The Maurice Brown Memorial Poetry Reading was the first time I had

attended an organized event for the purpose of poetry. Poetry, while not a new topic
or experience, is strange when I remember how I was introduced to it. For myself,
and like most individuals, it was introduced to it formally in a class room setting
around middle or high school. Where you were instructed to express your thoughts,
emotions and feelings in black and white, and surprisingly graded. How can a
feeling towards a certain experience or topic be graded out of ten points. Of course
there are literary elements, and writing techniques you were graded for but the bulk
of your points were rewarded by your teachers judging. A poem is not lines in black
and white, it is an art piece that is painted with colors on a canvas the size of your
will. This was the mindset I had when entering the poetry event.
Reginald Dwayne Betts was the author and poet that was participating in the
event. The first thing I noticed was the physical appearance of Reginald, a muscular
individual who had resolve in the way that he stood waiting for everyone to finish
their food and later be seated to start the readings. I had no information about
Reginald, what his education was, his reasoning for hosting such an event, and
more importantly his life story. His poems would be a direct reflection of the
experiences he endured, and while I had done no prior research I could sense the
painting he was prepared to draw before us. He had a smile on his face, and was full
of laughter when talking to his friends but the colors he would soon use to draw his
painting were the shades of gray, a dull but surprisingly colorful portrait.
After the first reading of one of his poems, he stated I was tried as an adult,
who knows what it means to be tried as an adult? I immediately thought that it was
a fairly senseless question. Who could possibly not know what that meant in this
room? Not only until after he immediately stated that he knew everyone in the room

had knowledge of it, but he emphasized that the concept was scary, and the
experience should not be experienced for a minor. He continued reading his next
poems, but I was not listening. I had completely ignored any word that came out of
his mouth. The only thing I could think of is at the gravity of those words, tried as
an adult. They were heavy words, but I had thrown them to the side and
immediately came up with the definition. Had I become this desensitized from
struggle, that I was fearful at the tone of his voice when he said those words. I was
introduced to the topic in high school, through a book I was assigned for my
government class. We had been introduced to the topic in completely polar
experiences. Mine through a book, and his through his life. Yet I could immediately
realize the burden it put on his shoulders. And the burden increased as he noticed
the desensitization of those words in his crowd. This was the poet that appeared
before me.
He continued reading poems throughout most of the event. Some poems
painted in gray, some in red, blue and green. He had evolved as an individual. A
once, tried as an adult, minor that was locked up for a car jack and sentenced to
live eight years of his life in a battle ground with murderers. I knew that while I
understood his situation, I could never understand or endure the same experience.
Yet the same man that was in jail for eight years, stands before us as a law student
at an ivy league school, and his goal through poetry is to educate the world of how
corrupt the law system. How can the same 16 year old teen be put into a room with
an individual twice his age, and a hunger for blood. The event continued with this
mindset. This man had evolved, he was enlightened. He was thankful for the life he
lived now and made an effort to live his life drawing on a canvas with bright colors,

but he could never forgot the walk he took among the shadows. The ends of his
colored strokes would also be edged with a shade of gray.
There was a group of poems I enjoyed, or more so I enjoyed the concept
behind the poems. The titled the group of poems, For the City that Nearly Broke
Me. The poem concepts were something new to me, but the feeling I had about the
idea was lively and I knew what he meant. This group of poems revolved around
what he felt when he thought his experiences and titled them For the City that
Nearly Broke Me. However each time he started the poem and titled it the same
thing, he found a new though that had popped and wrote about it. I really took
pleasure in the concept, never being able to write about the same thing, in the
same way you wrote it the previous time. It strengthened the idea that our
personalities and self, are constantly changing, and that depending on the time we
write, experiences are prioritized and displayed accordingly.
This was my first experience of a poetry reading. I thoroughly enjoyed the
experienced and kind of punched me in the face. I had to reevaluate struggle as not
a definition of myself but this world.