6/17 Poetry by Ayodele Nzinga

While national poetry month is tucked into 2008 history, poems have been heavy in the Bay Area air for the last few weeks as poets and spoken word artists have been opening their notebooks and spitting verses on stages across the area. Oakland, Berzerkeley and San Fran all recently held their qualifiers for this year’s national slam. The API set repped the page hard at this past weekend’s feature showcase at Eastside Arts Alliance, and tonight Poetry Diversified Oakland features the Wordslanger-Ayodele Nzinga.

Ayodele is like the Muhammad Ali of poetry-the people champ. For the last 7 years she’s been using poetry, especially Shakespeare, to teach urban youth over at the Prescott Joseph Center in West Oakland the ways of the world, from adapting Romeo and Juliet into a coming of age hood tale to remixing the Merchant of Venice with hip hop lyrics.

Tonight the poet “most likely to shatter your illusions of what poetry is, can be, will do, has done” will be holding down the stage with original verses and her own very original performance style. And I know it’s poetry and lyrics we’re talking about here, but sometimes some words just can’t do other words justice, so check the video of a set recorded in West Oakland recently. Word up. -kwan

Ayodele Nzinga
Free
7:30-9 p.m.
World Ground Cafe
3726 MacArthur Blvd.
Oakland CA 94619
510-482-2933
WorldGrounds.com