Cecilia Gathoni


‘If you loose your imagination you get bullied. It starts with a dream. You build the world you are in.’

This a quote from the Def Jam poetry Presenter, HBO, Russell Simons, which does more than explain the inspiration behind spoke word poetry. It’s all about imagination, and making something out of what you have.
Spoken word poetry is a form of poetry whose lyrics, whether read or performed, are meant to inspire, make a statement, or simply decry a form of injustice.
It evolved from a form of poetry called beat poetry, which involved people shouting and cursing the bad things in the world. Today, spoken word poetry tries to speak out these wrongs, but in a spirit of hope and courage.
When a poem is written and published in a book, unless the reader is quite imaginative, the poem might not have an impact on him the same way it would was it performed. There are three stages of writing a poem. The first one is brewing the idea on your mind, the second is writing it down, the third is publishing.
When poetry is performed, it is taken a further step, which adds more life to it . The impact it will have n the audience can easily be assessed depending on the clapping, a standing ovation, whistling or even requests to perform the poem all over again.
Unlike poetry published in books and other literature, spoken word poetry which in often times will require certain structuring and themes, spoken word poetry gives the poet room to experiment. The topics are varied and the themes keep being re-invented every time....
(My assignment in progress, Communicative Writing skills)