Stage Directions

Stage Directions

I place you in the fairytale in my head

and hope you don’t stray from the script:

Meet me center stage, under the spotlights

and let’s have an undressed rehearsal.

Take off your mask and tear from the scene

because my heart is tired of wearing cufflinks.

-R.Gibson

Laundromat Livin'

Laundromat Livin'

And emotions stay open
even if the door is closed
but I can't stop hopin'
my naked eye is clothed

in a clean layer
of lavender lint
to soften the stares
and scatter the scent.

And my wallet has heartburn
but my legs'd hate to retire
'cause it took twenty years to learn
how to dance like a dryer.

I mixed the lights with the darks
but still I ran out of quarters
and the piles have grown large
and this life is out of order.

In search of Lady Luck,
I always seem to find
my wishes washed up;
and tumble low dried.

-R.Gibson

Poem: Nightfall

Nightfall

Autumn creeps into my room,

blows its breath against my body

and I fall into my bed like leaves.

I drift into a delicate dream

under waves of silky sheets,

as cars sail across asphalt seas.

Shade-sipping cicadas sizzle

until the sinking sun signals

the sky to turn black and blue.

The moon bruises the broken streets

with a bone-white hue. Nightlights ignite

fluorescent fantasies and smokescreens.

I can’t sleep. My city keeps coughing cacophony;

choking on smog, it curses the stars for sitting snug

in their solitary silence. The city-slickers are senseless;

some seek to be saved, while others singe their spirits

with suicidal shots of liquor. The slow burning liquid licks

the lungs to drown out the dissolute dogmas of day.

In darkness, the bitches and dogs come out to play.

And dogs bury sticks and bones between hips for moans

but a bitch’s dirty words will make a dog come clean.

Junkies can’t flee their freeloading fleas—so they claw

across concrete, and scratch up enough change

to float around with their monkeys on a leash;

Addicted to the scent of this citrus-tinted city

the commoners are too cold to sip vitamin c;

the spin of this cyclical system is sickening.

The food-deprived dumpster dive in anorexic alleys

that ache between bulimic buildings that binge

on bodies and vomit out souls onto the streets.

But the people choose the tools to skewer life.

So their ghosts gather on graves and gamble grief;

shootin’ craps and talkin’ more shit than sewer pipes.

The haunted howls and toxic tones infect the sky;

it sounds like the undying echo of genocide.

The mentally enslaved shackle their brains to a train

that lugs their load across an underground railroad;

but the train tracks are a spine of human bones

and Tubman stopped conducting a long, long time ago.

With another day to bruise and break; the heavens

peel off the band-aid of night. The murky mirage recedes.

People rise and open their eyes but still lose sight of their dreams.

But I’m too ran-down to rise and too distraught to dream.

I can’t sleep. Leaves fall and fall leaves.

I think, therefore I stand on the edge of my sanity

but my mind already jumped.

-R.Gibson

SAVE MONROE PARK! SAVE OUR GREENSPACE!

What would VCU's Monroe Park campus be without Monroe Park? Imagine a1-2 year "renovation" of a 9 foot fence abruptly cutting off the park from the Richmond community. There would be no place of fellowship and restoration for the homeless in-need of help, the regular park-goers and the majority of 1st year students housed around the park. Doesn't sound considerate or ideal for the health of the community. This $6.2 Million makeover seems like a cover up for Councilman Charles Samuels' plan to weed out the already-vulnerable homeless population and cut off programs like "Food Not Bombs" that offer healthy, vegetarian meals for the homeless every weekend. Don't allow them to remove what little support is left. Save the feeding programs. Save our green space.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJiq5yzlmTk

Get more information and sign the petition here http://monroecampaign.wordpress.com/.

"Ice Pick/Iron Grip"

"Ice Pick/Iron Grip"

You stabbed me
in the heart with a key
that unlocked something
I cannot explain. It welled up
and shattered inside. The ravine you cut
crusted over like the crevice of a sleeping eye.
I wish I could pick away the memory like a scab.
But I won't heal unless you crumble off
with friction. I cried as I held on
to the iron hands of time,
but they only entrusted
a rusty constriction.

-R.Gibson

For Black Boys....

     So this past May, I was in a play titled "For Black Boys Who Have Considered Homicide When the Streets Were Too Much". I believe Keith Antar Mason, the playwright, really aimed to give a voice to all of the Black men who have been taught by society that expressing feelings emotions is a "female thing" and suppress so much in fear of being seen as soft or sissie. So his play can be seen as an invitation into the Black Man's Mind. It was a really challenging process that helped me tap into the well of my emotions and experience the vast terrain of my imagination. I am so grateful for my directors: Kim Exum & Crystal Johnson and my cast: Shawn Griffin, Chad Ramey & Jude Fageas for their hard work and dedication to resurrect the play from it's pages.

Here is a clip of one of my performances the cast dubbed "The Virginity Piece":


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KAmOqRhyM_0

"hiding love"

it's fun mixing up mediums :)
marker x staple x watercolor on canvas