Spoken Soul

Spoken Soul
Poetry by. Chantel Johnson (K-OZ)

Table of Contents

1.)          Intro to Distance
2.)          Popular Tree
3.)          Weaving
4.)          I Am Beautiful
5.)          Your I’s
6.)          Come Correct
7.)          Patience
8.)          Larry’s Psalms

***All poems written by Chantel Johnson (K-OZ)***


can you imagine one day you are watching television and the program you are watching is interrupted by breaking news.  To your surprise the breaking news is world coverage on people from different ancient civilization. It is said these people appeared out of no wheres and they were shock about what scientist and historians wrote about their culture.  When these people were interviewed they explained how life was and cleared up all the misinterpretation of their history.  In the poem, “Intro. To Distance”, Johnson writes on the misinterpretation of history that is from another time. Johnson questions the information written in books. She takes full charge and takes the reader, “How do you know if you were not their? Have you research the story of the historians and do they check out to be the truth?” For the best answer to any question is the self discovery of the answer through research.  As time goes on the stories of yesterday become misinterpreted by archeologist who sometimes use ethnocentrism as a way to determine what was there. This view is than given to historians who write their own views by what they perceive truth to be. Leaving the real truth to be loss and sometimes never found.

Intro.To Distance
By. K-OZ

Sometimes,
I look at distant places and
Wonder what distant faces
Use to fill in the distant spaces.
Mysteries left behind 4 human kind to decode
Our access has been denied.

Hoping what we find
Will defined some sort of answers
4 our lonely questions,
But what distant lives
Have already demise,
His story will never help us
Understand the gap
That separates us from the past distances.

Before slavery the First Africans that were brought to the Americas were used for service to build the economy of America though agriculture, and other services rented out for a number of no more than 50 years. During this time the new settlers notice the differences that separated the English settlers from the descendants of the natives of Africa. Since more than 50 years had passed and the younger generations did not understand the native tongue of their forefathers to be sent back to Africa. Slavery was inflicted onto the no longer Africans but a confuse people of a Negro race that was said to be inferior. Laws were enforced and the pride of the people was taken away. In the poem Popular Tree expresses how black men have been the victims of false accusations, rape and murder which haves damage the character of Afro-American men through the future generational imprint of genealogy. The popular tree represents the popula tree that reaped dead bodies that was strange fruit. This particular fruit came about when the owners of the plantation or member of a hate group wanted to punches a slave for wrong doing. The popula tree was a very popular tree in the south and was the death of many black men.

Popular Tree
By. K-OZ

Forbidden fruit set under the apple tree
Reading forbidden poetry,

Forbidden fruit was turning the pages
Licking her lips seductively,

Forbidden fruit called me
From the fields I plod
To pick from her ancestral apple tree,

Forbidden fruit played with her
Ancestor’s apples staring at me,

Back to the fields I stood alone,
With my plow and my bag filled with natures own.

With my sweat and strength,
I marched to the barn.

But caught off guard
Forbidden fruit had thoughts of her own.

For the master caught I and his forbidden fruit
On the nape of the barn floor riding me.

So off I ran from the fields I once roamed
I rather be a wild nigger free
Than to be strange fruit for Masta’s Popular Tree.


In the history of African Americans and Africans the history has been distorted and trampled. In the America’s slavery was one of the worst manipulation and mutilation of a race of people in the western hemisphere. While in Africa tradition and culture was stripped thought imperialism but not forgotten. In this poem the reader will notice certain terms that are use interchangeably, words such as; we, birds, tree and son v. sun. Each of these terms are a form of symbolism relating to the black race from the America’s, to the islands all the way to Africa. The poem shows how the ancestors try so hard to communicate in the modern times of Afro-Americans lives and black islanders.

*** To get a better understanding of where the poetess is coming from with the poem. Based on the research the poetess conducted to write this poem, the Matrix, Animatrix and the 5 Bloodlines of Hip Hop are a few movies and documentaries to watch to fully understand the symbolism.

