Mende Nazer at McrLitFest

Yesterday was Manchester Literature Festival all day.

Morning was bright and pale winter sun, seems like we skipped the rich gold of autumn this year. I was very nervous, because I had to do a performance at “Words on Asylum & Refuge“, an Amnesty International event in McrLitFest, and I wasn’t sure if any of my poems or songs were appropriate. The event took place at Cross St Chapel in Manchester city centre in a lovely circular room with creamy pillars and a domed ceiling, which lent a warm echo to the sound of all the people chatting. Good thing the acoustics were beautiful, because we discovered during the first speech that the PA didn’t work.

First onstage was Mende Nazer and Caroline Clegg. Mende wrote with Damien Lewis “Slave“, an astonishing autobiographical account of how she was abducted from a village in the Nuba mountains of Sudan and sold into slavery. Caroline is a theatre director and producer of Feelgood Theatre, who was so moved and inspired by the book that she spent years tracking down Mende to ask if she could adapt it into theatre. The result was “Slave: A Question of Freedom”, which has since toured the country, playing at the House of Commons and was turned into a Channel 4 film “I Am Slave”, starring Wunmi Mosaku.

Mende spoke very eloquently of her experiences, which brought her to the UK as a slave to a Sudanese diplomat. At times, she was too emotional to continue, so Caroline took over the account. There was a quiet, intensely moving moment where Mende described the first moment she heard the word “freedom” and understood that it was a possibility for her. I am rarely moved to tears by a live speaker, but this was one of those few occasions.

Having to perform my relatively lightweight material after such an inspiring woman was rather daunting, but I did my best to sing my soul out using the domed acoustics as a tuning fork. Singers may know what I mean by that.

The event finished with an equally moving presentation by WAST (Women Asylum Seekers Together), who spoke of their fantastic self help work with asylum seekers in Manchester. One of the speakers was particularly brave, because she herself had been refused asylum. Sadly, I had to rush off at the end of the event to set up the workshop space at Contact for Jean Binta Breeze, so I didn’t get to chat to anyone afterwards. But the experience was deeply inspiring.

What is the Commonwealth?

1948
Brothers & sisters,
we are gathered here to celebrate our common wealth,
the riches we share
when we come together as one family.

Our family grew in abuse,
our bond was sealed in blood,
the seeds of our union grew in poppy fields
& we reaped a drunken harvest in the land of sugarcane.

We picked cotton, packed cotton,
could have spun & woven cotton,
but our hands were occupied,
congealing blood in buckets.

We bought our own cotton back
as cloth on credit,
a family deal from our new loving parent,
a welcome to the fold.

& we so loved her, our mother country,
we dreamed of her each night
we tasted paper kings & queens
& fell asleep to her bedtime tales

till she slammed the door shut

our love, our kinship denied.
But can you deny the thickness of blood & history?
Can you deny wealth that is common?
Is this not our mother’s house?

I know the floors we scrub were never tiled in gold,
the pots we wash are only steel,
but didn’t we pay for those bloodred bricks & mortar
with cotton, sugar, cocoa, coffee, palm oil, rice, rubber, gold & spice?

The human wealth we left behind calls us home,
as we grow tired of cold meat & rain,
our children deny their own names
& become strangers in a strange land.

This family is haunted by guilt & shame.
Can we break this chain,
create a world for our children
where Abuse is not their middle name?

Superheroes of Slam – Behind the scenes

5.30pm. Everything was going to plan. Martin De Mello and I arrived at the Yard Theatre approximately on time. It wasn’t raining when we unloaded the PA and boxes of crisps and drinks from the car. We managed to get inside the venue, not always the easiest of tasks. While Martin set up the chairs, I set up the PA and microphone, plugged in my iPhone and Wanda Robinson sashayed through the speakers. As more people arrived to lending helping hands, we started to put up the Commonword banners.

Now, for the lights. Yard Theatre is a beautiful space, but without stage lights it resembles a concrete bunker, not perhaps the best atmosphere for a poetry gig. Martin drove us to another venue whose tech manager had promised two days before to lend us the lights. In fact, he insisted that he would set them up for us. But he wasn’t there. He just left, explained the man on reception. No lights left for us. No answer when the man tried calling tech man’s mobile. “Could you send him a text?” I asked. “Not much point really,” he answered,”He lost his mobile today.”

