i didn’t start playing with fire

til i bought        my first evanescence album

i didnt know    my brothers were arsonists

til i told them my first girlfriend
                            was white

didnt know
                                       who i was til pops
                         caught me
                                      slippin: considering
                                      myself in third-
                   person––i mean
                                      i called out to my People
in the third-person—i learned    
                            this is how to create of yourself an ‘other’
or separate      a heritage
from its            throat (the

way a word erects barriers       / traps
the lungs in burning house    / walls of oxygen

                              collapsing

                                                          to smoke)

——

                                              they | | we

a simple
distinction

                                                  can you tell me
              the difference?      or,

tell me what it means to be              Black;
to look in the mirror                          & see the things you not
                                                                  but assumed to be:

                                                  dumb
                                                  thief
                                                  violent
                                                  thug  
                                                  nigger.
                                                                  good as dead

———

tell me                                        it aint waking in this smelting pot hoping                                                                everything yours aint forged into weapon                                                                turned against you

                                                     how the blues was life cause

they choked us with em
                                                   or our skin––our armor
til they burned us in it

tell me                                     our pride aint burning bright enough to make                                                        white folk look away?
tell me                                     we aint all icarus
                                                   reaching for the birthplace of all this light
tell me                                     my self-love is hubris

                                                         watch me fly
                                                                             dance atop the street lamps
                                                                             singing

we gon be alright!
we gon be alright!

til the sun gets tired &
if i fall
tell me i had it coming…
watch my smile stretch across the sky

Evan Jymaal Cutts is a 22 year-old Boston native. He appreciates Black joy and art where ever he happens upon it & will tell you Anis Mojgani is one higher being’s gift to humanity, then cite/recite six-seven-eight-nine ten poems to prove it. He believes the key to change is imagination, empathy, and action; that your story is a unique one worth listening to.

He stumbled upon the Boston Poetry Slam after a meaningful Google search in the summer of 2013, the same summer he spent learning about the Nichiren Buddhism with Sokka Gakkai International (ask him about it).

Evan is a BFA Poetry candidate minoring in Africana Studies at Emerson College. His poetry explores aspects of Boston, Blackness, its magic, and is moving towards a global perspective following his recent travels to South Africa. He is a Best of the Net Anthology 2016 nominee and his work can be found online at threelinepoetry.org and voicemailpoems.org and projectpoetry.org.

For booking, contact projectpoetryboston@gmail.com.