Weaving
By.  K-OZ

Dreaming,
Dreaming of words
Dripping,
Spilling into colorful screams,
Kicking,
Action into dreams
Feinting,
Mending many bridges
Sang chorus while burning desires
Feed,
On the survival essences of the soul
Yearning,
Yearning tongue ask native speak.
Native tongue,
Native tongue,
Ask we;
To hear,
To feel,
The pounding of the drums
Racing though my soul
Reminds me of a time
When we use to move to those deep vibrations
Hidden in the darkness of the eye
Back at home in the deepness
Of my soul
Back at home where my pieces mend
Back in Africa, where the clay begins,
The call of the drums begin at the
Edge of the river bank,
But my call is distorted,
In a land where the blood does not run free,
I set under pendulum trees
Meditating to birds humming
Old black spirituals
To rid the branches of mocking birds
Praising the illusion of his story
Creating endless lines of shackles minds and chained bodies
Yes!
The caged bird is free!
Free to live
Free to think
Free to be whatever it may choose to be
But its free to live is oppressed
Its free to think is programmed
Its free to be whatever it please to be
Is not we.
Its lifetime is imprison
Setting in a corner
Counting forwards, backwards, sideways, upwards, downwards,
Counting in directions forgotten,
Confusing itself into a multi-persona, judging its own identity
Before creation
After destruction
Before chaos erupted
The anti-cultural evaluation,
Of a free will to move my burden to greener hills,
The pendulum tree swings low
Shouting my burden is to heavy to carry on to future generations.
“Sum it up child its time to break sticks and bury bones.”
The secrets cry in deserted silence.
Stories of soft black souls
Their ruin centuries linger in the sun with a purpose
They pose on the days birthing speaking pages.
For them I become the voice that will tell
The stories of the century,
Erase the sun to measure distance.
My secrets cry in deserted silence.
Centuries ruin linger on the sun,
Deep sleep arisen
Eroded I
Stories of soft black soul
My deserted silence secrets cry.
Centuries ruin linger on the son,
Centuries ruin linger on the sun,
Centuries ruin linger on the son,
Arose from hyergifics
Eroded I
Stories of soft black soul,
And the blood they tried to lay silent in the land.
When the sun was erase to measure their distance,
And we the true birds of the land
Stay deep in sleep
As they steal the hygiflics of our people and rid us of the root.
And while I set mediating of visions of the dead sipping tea,
Converting the missing embezzlement
The blood screams out at the root,
My deserted silence secrets cry.
Black ruin centeries linger in the sun,
Eroded We,
A tree of stories, of seep black souls.


One of the creator’s most precious creations was woman, the one who bares the pain of giving life and is always caring and loving even if it does not show. In the poem, I Am Beautiful, Johnson takes away societies judgmental thoughts of what a Afro-American woman is and should be.  She shows the natural beauty of an Afro-American woman by striping away the materialistic world inflicted by European standards and ways of thinking.


I Am Beautiful
By. K-OZ

I am beautiful,
I am just so beautiful;
I am beautiful in the mornin
When I have dust in my eyes
Crust around my mouth
Draggin my tired limp body across the mornins mist,
I am beautiful after the day’s rain, while waiting at the bus stop
Drench from perm to suede, and yes I’ll still sing in the rain.
When I am clean, I am beautiful,
When I am stylin, I am beautiful
But I am also beautiful
When I am in a pair of sweats, durag, nails not done hair not perm, body not fresh.
For I am the moons full glimpse, and yes the moon becomes the sun;
As for this womanly womb births life’s beauty;
With thick lips, full hips and thunder tights.

From light skin, to tones of brown to beige; hair of all textures,
I am Nina Simone’s Four Women.
From the sadden tones of gray to the changes of life,
I am Mary J. Blige’s soulful cries.
I am beautiful from inside out.
From the America’s to the Africa’s
I am beauty
I am woman
I am woman
I am beauty
I am beautiful
I am so beautiful
I am woman
I am beautiful
No matter my situation
I am beautiful
I am woman,
Beautiful.


The eyes are said to be a glimpse of a person’s soul. To be able to look in someone’s eyes and be able to feel their pains, joys and life experience is deep. For the eyes is a mirror image of life and can tell a persons life story.  In the poem, “Ur I’s “, the poetess writes on a pair of eye’s she saw and how the eyes could not tell a lie. A person may have a mouth of many sedates but the eyes never lie. 

Your I’s
By. K-OZ

Your I’s,
Are like
The Nile River,
Deep,
Dark,
Rich and full of life,
When I c your I’s
My soul shivers
4 a taste of your 4ever creesive touch.
Waiting to know what your soul secretly holds.
Although your smile warms me like the son,
But
It was your I’s that caught my attention
Speakin in depths no words could ever express.
I can tell, your I’s have traveled afar and seen through many storms.
Now I am looking in those dazzling I’s.
I get loss looking in those
Painless,
Sparkling I’s.
Looking in those
Deep,
Dark
Beautiful painless I’s.
I believe is my greatest destiny to come.


Understanding love can be difficult if the one who is searching for love does not know what to search for. Some may claim they are in love but are actually experiencing an illusion of a confuse state of mind by substituting lust for love. In this poem Johnson writes on the quest of finalizing a search for love through self evaluation. For one to love someone else they must love themselves first and then love will show up taking notice of self evaluation or the need to finalize the evaluation with a second opinion that is honest, pure, trusting, respectful , loving, compassionate and understanding.

