"Word"

Since April is National Poetry Month and the heroine of my latest novel, SWEET SENSATION, is a poet, I thought I'd share some of Deidre "Sweet Dee" James's poetry with you for the rest of this month. ;-) If you hate it, that's okay. She's not real. (I might go somewhere and cry though... But don't worry about that...) The first poem, I'd like to share is titled "Word." And she actually performs it in the novel.

“Word”

When I first heard
brothers on the block saying word
I got excited
I sensed we would be getting our power back again
There is power in the word
the strength of NOMMO
was going to take us home

But when I tell you of this new coming strength
all you can say is
Word!

I try to get you excited
I tell you about the Griots
the storytellers of the motherland
telling history in ceremonial detail
I told you about the power of slaves and ex-colored men
using the word to tell their narratives
to illustrate incidents in their lives
to punch holes in that peculiar institution

And all you can say is word?

In the 70s the word was spoken and Black was beautiful again
We’d lost the knowledge
of our beauty for so long
And all it needed was to be spoken into existence
We spoke it and there was power
Black Power

I tell you this and you, awed by history I suppose, simply say, word. . .

I mean the word is supposed to be more powerful than that
The word is supposed to take us back
The word and the drum they are with us again
We have the word in rap
and the drum in the boom-bap
But no one seems to be using them in the way they were meant
to be used
They don’t uplift, inspire, or even engage

And I complain to you and all you can mutter is word.
WORD

I know that you know that word is bond
Word is life
In the beginning was the word
God spoke it and created day and night
“In the Beginning was the word
the word was with God
and the word was God
He was with God in the beginning”
There is power in the word

And don’t look at me or even fix your mouth to say word, but
Be word enact word
Be word enact word
Be word enact. . .