STILL UNDERGROUND

that's what i like to say about my kuh-razy nationals experience (8/9-8/13) in beautiful abq, new mexico.
in summary...mercury (the trickster planet) was retrograde like a mf in my world last weekend! out of 74 teams and two hundred seventy some-odd poets, i placed first in the indies semi-finals (with "untitled" -aka romantic archetypes- and "for bashir"...what the seattle team calls my "B" pieces) and scored highest in the last round on the indies finals stage (with "the too much" and "word medicine") but received a TIME PENALTY for the latter, for going, i think, ten seconds over time. which, truth be told, i actually deserved because on the finals stage you get an additional ten seconds OVER the normal ten second grace period, which means i was 20 seconds over time! (AND STILL UNDERGROUND!)

i was given several pieces of advice/words of wisdom by some of my favorite poets:

rives: (the first poet i spoke with after the bout, in between me banging my head on his chest and screaming WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY???!)...christa, he said, i can tell you what you should do, even though you won't listen to me. don't think about it (the time penalty) EVER again...just keep it move'n...

roger bonair-agard : WHY did you lose? that is the question...were you ready to win? (and then he told me this beautifully empathetic story about his loss in 1997 at the nuyorican and how it ultimately served his writing)

bryonn bain (by email): is your soul power any less because you didn't fit into a time box? (and then he called me champion:0)

etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. etc...after the bout two beautiful women who sat in front of me during the team finals (who's names and exact words i will type up when i get home) wrote me compliments so amazing i cried. and the women loved me. all of them. and i felt it. so blessings...and thank you...



JANEAN LIVINGSTON (powerful!) and ANIS MOJGANI (deserving!) tied for first place and RAGAN FOX (who is HILARIOUS!!!) was second. with the time penalty, i placed third. CONGRATS TO ALL SEVEN OF THE POETS WHO MADE THE FINAL STAGE! WE RIPPED IT!!

ok...i'm over it now...i wanna shout out all the folks who gave me love throughout the weekend especially the seattle slam team: roberto ascalon, mat gano -rhymes with draino-, rajnii eddins, daemond arriendale and karen finneyfrock!), also louder arts and central jersey, my cousin will BELL, tai freedom ford, mo brown, michael cirelli (who wasn't able to make it out this year but who sent me love every day!), liz straight, and sonya, veronica and team oklahoma who were lodged next door to me at the hotel blue and who provided libations for my ancestor and goddess alters throughout the weekend (rum and vodka!). ALSO, not enough can be said about the phenomenal job that abq did in organizing this massive event! from accomodations, promotions, marketing (is that the same thing?) and venues, they did an absolutely OUTSTANDING job and should be used as a model for how to run a national event. BLESSINGS to the land for hosting us, BLESSINGS to the indigenous ancestors of the region. thank you for holding our spit.

ok. NOW WHAT THE HELL WAS ALL THE DRAMA ABOUT?

team finals hosted by karen finneyfrock and dasha kelly...the winners are announced from the stage;
in fourth place TEAM HOLLYWOOD! (yaaaaay!)
in third place TEAM FORT WORTH! (wooohoooo!)
in second place TEAM CHARLOTTE (yesssss!)
and in first place........(drumroll)....TEAM ALBUQUERQUE!!!!!!
and the sold out crowd of 2400 people goes bananas!!
it's the first time in the history of the national slam that the home team has won and they performed beautifully. the audience is whooping and clapping like crazy, abq is taking their bows and then...wait!...what's going on behind them???...members of teams charlotte and hollywood are standing with their arms crossed into X's in front of their chests in protest of abq's win!!..the stately queen sheba of team charlotte steps to the mic and indignantly says something that ends with, 'you all (abq) have no home training...' and, apparently, she wasn't alone in this belief...more to come...stay tuned!....(i believe members of team hollywood and hopefully of team charlotte are composing letters explaining their interpretation of events. will post or link when they becomes available)...OVERALL IT WAS A PHENOMENAL WEEKEND! more later...christa (like shirley, unbought, unbossed and STILL UNDERGROUND!)