4 things I learned from poets Sarah Kay and Andrea Gibson

On Friday evening, Andrea Gibson and Brown alum Sarah Kay performed the final leg of their mini poetry tour at the Met in Pawtucket. The two poets shared the stage for a few hours and spoke of love, anger, depression, and Whole Foods. Gibson, a well-known poet who writes about gender, sexuality, love, and class, was the headliner. But Sarah Kay is famous in her own right—she gave a TED talk in 2011 that went viral, and she currently works both as a performer and as the founder of Project VOICE, a program that teaches students about the power of spoken word poetry. Kay, knowing her audience well, opened with the slightly-awkward-yet-definitely-hilarious song “Providence,” which actually references the Ratty. It would be impossible to recreate the atmosphere from the performance and try to summarize the contents of the poems, so instead I’m going to tell you four things I learned as a poetry novice at her first slam.1) Listening to poetry can feel like a rock concert.

Who knew you didn’t have to be sitting in a quiet café for people to read their poetry? The Met is normally a music venue, so chairs were few and far between, leaving most of us attendees crowding the stage like we were waiting for a band to come on. Being new to the poetry scene, I assumed that this was normal for their shows. But then both poets called out how weird it was, assuring us that any future performance would involve actual seating. Regardless, I ended up enjoying the set-up because it forced an intimacy and intensity that immersed each audience member in the words. .

2) Not all poetry is intensely serious.

While the most popular spoken word poems on the Internet tend to be full of emotional depth and seriousness, Kay and Gibson showed off a range of genres in their performances. Gibson’s poetry was marked by a more intense approach, as they (Gibson’s preferred pronoun) would often build to a catharsis at the end, releasing a wave of intense emotion, and then transition seamlessly to a joke about Donald Trump. Kay showed a similar dexterity, but rather than separating the emotional and the silly, she combined the two. In a poem about getting dumped at Whole Foods, Kay used the most mundane organic foods as a vehicle to express the pain of ending a relationship.

3) Poets make sex jokes.

A lot. Not only did Gibson and Kay reference their sex lives while chatting, they both performed poems about masturbating. The two were unabashed by the content, and there was no attempt to hide the subject matter behind elaborate metaphors or flowery language. In a true testament to their talent, Kay and Gibson made an awkward and taboo subject honest, beautiful, and hilarious.

4) Stories are powerful.

This last point may be a little bit of a cliché, but watching live spoken word poetry in a crowd of people highlighted the impact of sharing something deeply personal. Although the content of the narratives in the poems Kay and Gibson shared did not necessarily relate to everyone there, the sentiments they evoked were universal. They both spoke about learning to love themselves, and Gibson encouraged the audience to give themselves the same appreciation. There’s almost a collective sigh of relief when you hear a poem you relate to, and see others nodding their heads or snapping their fingers in agreement. Through shared feeling, poetry brings people together and serves as a reminder that we are not alone in our emotions.

Gibson and Kay are masters at their craft, having the ability to both silence a room with the weight of their words and get everyone laughing. If you haven't been to a performance of spoken word poetry before—and I hadn't until now—you should definitely check one out. Even if poetry seems like it's so far from being your thing. What's the worst that can happen? You might even find yourself falling in love with words.Images via, via, and via Sarah Campbell Tucker '19.