To: My Anti-American Backfire.

For all the clarity that it's worth, I now understand why I have not created any performance poetry since I've left my real house. I was talking to this Ghanaian guy i met last week and he's like, "what you mean NY gave you a block, there is sooo much stuff out here...what is it....an overload?"

and well...the African made me think a lil. After all my thinking I've observed that it's not because I'm dialect/accent-shy or super reserved in a non-conservative society, it's the fact that my mission all these years has been to effectively reverse the effect of Americanization in my country and what it has done/is doing to our young people.

As I explained a few blog entries ago, it was the fact that I exerted so much effort into creating work that was uniquely local, in order to locate that uniqueness that is in fact Trinbagonian, when confronted with an american audience, I am at a loss. It's how I cringe at hearing the Caribbean girls in the church choir trying to sing and ad lib like Beyonce or how I reflex-frown at the West Indian utterance of the word 'Summer'....DESPITE the fact that all these things are now legit, because Caribbean girls who grow up in America WILL sing and speak like Americans, and Summer IS an actual season here.

I have trained myself for more than five years to reject everything American because of how it was invading my piece of earth. Now I'm on their own turf and my body hasn't surrendered to this context of living. It is in my nature to not assimilate into this place....and that has it's benefits and burdens. On the upside...I maintain my full identity, straight back to Taino and Kalinago days. On the flip-side, I don't remember how to confront audiences anymore. American audiences anyway.

Who put the death in dilemma?