Ihsan Abdussabur had a question that had gotten under his skin. He understood why people have an inborn fear of loud noises. But darkness? Darkness, even as it extended to human bodies?
He couldn’t get to the bottom of that one. It wouldn’t stop him from trying.
“That’s why people call me racial slurs as they cross the street that are parallel to me,” he began. “It’s utterly / absurd, it’s like their own self-segregation in this color-coded nation to keep me separated but equal. I feel like during this time it’s the end / of the world prequels / C’mon people!”
“I’m just saying questionable facts,” he continued. “And the question on my mind is — I’m just gonna ask you one more time is — are you afraid of the dark?”
Salwa Abdussabur and Aaron Jafferis.
Abdussabur is a member of The Word High School Poetry Jam, an annual reading and celebration of the city’s verse-spitting middle and high schoolers. This year, the group is adding something new to its repertoire: a stop at the International Festival of Arts & Ideas, one month after its final performance of the school year. The group is led by Project Coordinator Hanifa Washington and Youth Coordinator and wordsmith Salwa Abdussabur.
Part of the festival’s new ALTAR’d Spaces programming, poets take the stage at First and Summerfield United Methodist Church on Wednesday at 6 p.m. Tickets are $10; more information here.
Members prepare.
Monday afternoon, 12 poets gathered at The Grove coworking space on Chapel Street to rehearse, spreading out into the space’s nooks, crannies and quirkily-titled rooms to edit, memorize, and block existing poems, or write new material for Wednesday. With his head bobbing over his notebook, Caius Roi jotted down a few new verses: “June seems to be my month / Even If I was born in May,” he wrote. “I’m black, I’m an artist. Oh, and I’m gay.”
He paused for a few more lines: “‘Cause art is frivolous, black skin is hideous, and gay love is insidious. But hey, June doesn’t care, and neither do I. Celebrate your heritage, and let ideas fly.”
In the Grove’s billiards room, newly christened Gateway student Ari Rodriguez was dipping into her well of memory, working on a new poem about her father, who had spent the first 18 years of her life largely absent from the family.
“Why did I keep the hope that you will change?” she asked aloud. Sandwiched in swivel chairs beside her, Eli Whitney student and grad Anthony Rivera and Yousef Sheriff timed each other on their pieces, making sure they fell under a four-minute maximum. Rivera came over and gave her a long hug as she worked.
Washington flitted among the three. On the other side of the room, returning Founder & Creative Director Aaron Jafferis helped recent adult ed graduate Benny Sazon work out his blocking to a two-voice poem.
“I just think, if you faded, or went back or something …” Jafferis began, motioning to a section of the poem where one character transitioned into a second.
“Right! It would be like a rewind!” Sazon finished the sentence, walking back a few steps. “Bang, bang, bang!” he said, miming a gun. Then he dropped the gun, and switched positions before becoming a different character.
“This is the first attempt of really making a narrative out of my writing,” he said of the piece later in the evening.
Smith: Creative nonfiction makes it in.
From different spots around The Grove, poets came together for a final section of the rehearsal, cheering each other on and giving feedback. To Abdussabur’s poem, Jafferis began to join in on the chorus “are you afraid of the dark?” offering mmmmms and ooohhs as Abdussabur chronicled his experience as a young black man in New Haven.
Jafferis and Washington feted Sazon’s new narrative transition. The two listened patiently as word alum Jasmine Smith launched into a creative nonfiction piece that she had prepared for a portfolio earlier that year: “Acknowledge that your world is about to go up in flames. You are back at school but school will not be the center of your attention. The campus police calls while you are in class. They are wondering when the last time you saw your boyfriend was,” she started.
As she read, the whole room perked up, all ears. “Convince yourself you have not been abandoned,” she said. “Your boyfriend dropped out of school, disappeared for almost two months, and reappeared back in your hometown like nothing had ever happened.” Sheriff let out a long mmmmmmm of recognition.
“He does not explain. You do not feel better.” Sazon raised his head at the phrase, eyes widening. “Go to class. Absorb nothing. Pretend you do not know why you are failing. Pretend you do not blame yourself.”
The group burst into applause. They were, Washington declared, ready for Wednesday night.