning, I gave it my devotion and it hung me from the same cross
00:50
I thought would bring me salvation
00:52
My resurrection won’t be as triumphant as the one on the third day was
00:59
It’ll be me waking up to the second verse of pink matter
01:03
See, I learned it all from Frank Ocean
01:05
Learn you take as much time as you need to become who you need to be
01:08
We all grow at our own pace and might take
01:11
4 plus years to drop the damn album, but
01:15
We’ll get there
01:18
I read his open letter
01:19
Saw how coming out cleansed his spirit I saw his bare bones and the potency of his penmanship
01:24
It almost sounded like me
01:25
Now I couldn’t truly relate to the story
01:28
Our experiences be different but I’ve longed for that same catharsis because I never had that, you know
01:34
I’ve always been taught I was the man of the house
01:36
Taught to take care of everyone and then myself
01:39
You try not to show the broken
01:41
So you learn to numb the pain
01:43
Novocaine did it the best — the Frank Ocean song — not actual Novocaine
01:47
Where was I?
01:48
Something about numbing pain and how my fists numbed every time I acquainted them with the walls
01:51
I get lost in the thrill of it all
01:53
I let it linger
01:54
It’s the only way I’ve ever remembered that I am my father’s son
01:57
It’s the only sliver of manhood he ever left me with
02:00
See the men in my family don’t really get it like that but Frank does
02:03
See the men in my family are children of the sons with obsidian hearts
02:06
Meaning they’re black and beautiful but cold and hard to crack
02:09
I ain’t ever seen my father cry
02:11
Only seen my brother cry once
02:13
I ain’t cried since death made my grandfather past tense
02:15
Frank Ocean has that project right?
02:18
Boys don’t cry
02:20
But I’m learning that tears tear away the turmoil of any trauma and because of that I’m making peace with my soul
02:25
Because of that I’m praying for peace of mind to rain from the sky
02:29
Like man I guess what I’m trying to say is Frank Ocean taught me how to love myself
02:33
Taught me to take my time
02:34
Told me that not being okay is okay because I never looked at myself as anything more than a burden
02:39
I always felt myself to be akin to Atlas, holding up the weight of the world on strange shoulders and scraped knees
02:45
I’ve reprised my desire to do his solo
02:48
I’m learning to take care of myself in a way that won’t worry my mama
02:52
All while turning my casket’s scratched ceiling into an open door
02:55
I’m learning that this is a sweet life
02:57
That I’d rather chip my pride than lose my mind out here
03:00
It wasn’t Frank Ocean that I thought would help me experience this epiphany
03:05
because in all honesty
03:07
I’m used to being closed. Oh, yeah,
03:12
Ain’t used to being wrong
03:15
Now you are and I am madly involved
03:17
Madly involved
—
This post was previously published on YouTube.
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Photo credit: Screenshot from video