Thank God for Emma the venue manager! She helped us root through backrooms piled with lights and stands till we found a couple of parcans and improvised a stand. We rushed back to the Yard Theatre and I set up the lights on the balcony. Just in time. Slam contestants and judges had arrived. Phew! That was close.

Now, where’s the compere? Doors opening in 5 minutes and he wasn’t answering his mobile. 15 minutes later, still no compere. Thank Heavens for Dominic Berry. He just turned up to watch, but Pete Kalu, Commonword director, persuaded him to host. Not that Dominic ever needs much persuading to get onstage. A quick briefing and he was in the spotlight giving it large and camp, flirting generously with everyone in the room, a wonderful compere!

And from then on, the event went swimmingly.

Mark Mace Smith – Superheroes of Slam Champion 2011

Last night was the Grand Final of Commonword‘s Superheroes of Slam at Yard Theatre, Hulme. A sell out event, with standing room on the balcony and a loud enthusiastic audience who were urged on by the always wonderful compere Dominic Berry. Some truly astonishing performances, which the judges sometimes seemed to mark rather begrudgingly, but fairly. The ultimate champion was experienced slam winner, Mark Mace Smith, who collects the Dike Omeje Slam Poetry Cup and £250. Mark celebrated with a barnstorming beatbox attack on Cameron and Clegg.

You can check out Mark Mace Smith on his blog: http://thuddub.blogspot.com/

New tune uploaded on Dark Jazz bandcamp: Take Me

Occupy! Celebrating Dissent

I applaud all those protesting against global exploitation by financial elites in the Occupy protests.

Fight the Power! This economic system is not broken, it is simply working more ruthlessly to benefit those financial elites who created it.

Imagine a different world!

New tune by Timeless Love Orchestra on bandcamp

Prose poem in progress: Blues

Blues

Some might call this hell: these bodies pressed so tight that you don’t know where your own flesh begins or ends, the absence of light so complete that your hand reaches vanishing point six inches from your face, the eyestinging thickness of smoke, of lambs bread and sensie and high roller cigars, the layers of sweat, Old Spice, Charlie, Brut & Tramp, the flash of lighter flame in your face as some bwai checks to see if the gyal by your side is fine or just plain, the music that shakes the walls, rattles the ice in your glass, thrills the marrow in your bones, the heat of so much flesh, sweat flooding spontaneously soaking your brand new buttoned down shirt.

Some might call this hell, but we just call it blues. Blues is this place is where time and space entwine to make dark matter pulsate and all the trivial frustrations of no job wanderlust through the same streets every day, and all the pent up tension of sinew straining labour with bricks and plaster, with pistons and gears, with chip fat and chicken guts, with straightening combs and curling tongs, with spades, steering wheels, ticket machines, filing cabinets and typewriter ribbons. All that mashed down plugged up energy locks into boom boom bash of the blues, this mass of bodies pulled together by ribbons of magnetic attraction into a sweat lodge ritual, where too much pressure bursts forth in neon flowers, sirens, whistles and fog horns, the song of a funkiefied nightingale chirpsing every mampie owl that flutters by, big hipped wings flapping the night sky.

We are the hunting pack, migrating starlings, iron filings, all moving to the same beat, all of the crew, the man dem, the gal deem, the spar, mates and sistren, we are all at the only point that matters, we are the singularity of the night, we are the black hole of love, we are timeless, we are ghosts.

Poem in progress: Scruples – Xmas ’85

Scruples – Nov 85

Tin walkman sings tumbling down
the crowded stairs.

Fish blue dress sucking skin,
blonde lips open to wet gold teeth.
Tinman sees her shuffle bodies,
charismatic convulsions & velvet smiles.

Jilted tinman sings brittle whisky breath,
whines cryptic guttural hate.

Doormen catch him, gently embrace.
Tinman stains a white shirt.
Small stance is strong – crisp elbow strike to chin.
He crumples, soggy fingers
tripping on the step
into amber air.

Tin walkman sings in frozen mud,
his mouth, a dark endless room.

Check out my new music blog: Dark Jazz

Got so much music and weird sounds on my hard drive that I thought it was about time I set up a music blog. Will be posting a tune a week for a while.

http://darkjazzmusic.blogspot.com/