O, Miami Annual Poetry Festival, Returns

Miami FL

01 April, 2021

8:17 AM

Description

By Selena Stanley Miami Times Staff Writer Mar 30, 2021 April is National Poetry Month, which means it's time for O, Miami's Annual festival celebrating the genre to take over the city again. This is the organization's 10th anniversary of cultivating a love for literature amongst new audiences and putting one of the oldest art forms in front of modern eyes and ears. Sponsored by the Knight Foundation, O, Miami's mission is for every person in Miami to encounter a poem in April – whether it's painted on a rooftop, pictured on a billboard or recited by a man on the street. You may have already seen one of O, Miami's past poetry installments, and not even realized. Poetry by a third grader above the ticket booth of the Colony Theater in Miami Beach in 2019. Residents will likely encounter poetry in the most unexpected ways throughout April. /Courtesy of O, Miami The festival will run from April 1–30 and feature celebratory events, workshops and activities for members of the public. O, Miami aims to not only make poetry accessible, but relatable to all. "We're always looking to not get stuck in one neighborhood, and try to present a Miami through the festival that is as reflective of the real Miami as possible," said Scott Cunningham, O, Miami founder. O, Miami Founder Scott Cunningham/Via PScottCunningham.com Presenting Miami's diversity involves collaborating with new local talent every year. An open call is held for anyone to submit ideas in the fall and make a conscious effort to highlight voices of color, according to Cunningham. Every year, the festival elevates voices of color. "Poetry in Paradise Renewed" in 2019 featured members of the Art Prevails Project collective, including artistic director, poet and educator Darius V. Daughtry./Gesi Shilling "Our hope by doing the open call is that the scope of the festival gets larger and more inclusive," he said. Poetry has a new face. It's no longer regarded as the elaborate Shakespearean prose only celebrated by intellectuals. It's art for the masses and is experiencing a resurgence within popular culture, especially for Black Americans. After Amanda Gorman took the stage at President Joe Biden's inauguration and the Super Bowl, people could not get enough of her. Her impassioned political poems resonated with so many and raised the art form's profile. One million copies of Gorman's Book, "The Hill We Climb: An Inaugural Poem for the County," were printed for release on March 16. Cunningham compares Gorman to a pop star, but credits her rise to a larger cultural shift. "I think people really had their eyes opened. They thought, 'Here's this person who looks like a superstar doing this art form, that maybe when I was in high school was taught to me sort of as a dead art," he said. "Amanda getting to that point is the result of years and years of people doing the work to open up poetry to more people, and really take care of the genre by making sure it was more inclusive. I think for years poetry was stuck in academia." Although poetry predates literature and can be traced back through every culture, spoken word has a rich history in Black societies. Early African civilizations passed down their history and traditions through storytelling in a poetic or musical fashion. During the 1930s and 1940s, Black writers in France used poetry to assert their cultural identity, in what is now known as the Negritude Movement. Additionally, mid 1960s and 1970s Black American artists declared war on racism through their art, in what's now referred to as the Black Arts Movement. Perhaps one of the biggest household names in poetry, Maya Angelou, also gained popularity in the late 1960s. In her 50 year long career, Angelou published dozens of books, won the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2010 and was widely regarded as "the Black woman's poet laureate." Angelou's poetic works have been called anthems for Black Americans, and her legacy lives on today. FILE - In this Dec. 15 1992 file photo, American poet and writer Maya Angelou speaks in Washington, D.C. Angelou, a Renaissance woman and cultural pioneer, has died, Wake Forest University said in a statement Wednesday, May 28, 2014. She was 86. (AP Photo/Doug Mills, File) American poet and writer Maya Angelou speaking in Washington, D.C. in 1992./AP Photo/Doug Mills Meanwhile, one of poetry's more modern footholds on Black culture is rap and hip-hop, which many people forget. "I look at [poetry and rap] as two different art forms with a common ancestor," Cunningham said. "There are a ton of poets writing today at the highest level, Pulitzer Prize winners, for whom rap was a formative artistic influence and continues to be an artistic influence. There are also rappers who grew up with a poetry background." Chance the Rapper and Common both come from poetic backgrounds and are perfect examples of Black artists who embrace the intersection. Chance the Rapper accepted a Grammy for best rap album for "Coloring Book" in 2017. He donated it to Chicago's DuSable Museum of African American History./Matt Sayles/Invision/AP "I think that in distancing poetry as an art form that only few folks can do, what it does is kind of deny this reality that so much of the Black tradition and Black vernacular is grounded in poetics," said poet Saida Agostini. Saida Agostini, a featured O, Miami poet./Via OMiami.org Agostini is a queer Afro-Guyanese poet whose work explores the way Black people "harness mythology to enter the fantastic." A two-time Pushcart Prize nominee, her poetry can be found in Barrelhouse Magazine, Plume, Hobart Pulp, and other publications. Poetry should be embraced and recognized for what it is in Black culture, according to