About this project

Dogfight
by Jaamil Olawale Kosoko
(published in The American Poetry Review, Sept./Oct., 2009)

Animal spit mixes
with mad sweat,
the Rottweilers' teeth rip
each other's skin:
the torn patches of sin,
the dangling pockets of flesh,
open,
then the thin trails of hot blood
from cuts the color
of rosebuds,
the color angry petals take
when they take shape,
naked and burning--
a deep, fat pain
turning electric under the sun.

My first fight felt much like this:
the dog of me escaped
through playground gates;
there were fists
and kicks,
a bite as I Mike-
Tysoned his ear.

In that instant
the ground ripped.
I could hear the crowds'
dumb voices, their
fang-flung poisons shot
into the humid,
mid-day air. There,

in that instant,
we were schooled
in the cruel truths of play,
learned how to change shape,
how to hate,
how to take and take and
take;

on that ground, we boys,
we, the torn down dog-boys
built of muscle and gristle
and blood-vessels and bone, learned

how to use the powers we possessed,
the power to bleed,
the power to fight and feed,
the power to rip open the electric body of pain
and hold the live wires of its flesh,

tight, to our hearts like a fresh cut bouquet.

Les Esprits de la Mort
(The Spirits of the Dead)

Les esprits de la mort
Nous reviennent plus souvent
Il est maintenant que nous avons
plus besoin d’eux
Nos ancetres, nos aines,
qui sont croises au dela.
Ils nous parlent

Parmi mes visions
Ma grande mere,
toujours au bord de sa mort
Jeune, et vierge
Non pas elle meme
mais le soi oublie
Une ange toute nue

Mince, la peau sec
Je vois son corps expose, atrophie
Fait de manqué d’utilisation.
So regard fixe entre deux mondes
Les mondes sont pareilles-
juste aussi froides,
aussi engordis mais
Sans le corps…

C’est un signe a ne pas ignore
Lorsque le passé s’introduit
plus dans le present que le present
Les souvenirs et premonitions
se trouvent paralleles
Lorsque les esprits nous parlent
vivement comme maintenant

Le passé, j’ai appris
Est un signe…
le signe de trios femmes-
Une trinite de femmes mortes,
qui nous trecassent
Juste d’etre toujours en vie
Grande- mere, mere,
soeur tous jeunes et legeres

Elles portent toutes le meme visage
Elles prennent un pas entre
le temps et l’espace
N’ignorez pas!
Lorsque le passé se reouvre,
comme une ventre maman
Qui nous invite d’y retourner

-Jaamil Olawale Kosoko
French translation by Jodi Obeid

Project location: Philadelphia, PA

40

Backers

$1,035

pledged of $1,000 goal

0

seconds to go

Project By

Jaamil Kosoko

Philadelphia, PA

Send Message

Jaamil Olawale Kosoko is an author, arts manager, poet, choreographer, performance artist, curator, experimental vocalist, and comedian. He is the Founder and Executive Producing Director at KOSOKO PERFORMANCE GROUP. His work has received grant support from The Pew Center for Arts and Heritage through Dance Advance and The Philadelphia Cultural Fund. Performance Venues include: Joyce SoHo, Dixon Place, Dance Theater Workshop, Bennington College, Danspace at St. Mark's Church, the CEC Meeting House Theater, Painted Bride Arts Center, among others. Creative consultant and/or performer credits include: Terry Creach, Lisa Kraus, Kate Watson-Wallace/anonymous bodies, Pig Iron Theatre Company, Keely Garfield Dance, Headlong Dance Theater, Leah Stein Dance Company, Emergent Improvisation Ensemble, and, Faustin Linyekula and Les Studios Kabako (The Democratic Republic of Congo, Africa). Publications include: The American Poetry Review, The Dunes Review, The Interlochen Review, The Broad Street Review, Silo Literary and Visual Arts Magazine. In 2009, Kosoko published the chapbook, Animal in Cyberspace.

1. kosokoperformance.org