Hello Friends,
Today's poem is a spoken word piece by Imani Cezanne entitled "Flowers." I have included a transcript of the first lines below, but the piece is only properly taken in as an oral performance — so please watch it here.
The very origins of poetry are oral. Back before we wrote anything down, humans invented rhyme and meter for the purposes of making their words, their stories, easier to memorize, repeat, and pass from one person to another. In this sense, today's spoken word and rap are truer to poetry's origins than the written word.
Just some food for thought.
Ellen
My mother tells me
I'm her favorite daughter.
Granted, I'm the only one.
But it makes me smile anyway.
The other day I
asked her what kind of flowers
she wants to be buried with.
Gardenias, she said.
White ones.
She isn't dying.
But I've spent my whole life
watching her eat herself
into the earliest grave
she can fit into.
This is only a brief excerpt. Please watch the rest of Imani Cezanne's piece here.