her. "Even if we look at 'WAP' [by Cardi B], you know 'macaroni in the pot wet and gushy,' we have always been lyrical in the ways in which we communicate with each other. I think our biggest work is to take away that boundary, or perceived boundary, that lies between art-making and artistic expression of our truths," she said. Agostini hosted a poetry workshop for O, Miami's festival this year, along with a few other poets of color – Teri Ellen Cross Davis, Tafisha A. Edwards and Katy Richey. It was called "Putting the O! In O, Miami," and allowed participants to explore their sexuality through poetry and "uplift the erotic in Black womanhood." Teri Ellen Cross Davis, a featured O, Miami poet./Via OMiami.org The poems written at the workshop will be turned into a zine, or a small-circulation self-published work, and be distributed throughout April. The group of poets always wanted to do a project like this, and are happy it finally came together. Giving Black creators a platform, especially now, is very important for the community, according to Cross Davis. With "Who's The Fool? How To Patch A Leaky Roof." In 2019, artists Najja Moon (L) and Michelle Lisa Polissaint focused on one aspect of the gentrification machine in our community, the proliferation of only one kind of free umbrella./Courtesy of O, Miami "I feel like when you approach the page as a writer, you have to be honest with yourself or there's no point to it. In that honesty, and in that truth, that's where we can get to the heart of what's holding us back and what gives us joy," she said. "Right now, during this pandemic, when we have this virus that has seemingly singled out so many people of color, I think we need to let joy be our prescription to get better." Poetry can be used to understand the hard parts of life, express unique ideas and celebrate culture. Now, in a time where people are more reflective, it's no wonder poetry is growing more popular. O, Miami aims to inspire and remind people the art of poetry can be found anywhere – in music, in everyday speech or right around the corner. Learn more about the 2021 O, Miami Poetry Festival at OMiami.org. O, Miami Poetry Festival events and projects "Calling on Ancestors: Exploring Tenderness in Turbulent Times" April 17 & 24; 7 – 8 p.m. This workshop will allow attendees to see themselves through poems about identity, place, time and light. Conducted via Zoom. "Poems for Blue Station Stones" All month This installment places a small plaque at the Earlington Heights Metrorail station in Brownsville in the vicinity of Beverly Buchanan's Miami artwork, "Blue Station Stones" (1986). The plaque excerpts lines from a poem that Alice Walker wrote specifically for the late artist: "How do we make new / And restorative of soul / The old pain? How do we learn / To carry with grace and humor / All that has happened to us?" Community Fridge Centos All month Community Fridge Centos adds poetry to community fridges, a food supply network designed to assist local Miami-Dade communities in eliminating food insecurity. In collaboration with Buddy System MIA, who created and maintained the fridges, this project puts original poetry stickers onto the food packaging, providing a safe literary addition to the network. Stretching from Homestead all the way to Little Haiti, the poetry in the fridges invites community members across the county to benefit from this mutual exchange of grassroots efforts to provide, not only food resources to these neighborhoods, but also a reservoir of creatively driven content to be enjoyed by all. "Displacement Posters" All month Inspired by acts of protest and fluorescent advertising posters from the 1970s, "Displacement Posters" reconfigures this commercial medium to bring awareness to climate change as a gentrifying force – a phenomenon that has resulted in the displacement of low-income people of color who can no longer afford to live in their homes and is greatly changing the cultural makeup of the county. The posters are installed across neighborhoods where this threat is prevalent: inland, high elevation areas such as Little Haiti, Little River, Magic City and Model City. The posters will be mounted to chain-link fences, construction site walls, trees and electrical poles. The idea is for them to treat their surroundings as an extension of the typeset page, thereby transforming the space of the city itself into a poem to be read. Opa-locka Light District All month Developed in collaboration with the Opa-locka Community Development Corporation, "Opa-locka Light District: Poetry Street Lamps," will illuminate unlit parts of the city's downtown area with poems written by residents. The "light" in the project is being created by Mario "The Maker" Cruz, in association with Moonlighter Maker Space. "Remembrance to Order" Submissions accepted all month. The pandemic has disrupted individual's lives in so many ways, including the way they grieve. As the one-year anniversary of the pandemic approaches, "Remembrance to Order" acknowledges the people who have passed. O, Miami is offering families and friends of those who have died the opportunity to memorialize their loved ones through the shared language of poetry. If you lost someone this past year, and either the requester is or the loved one was a Miami-Dade resident, O, Miamiwould like to provide a small way to honor them through a poem, for free. You can request a poem at OMiami.org/remembrance-to-order. For more information and a complete list of O, Miami events and projects at OMiami.org. The Miami Times is the largest Black-owned newspaper in the south serving Miami's Black community since 1923. The award-winning weekly is frequently recognized as the best Black newspaper in the country by the National Newspaper Publishers Association.