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We welcome our first and only literary poet of the season, Angela Peñaredondo, to clique up! We dissect the literary poetry process and throw poetry sugar and salt at the “2 Piece Combo.” Angela shuts it down at the end by bringing a poem worth all the re-reads for the “5 for Ya Eye”.

[Episode Index]

• “Meditations On a Fist” 0:35
  
• Threads & Lines: 4:20
  
• 2 Piece | “Sea Salt” 15:41
  
• 2 Piece | #poetry: 28:34
  
• 5 For Your Eye | 38:11

In a rec. room at a community college I found poetry exciting again, and the conduit to that was Angela Peñaredondo. I had finished performing the normal “College Presentation” poetry set, inspirational and politically-motivational pieces being the cornerstone for most college shows. Angela was one of the poets I shared the stage with, and she presented a video collaboration; showcasing her poetry with visual accompaniment. The visual and poem were lost on me at first glance, and that was surprisingly refreshing. Angela was not trying to make a point that was easy to understand, but make art in the hopes it carries a point along with it.

It was this approach and need for revisiting a poem that got me excited.

Poetry can be a conduit to change, and is often used to inspire political and social action in the spoken word community, but Angela was something different. No easy-to-understand punches and hits, no catchy word play or simplified wisdom. You need to earn that artistic interpretation. Angela represented to me the part of poetry that first got me hooked; The “ What did they mean?” part of this poetry ting. Angela’s work wasn’t to be sold on loud performance flourishes or room shaking one-liners, but instead built on the foundations of poetic ambiguity and a need to interpret. Angela excited a part of my artistic soul that wanted to explore, anticipating the discovery of if I was spot on, or realizing I got more digging to do before I reach those gems.

We invited Angela to ‘Clique Up’ in the hopes that we could show our audience this side of the poetry world. Her “Threads and Lines” piece took work for Kuya and I to find points of understanding we could move forward with. As spoken word heads, we’re trained to write in a way that can be understood in the live venue, because if it don’t land it don’t hit. But without the constraints of real-time comprehension, literary poetry serves as a reminder of our connection to this ambiguous art world where interpretation allows us to get in where we (think we) fit in. Angela continued to represent with her “5 For Your Eye” piece, now with us having better context of her work and how her literary style operates. The experience opened our eyes and ears to become more receptive of how dope Angela’s work is, once we got over our stage-vs-page poetry hangups. It was this journey, this paradigm shift that was needed to be shown through at least one literary poet in the season.

There are a lot of us out there writing poetry; from the professional (paid) poet to those just trying to get through their lives, but we are all connected to the same thing. That thing is not easily understood and definable and that is why literary poetry is so important for poets to learn that revisiting ideas is a part of discovery. There are parts of poetry that remain unseen unless we really dig in, and poets like Angela reminded us that there’s always more to discover and learn from.

Writeup by Daniel Hees

[Footnotes]

• Angela Penaredondo: Facebook
• 2 Piece Combo: “Sea Salt” – written by David Mason, adapted by Motionpoems
  
• 2 Piece Combo: #Poetry @killusionrebirth
  
• Music by The Dope Spot Studios Produced by Dom V
  
• Intro title & segment transitions animated by Seth Garnes