Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer
ONE STARTED to write poetry to impress a girl, the other found his muse a poetic piper leading him from manic depression. And poetry started for thrills and poetry began for therapy met before a minuscule audience at RedBones the Blues Café on Wednesday night.
Duane Francis and Godfrey 'The Tinman' Clarke were the guests as the year's 'Evening of Contemporary Literature' series, which began at the Braemar Avenue, New Kingston, restaurant and nightspot.
The former was much more active on stage, much of his material focused on women, true to his start, while Stewart sat as at points he delved into his own mind.
Francis, a RedBones regular, began on a social note, observing 'guns barking more than dogs/too many rebels without a cause', the literal handful of people who came for poetry clapping above the buzz of dinner conversation. He went on the road by dubbing every Jamaican driver a 'Ph.D' (Pothole Dodger), to laughter, and there was more as he declared 'this one is very serious' and said 'me want a girl fi meself/tiad a hide unda bed an' jump ova fence.'
MATTERS OF THE HEART
Microphone in hand, Francis stood near the edge of the small stage at RedBones, eyes closed sometimes and free arm gesticulating, as he went into matters of the broken heart ('perfect match, screwed up liver and broken heart') and waxed warm for the lady in the 'Blue Dress'. He made a bid for a lady's love with 'let me be the one to give you 10,000 reasons to scream my name' and there was more laughter as he revisited childhood when he would ride his bicycle ('the more I pumped the more she squeaked').
He made various claims in order to win a lady's love, including 'I will be your chameleon, blending into every shade of your desire', 'for you I would backstroke across the crocodile infested Nile' and 'baby for you, I would go bungee jumping without the bungee cord.'
Along the way, he opened a debris store for every 'Roadblock' and closed with a humorous take on the supposedly deranged, saying 'clothes mighta dutty, might smell bad/but don't you dare call me mad.'
Godfrey 'The Tinman' Clarke made his poetic debut at RedBones on Wednesday night. "In the latter part of the '90s I embarked on a journey filled with potholes and bad relationships ... Manic depression, I was diagnosed with. You can dwell on it, or you can look at it and move on," he said.
"The poetry was the inner child, expressing to me, Godfrey, what was inside me," he said.
BECOMING AWARE
He began with 'Aware', in which the Rastafarian said Selassie 'walked me through the gates of hell/just so I could live to tell'. 'Situation' commented on 'children having children' and he advised would be immigrants 'what are you looking for in Uncle Sam/when you have the promised land.'
He addressed his former situation directly with 'Wha Happen' and the state of the earth in 'Earth Crisis' ('plastic bottles and broken bottles everywhere/what happen Jamaica, don't you care?'). 'Life In a Nutshell' summed up life and 'Another Day' described a state of 'living hell, still all is well.'
Clarke paid homage to his mother who was there, 'despite the fact I kept falling' and observed many things 'From a Window In Jamaica'. He spoke of 'Sound Mind', at points during his debut reading asking 'you like that one' and there was laughter as he described his 'Giving Tree', in which he would often be 'sitting on a branch/reflecting on the state of my ranch'.
