L-Majesty

Who is L-Majesty?

L-Majesty is a clever construct, a moniker, a stage name used during open mic performances to express a supreme love for words and a sincere desire to master metaphors, harmonize similes and breathe new life into personification pieces.

My real name is Luis Pabon. I am many things. I am an: Individual, Son, Brother, Uncle, Poet, Writer, Social Worker, Artist, Singer, Songwriter just to name a few of the roles I occupy. I am of Black and Puerto Rican descent and was born and raised in Bronx, NY. I lived in the Bronx for over twenty years before migrating to Albany in 2003. I moved to Albany for three reasons: to finish my graduate studies, locate affordable housing and escape the oppressive clutches of gentrification.

I am a magnificent wordsmith who has had a love affair with the purity of language since the tender age of 6. I first learned the power of words when I was 8yrs old. During that time I had the flu and chicken soup and orange juice were not making me feel better so I surrendered to my flu-induced hallucinations and wrote my first piece about sycamore trees. After drafting that piece, I felt so much better. The catharsis held wonderful healing properties and from that point on I have continued to derive private joy from the process called writing.

It wasn’t until I went to the Nuyorican Poets Café as a teen that I began to realize that words can move off the page and into the lives of others. I realized that I had the ability to touch lives with the power and precision of my words. So I began performing at the Open Rooms and various open mics in New York City.

Since moving to Albany, I have participated in a variety of Open Mics, Poetry Slams and Talent Competitions. In August 2011, I won First Place in the Division 3 Plaza Lites Competition which afforded me the opportunity to share my work with a wider audience and network with other talented performance artists. It is a wonderful feeling to be surrounded by a group of such talented and inspiring individuals and I look forward to a lifetime career of performing and writing a life I wouldn’t mind living twice.

My work explores the intricate nuances between humanity and the divine. I examine topics such as sexuality, religion, love, technology, relationships, government, injustice and race. These topics are the most difficult to explore at times as they rest on the fulcrum of curiosity and fear. However the guiding principle that I employ when writing poetry is this: “Write the poem that you are most afraid to write as that is the poem that will break into the human condition and honestly steal pieces of understanding”.

RECENT ARTICLES

FRESHLY SQUEEZED

This is the twilight zone
No longer humans but human-like clones
Artificial robots with mechanical bones
Missing that something we once called our souls
We are not at home
We are lost in our alone
With drums in our folds
Please leave a message after the tone
We are vacant-eyed drones
Step-ford children birthed from assembly-lined wombs
We are trademarks and brands
Anything other than human (man and woman)
There is seriously something lacking
This is not your regularly scheduled programming
We are being juiced by Autotune
Blended by the music
Chopped and screwed
Made into a fool by viewers like you
Awarded the prize of trust
For being so unbelievable
And nothing makes sense
Expect to find an honest connection
At a club called “Secrets”
Expect to find a decent human lover
At a place called Monster
All I have done is make excuses for it
When we are being freshly squeezed
Juiced to the flavor of early mortality
Human-reduced in mass quantities
To another level, standard, another degree
This is something spiritual
It is not something you can see
Something that hits you
In the middle of your naivety
You can hear it
The nutrients being removed from your system
As you buy into being brainwashed and conditioned
Just wanting a little fun
Trying to take your mind off the revolution
Seeking first the kingdom
Someone you wasted your love on
-Something
But you know too much to pretend to be dumb
Your skin is too black to ever deny seeing the sun
You can’t hide behind the aegis of youthful ignorance
Claiming that you had no idea and didn’t know about this
I can’t play dead
I won’t play dumb
I know the value of walking fast so I refuse to run
So many human lives juiced into submission
Believing in all of these human lies brainwashed and conditioned
Barbz, acolytes, disciples and cults
Jonestown in your town
Exploiting your faults
Juiced like Tropicana and a glass of Minute Maid on ice
Be careful not to drink that tall cup of Flavor aid laced with cyanide and high
Getting high off skies with clouds of sleepy-eyed weed
You’ll never fly high with beedies and trees in your wings
It will juice you low
Call it mellow but keep you broke
Romantic smoke
Call it passion
But it will make you choke
Hold your throat
Keep you from speaking the things you know
Form follows flow
Interrupted by a blast of the blow
Lines of coke
Ye yo a yo yo
Let go of the dope
Don’t be freshly squeezed by the enemy
Only you can say no more.
No more (echoed fade out)
That is the key
Spiritual release
Now be free
Let your spirit take the lead
Don’t allow it to be freshly squeezed daily
Piece together your peace.
Peace I say sincerely.

THE SEA OF YOU

I jumped into the sea of you
The deep of you
Enjoying the warmth of your comfortable
The blue of your wonderful
I never knew
Water so beautiful
Land so tropical
I never knew the reach of your pull
Or how deep you actually were
But I should have known
When my feet never reached your ocean floor
That I was on my own
I should have known that you were just
A drowning soul off the coast of gone
Searching for an anchor
Someone to lean on
I should have known
I would be on my own wanting more
As you were just a wave
Never shore.

STRANGER DANGER

I sit in mirrors that forget me
Play with shadows of who I could be
Pregnant with lazy possibility
Never blossoming
I feed on my faulty philosophies
Truthfully speaking
I don’t know how to be
Cuz he never taught me
Left me estranged from my male identity
Masculinity tweaked
As Grandmommy
Tried to show me how to shave properly
Add the cream lightly
Stroke gently
Sometimes against the grain
See she was going through “the change”
And only knew how to shave
The way she shaved her legs
But a face
And a leg
Are two different things
Somehow her change
Only dollared into the phantom father that never came.
And I often times
Hid behind mami’s legs
When company came
Cuz I learned to be afraid of everything
And nothing
Life
-The monster always under my bed at night
I stood by doorways
Watched the dust play
Circle and dance like constellations
In the patch of afternoon light
Daddy was always a satellite
That occupied my mind
But never occupied my life.
My life not mines
But mami’s
Her little man
Surrogate husband
Full time friend
Dad was supposed to be her companion
But his absence left her questioning men
My life
Her Jesus Christ
Slain sacrifice
Put on altar as answer
I would be her answer
Her fantasy
The knight that never came by to save her life
I would save hers
By ending mines.
Now I don’t know how to be
Daddy left me estranged
And now
The stranger is me.