Come Correct
By . K-OZ

U,
In my arms
Like
A mother holds her child
Close
To her breast
Wishing
All the best to come,
I, lock my arms tight
Around your temple of being
Hoping to keep good luck between I’s
Of tru’ kings and queens,
Like
A warrior protecting his state of togetherness,
My state of mind
Is intertwine in with your levels of deepness.
How I thought u were crazy 4 walking on quickening grounds
Now I know love won’t slip away.
Because u came to seek
What those individuals did not c in me.
Yeah,
Ur originality has brought me to say.
What lies in the heart dies in thy heart
Because
That that lies steep
Within thy soul
Will never fade,
Yeah
Ur deepness has made me realize.
U are my heart,
U are my body, mind and soul
And nothing less,
Yeah,
Ur whole temple of being has open my eyes to realize.
U are my
King ,
I am your
Queen,
You are not the other man,
I am not the other woman,
I have to tell u
I luv u all my life boy,
Because
I have seen many souls

Through desperate I’s.
I have saw bleeding hearts
Pounding through painful chest,
I have done no wrong
When my I’s
Look through ur soul
Through ur I’s
But
This time
I did come correct.
Now I know love is here
To stay.


Everyone wants to fall in love and be loved by someone. No one wants to be alone in life. Even the children in the sand box learn their first experience of liking someone more than their favorite toy or favorite food. When puberty hits harmonies are introduced to the female and male body and maturity takes its long adventure to completeness. Both sexes learn about the difficulties of dealing with relationships. From a young immature mind sex is love and a person’s emotional state is the less of the worries, for lust for sexual attention is the new love. In the poem, “Patience”, waiting for the right person can be hard, especially when you are use to giving your self freely to people. In today’s world there are not many good examples of pure love and passion. The divorce rate in this time and age is very high. People are rushing into relationships and not caring if the bond they are forming is right. In the case of the poem it speaks on a bond that was built on patience and asking the God or gods for guidance though the stars and other ancient techniques use to make the right match in love.

Patience
By. K-OZ

U,
My light,
My half,
Came to reinforce that duality
The unity between 1+1,
We together reform that spark of old luv that did not pass the test of earn luv
My sweet luv
I change course to become luv
Through Cosmo theoretic chemistry
I’ll be your kindred flam when time gets cold
My soul knows your souls interest and your soul is my soul’s entrance into deep depths of unconditional compassion
Swimming in and out of truth,
Our souls twine in togetherness
Remember this,
Never forsake this,
I your nut u my geb,
Our souls as 1 intertwining on hours of long distant conversation
Forming future blueprints to bottle the essence
To reproduce the sun,
My soul your seed,
3 is a good number so 7 dayz a week our souls will speak yearning to close the gap,
My lock lay’s free,
No other can penetrate this space

Waiting 4 the day u come to erase these enter walls and build a dynasty of diamonds and gold.
U got the key,
U and I together are time
So as long as there is time I will always and 4ever luv 1, cause u are my number 1 luv,
1 luv,
Luv.


When the time comes it does not ask if one is ready for the unknown. Death does not wait for anyone and it does not take orders from those who do not want their love ones to depart from the world of knowing. Sometimes people get the chance to meet the presents of death and they struggle though the challenges that death presents between the duality of living and not living. The first thing the reader will notice is the title of the poem.  In the Bible the book of Psalms expresses the emotional state of the people who are followers of the creator of Israel. In the poem the life of Larry is express using the name of a book in the Bible that foretells Larry has been written in the stroll of life. The poem is accompany by  George Gershwin’s Summertime from the opera Porgy and Bess that is sung by Nina Simone who paints the song in dark, gloomy and sad sung notes. Her chose of style foretells of death visiting in the summer or during the changing season of spring to summer. The representation of death in the poem is a symbol of change that comes with the cycle of life. 
***This poem is dedicated to Larry Glover who passed away from Lung Cancer on May 29th, 2005.

Larry’s Psalms
By. K-OZ


Summertime singin in the wind,
Can you hear her,
Can you hear her,
Can you hear her sweet melody
Blowin the high grass and daffodils,
Bitter sweet melodies dancing from
Clouds and sun rays,
Can you hear her cooing in the wind?
Can you hear her ,
Can you hear her,
Can you hear her sharp jazz laic blue’s
Telling life’s joy’s and pains.
Can you hear her singing your story.
Can you hear your story echoing in
The distance?
Are you laying your Burdon down in Summertime’s
Bosom of peace?
Do you hear,
Do you hear,
The call of your mother while ringing the bells,
Can you hear
Your father calling you to come on home,
Do you feel the excitement of words?
Climbing up throat sliding down tongue
Jumping from lips telling many ears everything is going
To be alright.
Yes everything is gonna be fine,
For I am in the warm and loving
Embrace of summertime.