Rough Diamonds

At
The Gothic
Moon Café the
open mike beckons for a
voice. Tribal costumed youth
answer the call, longhaired and/or
shaved heads, some spiked, others colored
green and purple, beaded and braided, male and
female, their bodies pierced and tattooed, wearing baggy
pants, ripped jeans, tie-dyed tee shirts and miniskirts. From the
outrageous to the plain Jane, they line up and sign in. Most pack guitars,
axes to pick and hack away in melody against the cacophony resonant in the
mediocrity of middle-class life. Others speak in verse, selling stories of the wild
banished children of the night, exiled by Main Street America, the stars of “muzak”
videos filmed out in the streets or in cars and bars. Tales of obsession filled with emotion,
discontent and hidden depression. It’s about them, all the angst and ambiguity, with words
that are raw, flawed and unpolished. A primal scream, a rap on life, a static noise echoing
the etchings and scribbled graffiti found on toilet stalls and bathroom walls. Hip-hop
street slang and language found in the MTV thesaurus, mixed with four letter
words in a way that would make Lenny Bruce blush. It’s a Poetry Slam.
They shout it out for shock, culture schlock, cultivated and spawned on
the agar of hype in the Petri-dish of mass media and marketing.
Youth exploiting youth, it’s all the rage, so listen, because
some are in tune and you just might hear echoes of
Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Baraka, or discover
a new Morrison, Dylan or Shakur.
So, let them bear their souls
and shout it out, because
isn’t that what it’s
all about? Poetry
doesn’t die, it
evolves.