Poets here, Poets there.

Things have slowed down a lot since the craziness in Canada. It's a somewhat bittersweet break, and it's given me a much needed opportunity to reflect on the places I've been and the people I've met. Canada was such a wonderful experiennce, and was surprisingly different than I thought it would be. So often, in the states especially, we tend to lump Canadians in with Americans. True, the culture isn't that different, but there are a few discrepencies that can catch a girl off guard. Things so small that they can't really be explained or articulated. Just a general feeling. Michael Moore made a bit of a joke about it in one of his films, and although I'm not a huge Michael Moore fan, I think he pretty much nailed it. There's just a general feeling of trust amongst the Canadian people that we don't have in the states. Sure it exists in some towns in the states, and I"m sure that there are places in Canada where people are a bit more wary of each other, but generally speaking, there's just so much less tension. It's a relief, but also a bit unnerving. And of course, there's the obvious reality of the nomadic lifestyle which has hit me quite hard these past few weeks in mexico: It is indeed quite hard to say good bye to such wonderful people after only meeting them.

I can't believe it's mid-November already! As I've been pursuing this project, mainly by interviewing poets from all over, poetry lovers, random people at poetry events and the like, I've slowly started to realize that I may have an obligation to use this knowledge for a greater good. It's not like I'm learning how to save the world from evil oil drillers or something, but I am still gathering information that could be extremely useful in helping poets achieve what seems to be a universal goal: create some kind of dialogue between people of different perspectives. If you think about it, that's the point of spoken word anyway- to reach people through words who normally wouldn't have the time or the heart to listen.

Everywhere I go, I've been stunned by the differences, sure, but even more so impressed by the similarities. Canada and the US are obviously quite different than Mexico, culturally, linguistically and socioeconomically. To be honest, because I had been forwarned that the poetry scene here is just a baby, I wasn't expecting much. But when I went to D.F. a week ago for the slam, I was completely blown away. In addition to listening to his poetry, I had a great interview with E-Wor, a 15 year old MC:

His style is playful and heavily hip-hop influenced, but with a message of social justice and political reform. In fact, the poetry that night was dominated by a general call to action directed at the youth of this country, a challenge to really listen and question what is going on in the media and in the political realms of the country.

Basically, what really shocked me was the similarity between the politically inclined style of the poets here and that of the poets in Canada. Sure the language is different, and the criticism of women getting plastic surgery to look like Paris Hilton carries a bit more weight here than it does in Canada, but overall the similarites were both striking and invigorating. At one point, I wanted to write down a translation of a poem from one poet in mexico and compare it to the words of a poet in Canada. I was, and still am convinced that if the poems were translated into the same language they would appear so strikingly similar that an uninformed third party may believe they were written by the same poet.

A scene, so new and (some what) poetically isolated, that portrays such dead on similarities can only mean one thing: that the desire to spread a message of change and justice through spoken word can be developed completely organically without the influence of spoken word artists from places like New York or Chicago. True, the slam organizers here are (originally) from the states, but when asked, they most vehemently replied that the scene existed here long before they came along. It just needed some organization.

I did a little research on my own here, asking some of the local academics about the tradition of spoken word in Latin America. Although I have not had any first hand exposure (and I think it's due to the region of Mexico I'm in right now), many people have referred me to the Décima tradition. Decimistas are people who compete in improvisational style of a tight octosyllabic form with 10 lines (hence the name, décima) in an ABBACDDC rhyme pattern. It was repeatidly emphasized to me, and so I will pass along the emphasis here: décimas are an *improvised* performance art that often tell the story of a town, city or culture.

I don't know if I'll be able to meet a decimista here, but I'll definitely ask around. My point is, of course, that it truly does seem that there is some inherent human need to use the power of our voices to portray the true condition of a people and their relationship with their society and state. Maybe that's why even modern spoken word artists tend to feel such a responsibility to not only connect with people, but to tell them the "truth" or at least expose them to another perspective. The more I study it, the more I see that spoken word seems to be a type of oral blogging, except to call it blogging is sort of counterproductive because blogging is relatively new, whereas spoken word has been around for as long as language has existed. People use their ability to perform, captivate and influence through poetry as almost a new type of media. Perhaps its recent (re)surgence in popularity could be due to the fact that people are starting to realize that even our public media has an agenda, that newspapers and t.v. stations are first and foremost a business.

When I embarked on this project, I wanted to examine the differences between spoken word scenes in different countries. I was emphasizing difference because I believed that the poetry would be affected by levels of priviledge. What I failed to realize, at least up until this point, was that priviledged or not, people want to make a difference in their world. But as my study continues, I am only sure that my theory will change and change again. It's hard to say what is beyond the horizon. I only know that it will be full of words.