Reflections

Sporty Tongues

I don’t know when it began, but poetry has become a sport. I always thought it was disingenuous to see art used as a competitive medium, but there are a number of contests to see who can “battle on the mic.”  Poetry is the channeling of Spirit. If I am channeling Spirit, there is no battle…just sweet surrender.

If art is based on truth, and in particular my truth, there is nothing you can say or do that will extinguish it.  Conversely, there is nothing that I can say or do that will eradicate your truth.  That begs the question, why is there competition if the competition is spiritually ineffectual?

This is the reason I don’t participate in poetry slams: I don’t like how competition corrupts art.  For me, art is about building community.  I don’t need a winner and a loser, or for someone to be named the victor or the vanquished. The joy is in connecting and igniting people to fire their own light. 

Poetry struggles enough as it separates from the ego.  Once my poetry is free, it has no need for conquest. It is enough that it sees itself, hears itself, and touches itself …the harmony is all it lives for.

Tease me with your words so I can be seduced. Hug me with your thoughts so I may listen. Your words may tell me things I knew in a former life.

Attack me with your words and I may fall.  Curse me with your words and I may cry.  But once I am silent…you will never know how close I was to liberating you.


Copyright 2012 Joel Brown