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Scorpio, performing at IWPS 2019 in San Diego, CA.
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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.
There's nowhere in nature
where true silence exists, So, as us humans do,
we created one. We call it an anechoic chamber,
a room designed to cancel the noises Of the outside world
and kill all reflections. Any sound produced in this room
gets lost in the walls. No one has ever been able
to stay in one alone For more than an hour. Within ten minutes,
your mind tunes into your heartbeat. The loudest sound for you to cling onto. Within 30, you start to hear
the blood moving through your brain. By the time an hour rolls around, You've already driven yourself mad. Us humans need sound, the same way that we need love. You see love is sound and silence,
the lack thereof. My father was a musician. He constantly surrounds himself
with music, But my mother tells me
he was out strumming chords For other women,
so we moved away from him. She always made sure
the house was filled With salsa and reggae. A man took a liking to her. Moved us from our loud house
in Houston, Texas To an anechoic apartment in Tampa, Florida. You see, words are so easily lost in these walls. The same way love has gotten lost
in these walls. I know separation far too well
and I know a relationship Is on its last leg… When there is silence, When we no longer have words For one another, no frequencies to exchange, Or laughter to fill the air. I've been hearing you echo through my eardrums. You always have something
to say in my dreams. So it seems…
You've come back around
to create more silence. Another relationship gone cold. Heart rate decreasing the stillness,
still driving me mad. I told her I loved her before I felt her silence and it feels like… L-l-like a piece of myself is missing,
like the air has gone thin, And I took a wrong turn, Down the wrong path
in the black of night. My body still be finding it difficult
to break the stillness, This cardiac don't make 808s. I guess this heart break,
blood streams stagnant, The quiet keeps me awake. I guess there ain't enough love
inside this body To keep the music on. So, I be searching for underground raves
in the hearts of women Trying to hear something,
but you see, My mentor is telling me
that beauty be deafening, So I guess that's why
I can't hear much these days Because it feels like
I've blown out my eardrums Breaking beats for girls who won't return a single riff, Busting baselines but can't get
a melody to leave her lips, Trying to make music in this anechoic frame I keep on ending up… In silence. And I yearn for the day
that this heartbeat breaks And pumps 808s, that this body
be filled with frequencies, Grand pianos living in my throat,
that I meet a girl, Who will be making music
at the same key signature, The same tempo,
and God will mix us Into the DJ set of history
because I know that love is out there, Somewhere. All I have to do is listen. (cheers and applause)
