3-2-1 Response-TooDeep the Poet

As I continuously attend poetry readings I begin to notice the same thing happening every time. They all talk about life. As minute as it may seem, it is the big picture. I’ve noticed that poets constantly try to subliminally send a hidden moral message to the audience in their readings. I must not lie because I, myself, have been guilty of trying to beat a message that’s been heavily on my mind into the heads of listeners of my poetry. Most of the time they get the point, but some of the time it goes right over their heads. I am writing about this because recently there’s been a poet named TooDeep from Busboys and Poets on campus that’s read about suicide. She unleashed some of her realest material about her thoughts of suicide and how she’s never felt like she’s fitted in or has been considered pretty enough. She spoke about women empowerment and how there’s someone out there for her who will appreciate her for simply living. She did spoken word so her words were very strong and powerful and it made me appreciate the art of formulating speech that has the ability to touch the emotions of others. It was one of those moments in my life where it gave me hope that there are still people out there with common sense and the ability to speak up. She showed me, in one sitting, that words are powerful. As cliché as it sounds, it correlates with what I want to say. Words can be helpful and they can be killer when it comes to a person constantly being teased and on the verge of committing suicide. It didn’t hit me that hard until she opened up to us and told us how she was standing on the edge of the building at her job, calling her aunt to tell her goodbye. It made my jaw drop that a person of such her strength even thought about doing that. The fact that there are messages in poetry doesn’t mean that the poet is trying to tell you what to do, they just want you to understand and that is what TooDeep showed me. She was very inspirational and I’m glad she graced us with her presence.

TooDeep was a fast-speaking poet, so it wasn’t clear to me how she got so much information out in so little time. How did she create the effect of time going on forever, when in reality, it was only 3 minutes? It felt as if she was producing a miracle every time she spoke. At times I did feel as though I missed some information because she spoke a little too fast or I was distracted by her hand movements. It was hard to get past at first, but then I caught back up and it all came full-circle. I wonder if she often has those problems from people who watch her perform.

A question I would want to ask the class is if they feel that spoken word is an effective way to pass on moral messages? Also I want to know if you guys even like spoken word because it can’t be effective if no one listens. For the poet, I want to ask TooDeep what made her speak out? It just seems easier to keep your mouth closed.