Regie Gibson
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Author, songwriter, educator and workshop facilitator Regie Gibson has performed taught and lectured at universities, theaters and various other venues in seven countries most recently Havana, Cuba. Himself, and his work appear in the New Line Cinema film "love jones” a film based on events in his life. Before leaving Chicago he was Writer in Residence at the Effie O. Ellis Center sponsored through National- Louis University and is Chernin Center for the Arts Community Writers. Regie has performed his work with the Elgin Symphony Orchestra and Orchestra “X” a multi ethnic ensemble of classically trained musicians from several countries. In 1999 Regie founded “The Church of the Funky Word”: A literary and musical arts ensemble utilizing classical, contemporary and original literary texts, music and rituals from various world cultures. In addition to his teaching and performances, Regie lectures on poetry, creative writing, and communication for young adults
and has been widely published in anthologies, magazines, journals, sound and electronic media.
He has been a featured numerous times on NPR. And is currently featured on WGBH-2 Art Close-Up. His first Collection of poems “Storms Beneath the Skin” has received the Golden Pen Award.
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The Witness (?)
i did | NOT | see a thing | NOT | a thing | NOT |
bat in father hand | NOT |
mother head implode | NOT | rush or crush
of bone of head caving like divot
like fresh tire track in wet red sand
did | NOT | hear the awful splitting yes
did | NOT | | NOT | hear the awful did | NOT |
hear last shutter shocked
ghost of air leave as she slumped forward into
never like an emptied hand bag did | NOT |
taste the inside of my stomach did | NOT |
feel fear fall into the hole i was
the whole i was did | NOT |
see floor rise to meet her blood or hair
uncovering skin uncovering bone of head I did | NOT |
see crush beneath balanced beauty
of black wood pirouetting in brown hands
of the father | NOT |
standing like awe at how easily
the mother silhouetted
when grace danced from his grip when
he became cudgel knowing her head was
wilt and winter and death
had finally listened to the dark god
in his hands
How to Dig Nina
For Nina Simone Some Advice to Al
First,
Abandon what you know about voice, brother-
What makes it and women beautiful…
And just put your hands into earth,
Close your eyes, and listen to alluvia, indigo root,
Coals bituminous narrative speaking the fossil wet womb.
Next,
Place an ear to your grandmothers back-
To where it bends at its most incurable angle.
Hear the holy conflagration of tambourines-
The orgied boot stomp holler-- the sermoned ring shout
of ripened hands.
Then,
Wait. Wait until language un-shackles a tongue flame
Above your head. When this happens (as it always will)-
Your mouth will germinate a naked song.
That night,
Go bury that song in your lover
Until her breasts opalesce with milk, until her belly
Becomes blossom and mother note.
Yams, Maize and Matzo Ball Soup
for the Colonizing European Soul
An Old Western Love Song circa 15th century and counting
After Yusef Komunyakaa
Because your kiss
Codifies genocide into a smoldering
Coefficient of Arawak flesh. & the crusade
In your eyes makes me want to fill your
Hands with severed hands…
For you, my love,
I’ll assail the seven seas in search of whole
Peoples to kill. Colonize your mouth
Print on mind matter. Play a shell game
With their gods.
There are so many ways
To love you, it makes me want to rape something
And bring it to Jesus. When we're apart,
My instinct to extinct rises
Like distilled molasses,
& I punctuate your portrait
With an ellipsis of slave-ships. My need for you
Is a crucible. No. Is an oven pregnant
With yellow stars. A charred castration
Paused for a photograph.
Is a mushroom
Grafted from wind & fire, blooming
In the blackening horizon like a bush
That won’t stop burning.
