Michael Sloman, otherwise known by his stage name as ILLiptical, The WizARd of MARS, is a Spoken Word Poet/Hip Hoppin’ MC with an inspiring passion to speak his thoughts and express his creativity for crowds of various ages and cultures at any given moment as the opportunity arises. He holds a Masters in Writing from the College of Saint Rose and has been an active performer in Albany since his junior year at Albany High in 2001. He is currently running two after-school spoken word poetry programs, which he entitled “Spit the Heart’s Truth” at both Albany High School and Albany Leadership Charter School. He has been a feature poet at Dan Wilcox’s Third Thursday’s at the Social Justice Center, is one of many of the prestigious Nitty-Gritty Slam champions, and also won a poetry slam in Brooklyn NY in 2009, where not only was he the only light-skinned brother in attendance, but also the only heterosexual male! He is honored to be a part of Albany’s team!
POEMS
RECENT ARTICLES
OLD MEN OF THE MIC
Juvenile voices
Autotunin’
Over crumbling beats
Of tradition,
Nonsense chatter
Molding over ciphers
Of yesterday.
Oh, insightful ancestors and MC’s,
What became of your dreams
That slipped away in the night
Like the moon deferred of responsibility?
There is no action
In today’s verbs
To ripple through the streams of your legacy
You are the old dogs
But once upon a time you were the Giants
Defying the cunning tricks
Of politicin’ Dodger’s
Your revolution called the shots heard around the world
When you were tired of being disenfranchised,
But, what happened to your underground treasure
You once kept guard over like gnomes?
Do you regret not warding off the grinches
Who have robbed you of your throne…
Who laugh away the fire-burning inspiration
Till it dissipates into thin air.
Constellations of the sky,
Break up the unwavering fake stars
That front like they’ve been outshining you for light years
And insert omens into comets
Like the God MC about to rock it
You shoulda stayed, old men of the mic
And auto-corrected
Your ships
Drowning today.
Cause your vessels
Be autotunin’
Over floundering beats
Of tradition,
Stagnant rhymes Molding over ciphers Of yesterday
MR. JENKINS
What song you wanna’ sing, Mr. Jenkins.
It’s the eve of Christmas break
And we’re going buck wild with anticipation.
But you’re a nice old man,
So even though you not our real teacher,
We won’t give you that hard of a time,
Really…
Just as long as you give us
A jolly old tune to hum,
We promise we won’t act shy
Or too stubborn to care.
Just what do we really wanna learn,
Mr. Jenkins?
Why that’s the smartest question
We heard
All day
All month,
And all year
I thought you was a sub?
How about this, Mr. Jenkins,
Because you care so much
About us crazy kids
We’ll let you in our little secret
That no social worker,
Principal,
Or normal teacher
Has yet to figure out…
But we’re gonna whisper it in your ear
Cause otherwise Middle School’d be just too easy
And we don’t want you sitting around
Frontin’ like you don’t care
And we know you care,
Mr. Jenkins
So tell us what song you wanna sing
And we’ll tell you what we really wanna learn.
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