"What We Deserve" by Sonya "The Drama" Boom Renee.
Typically I'm not a fan of slam poetry, but I think this piece by Sonya "The Drama" Boom Renee is strong, and worth-watching (two times seems to be most effective). I am also providing a transcript of the poem, although I apologize in advance for errors and/or omissions. If readers have corrections to offer, please email me. Also, I would be interested in hearing your feedback: Do you enjoy slam poetry? If so, why do you find it appealing? If not, what are your reasons? Do you enjoy this particular poem?
Culturally-diversified bi-racial girl,
with a small diamond nose-ring
and a pretty smile
poses beside the words: "Women deserve better".
And I almost let her non-threatening grin begin to
infiltrate my psyche-
till I read the unlikely small-print at the bottom of the ad.
'Sponsored by the US Secretariate for Pro Life Activities
and the Knights of Columbus'
on a bus, in a city with a population of 563,000.
Four teenage mothers on the bus with me.
One latino woman with three children under three,
and no signs of a daddy.
One sixteen year old black girl,
standing in twenty two degree weather
with only a sweater,
and a bookbag,
and a bassinet, with an infant that ain't even four weeks yet-
Tell me that yes: Women do deserve better.
Women deserve better
than public transportation rhetoric
from the same people who won't give that teenage mother
a ride to the next tranist.
Won't let you talk to their kids about safer sex,
and never had to listen as the door slams
behind the man
who adamantly says "that SHIT ain't his"-
leaving her to wonder how she'll raise this kid.
Women deserve better than the three hundred dollars
TANF and AFDC will provide that family of three.
Or the six dollar an hour job at KFC
with no benefits for her new baby-
or the college degree she'll never see,
because you can't have infants at the university.
Women deserve better
than lip-service paid for by politicians
who have no alternatives to abortion.
Though I'm sure right now
one of their seventeen year old daughters
is sitting in a clinic lobby, sobbing quietly
and anonymously,
praying parents don't find out-
Or is waiting for mom to pick her up because
research shows that out-of-wedlock childbirth
don't look good on political polls.
And Bush ain't having that.
Women deserve better
than backward governmental policies
that don't want to pay for welfare for kids,
or healthcare for kids,
or childcare for kids.
Don't want to pay living wages to working mothers.
Don't want to make men who only want to be
last night's lovers
responsible for the semen they lay.
Just like [they] don't want to pay for shit,
but want to control the woman who's having it.
Acting outraged at abortion,
when I'm outraged that they want us to believe
that they believe
"Women deserve better".
The Vatican won't prosecute pedophile priests,
but I decide I'm not ready for motherhood
and it's condemnation for me.
These are the same people
who won't support national condom distribution
to prevent teenage pregnancy--
But women deserve better.
Women deserve better than back-alley surgeries
that leave our wombs barren and empty.
Deserve better than organizations bearing the name
of land-stealing, racist, rapists
funding million dollar campaigns on subway trains
with no money to give these women--
While balding, middle-aged white men
tell us what to do with our bodies,
while they wage wars and kill other people's babies.
So maybe,
Women deserve better than propaganda and lies
to get into office.
Propaganda and lies
to get into panties,
to get out of court,
to get out of paying child-support.
Get the fuck out of our decisions
and give us back our VOICE.
Women do deserve better.
Women deserve choice.
-Sonya "The Drama" Boom Renee
Individual World Poetry Slam Finals 2006
7/08, ETA: I believe this is the ad that inspired the slam.
You can find more information about the campaign on the USCCB (United States Congress of Catholic Bishop's) pro-life activities page. Though the partners sponsoring the ads are primarily religious organizations, there is one anomaly: a group calling themselves "Feminists For Life", who also host the Women Deserve Better website.
I find this very perplexing. Maybe this group is old news, but this is my first encounter with them. I've looked through their site a bit, and can't quite tell if it's a legitimately pro-life feminist organization, or if it's a pro-life group masquerading as feminists. Either way, I wasn't expecting to find any kind of a 'feminist' organization behind this campaign.
7 comments:
Typically I don't like poetry at all but that's one poem that made me stop and say "wow." I blogged about it when I first saw it.
I am quiet speechless.
Yet another tantrum of irresponsible individuals wanting the government to bail them out and teach their children. I could say more about the type of woman who gets pregnant despite the squalled conditions (not people who get raped but the many who go about it carelessly), which is really cruel to the child, but I doubt "pro-women" sites would appreciate that. Rather, lets divert to other issues rather than the ones that don't blame us. There was some concern of the children, and that's fine, but a lot of it was whining.
When women have sex it's irresponsible, when men have sex it's not their problem... just as many men have irresponsible squallid babies as women, because it takes TWO - but women are the ones who don't abandon their babies, and women are PUNISHED ENDLESSLY for this.
i can't tell the difference between trolls and idiots anymore.
I looked at the performance and it nearly blew me off the chair. Absolutely amazing. As I am not too familiar with the American accent, I really appreciate your transcript and will have to go through it again. But I do love this poem - possibly because of the subject being absolutely conform with sonya - and the performance was fantastic.
Men are considered such garbage in those environments that it's merely considered consistent with their nature. Don't get me wrong- men are certainly to blame for it as well- but I was trying to keep it related to what the speaker was going on about. A better subject would have been children deserve better. Instead this woman went on how the government is supposed to cater to them but if the government did tell these women to watch who they have sex with, the government would be accused of trying to control their womb and the women would protest it. Do you know why these problems have been going on since the beginning of mankind jexxus? It's because of attitudes like these. You sidestep the issue. You're a coward. If the woman has sex with a destitute father, than does she really care about the child? Don't most people have children for themselves anyway, or just let it happen? And how many women fool themselves? Well I'm screwing up my child but hey I didn't abandon him/her like his/her father did. Sidestep the issue to make yourself feel better. To make yourself fell better about the hideous act that you've committed. Again, I'm talking in general here.
Jexxus, I am going to stay out the politics here and answer the direct question you posed regarding slam poetry (for the record, however, we are on the same side on this one.)
As a former Performance Poet who occasionally participated in slams, I am of a mixed mind on the subject. I enjoy good slam poetry as it is a high form of performance art. At the same time, far too much slam poetry lacks the economy of language that is associated with great works of poetry. Certainly there is also equal measure of slam work that leans on punditry punch lines as some artists are more concerned with winning slams than creating great poetry that can also be a great performance piece. In essence, when it is good I truly enjoy it and when I find it to be lazy, pandering writing, it I am the guy wondering if anyone else in the room is really paying attention.
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