Bum Rush the Page: A Def Poetry Jam Book

	Foreword	xv
	Introduction	xix
	Invocation
	We Have Been Believers	xxv
	A Poet Is Not a Juke Box	xxvi
	Nommo	xxvii
	No Jive	xxviii
	failure of an invention	xxviii
	Building	xxix
	The Disdirected	xxxi
	Blood I Say, Study Our Story, Sing This Song
	The Way We Move	1
	... And the Saga Continues	1
	Bad Times	3
	How to Do	4
	Like a Dog	6
	Lonely Women	7
	On the Other Side	9
	N	10
	Her Scream Has Been Stolen	11
	Crater Face	12
	susu	13
	An Asian Am Anthem	14
	Scout	16
	This Old Man	17
	Afternoon Train	19
	Beginning at the End: Capital/Capitol Punishment	20
	Open Your Mouth--and Smile
	A Chinese Man in Smyma	22
	450 Years of Selective Memory (Smile)	23
	the n-word	24
	an open letter to the entertainment industry	25
	Metropolitan Metaphysics	28
	America Eats Its Young	29
	laughin at cha	31
	Rosa's Beauty	32
	Overworked	33
	Nintendo	34
	Stealth-Pirates of Cyberia	35
	The Death of Poetry	35
	Last Visit to Chestnut Middle School	37
	Learning to Drive at 32	38
	Mr. BOOM BOOM Man	39
	Road to the Presidency	40
	For What It's Worth	41
	Every Word Must Conjure
	It's Called Kings	44
	Billy	45
	To Become Unconscious	46
	Letter to an Unconceived Son	46
	The Usual Suspects	48
	Blooming Death ... Blossoms	49
	What the Oracle Said	51
	The U.S.A. Court of No Appeal	52
	on the state-sanctioned murder of shaka sankofa	52
	An Epistle to the Revolutionary Bible	53
	Warrior Womb	55
	Cowboynomics	56
	Demockery	57
	Executive Privilege	58
	Question	61
	georgia avenue, washington d.c.	62
	A Palace of Mourners	64
	Palestine	65
	The Road from Khartoum	66
	A Modern Love Poem	68
	In Praise of the Seattle Coalition	69
	Blood Is the Argument	69
	Drums Drown Out the Sorrow
	Amadou Diallo from Guinea to the Bronx Dead on Arrival	73
	Another Scream	74
	A Well-Bred Woman	76
	Amadou	78
	BLS	78
	after diana died	79
	Dudley Randall (1914-2000)	80
	Hoodoo Whisper	81
	Sammy Davis, Jr.	82
	Glad All Over	84
	Dancing after Sanchez	85
	The 13th Letter	86
	In Black Churches	86
	For Gwendolyn Brooks	87
	tonal embryology	88
	Zizwe	88
	All, Bomaye	89
	Phyllis	90
	Timbalero	91
	Puente	93
	Somalia	93
	epitaph for Etheridge Knight	94
	Farewell Queen Mother Moore	97
	Palenque Queen by Habana's Shores	98
	When the Definition of Madness Is Love
	January Hangover	100
	the hardest part about love	100
	Lies We Tell Ourselves	102
	8 ways of looking at pussy	103
	Temporary Insanity	105
	alone in belize	106
	footprints	107
	Big World Look Out	108
	Bullet Hole Man: A Love Poem	110
	Dreadlocks	111
	Roots	111
	Six Minutes Writing	112
	Diner	112
	Fullness	113
	Wet Dream	115
	foursomes	115
	Wishing You	116
	Shunning an Imperative	116
	January 8, 1996	118
	A Poem for You	119
	Throbs for the Instructress	120
	At the Frenchman's	121
	Mata Hari Blues or Why I Will Never Be a Spy	123
	Yellah	124
	Extremes Ain't My Thing As Salaam Alaikum	125
	13	126
	rock candy	127
	Love Jam	129
	Cocaine Mad-Scream Article #33 LoveSong	130
	We Whose Fathers Are Hidden
	The Elders Are Gods	132
	What the Dead Do	133
	creation is a cycle	133
	Birth	134
	Daughter-to-Father Talk	136
	Tattooing the Motherline	137
	Our Fathers	138
	Mama's Magic	139
	Father's Day	140
	Momma in Red	140
	Wildlife	141
	Chicago on the Day Brother Increases His Chances of Reaching Age 21	142
	Lest We Forget	143
	The African Burial Ground Called Tribeca	143
	fatherless townships	144
	Waiting for the Results of a Pregnancy Test	146
	Sitting in the Doctor's Office the Next Day	148
	Circa	148
	Seed of Resistance
	Cooking	151
	Ben Hur	151
	in 5th grade	152
	Complected	154
	Broken Ends Broken Promises	155
	My Name's Not Rodriguez	156
	Water from the Well	157
	The Tragic Mulatto Is Neither	158
	Beauty Is Moving Us Forward
	I'm Sayin Though	160
	beauty rituals 2000	160
	Medusa	161
	Stariette	161
	exceptions	163
	What the deal, son?	166
	Plain Ole Brother Blues	168
	Why I Be a Goddess	169
	I'm the Man	170
	Dare to Be Different	171
	Thoughts from a Bar Stool	173
	A Blue Black Pearl	173
	runnin	175
	conversations in the struggle	176
	Harvest: A Line Drawing	177
	joseph speaks to gericault in the studio	178
	Entrancielo	181
	New York Seizures	182
	Hey Yo / Yo Soy!	185
	Flying over America	188
	It Was the Music That Made Us
	I'm a Hip Hop Cheerleader	190
	kill the dj	192
	Ms. Cousins' Rap	193
	all up in there	194
	Doin'	195
	The Trash Talker	196
	Owed to Eminem	197
	A Psychoalphadiscobetabioaquadoloop	200
	rapid transit	201
	hold it steady	202
	Conversation with Duke Ellington and Louis (Pops) Armstrong	203
	For Lady and Prez	204
	breath	205
	The Flow	206
	Bebop Trumpet	208
	conjugation of the verb: to blow	208
	The Creed of a Graffiti Writer	210
	Sonido Ink(quieto)	214
	because I am it's a race thing trip	215
	Grasshopper	217
	Grace	219
	The Low End	219
	rep/resent	221
	2G (Another Millennium Poem)	223
	enter(f*#@ckin)tained	223
	Children of the Word
	Motherseed	226
	Wake Up, My Little Pretties	227
	nommo: how we come to speak	227
	spaNglisH	229
	New Boogaloo	229
	Mi Negrito	232
	News of the World	233
	Much of Your Poetry Is Beautiful	234
	Ginsberg	234
	In Bed with James Tate	235
	soulgroovin ditty #7	236
	Sundays	237
	To Aretha Franklin from Sparkle	238
	Lumumba Blues	239
	All the shoes are shined and the cotton is picked	240
	In this day age	241
	The Trouble I've Seen	241
	Having Lost My Son, I Confront the Wreckage	242
	Bensonhurst	243
	For Michael Griffith, Murdered Dec. 21, 1986, Howard Beach, NY	244
	Lift Every Fist and Swing	245
	TV Dinner	245
	Bluesman	248
	We're Not Well Here	250
	Nickel Wine and Deep Kisses	251
	The Coward	253
	Strip	254
	Sex	255
	enemies	256
	American Poetry	257
	So Many Books, So Little Time	260
	How to Be a Street Poet	261
	The Adventures of Grandmaster Flash	263
	X	264
	The Tradition	265
	There It Is	267
	Contributors	270
	Permissions	281