ShadoKat
ShadoKat is "rapidly becoming a leading force in the spoken-word world" (Home News Tribune, 2007). A New Jersey Native, ShadoKat has exploded upon the spoken word scene rousing audiences while featuring at venues such as The Green Mil Theatre in Chicago, Club Cargo in London, New Jersey Performing Arts Center, Yale University's Peabody Museum, The Green Court Theatre in Los Angelos and even garnering a 3rd place finish at the Apollo Theatre's renowned Amateur Night. In 2006, voters across the nation named him the National Underground Spoken Word and Poetry Award's Male Performer of the Year. ShadoKat has recorded tracks for release on several internationally released albums and been featured on stage with artists such as Dead Prez, Black Ice, Immortal Technique, Saul Williams, DMC, Amiri Baraka, DJ Afrika Bambaataa and performed on the progressive tour, Hip Hop for the People, which featured Ras Baraka and was sponsored by Bill Cosby.
ShadoKat first appeared on the spoken word scene in 2003, immediately making a run to the semi-finals in the Nuyorican Poet's Cafe Poetry Slam Series. Using hip-hop influenced style and cynical humor, his passionate messages don't shy away from various topics; speaking on social awareness, community and even "sexuality in an evening of verbal virtuosity." (The Star Ledger, 2007). ShadoKat is driven to inspire and educate audiences and while working with Mayhem Poets and other poetry ensembles, he has performed at numerous high schools in the northeast. He has created and led workshops at schools and youth organizations in New York and New Jersey and created work for study and performance at Hampton University, New Bedford School District, Anderson University and the Hudson County Urban League Youth Convention. He has been featured as a performer and lecturer at colleges and universities including Virginia Tech, William Patterson University, Pace University, Rutgers University, and the University of Maryland.
ShadoKat reached the world famous Nuyorican Poets Café Poetry Slam Finals twice in 2006 and 2007 and Bowery Poetry Club Poetry Poetry Slam Finals in 2004 and 2007. ShadoKat was also the Last Man Standing Poetry Slam Champion in 2005 in Baltimore, and the 2005 Poetry Slam Champion at the AFRAM Festival in Norfolk, VA. He was a New Jersey Grand Slam Finalist in 2005 and Bar 13 Grand Slam Finalist qualifier in 2007. He competed in the National Poetry Slam Competition in 2005 as a member of the Central Jersey Slam Team and in 2007 with Bowery Poetry Club's Urbana Slam Team which placed 6th in the nation.
His poetry has been featured on radio shows including, Montclair State University, Virginia State University, Rutgers University, North Carolina St., Jazz Poetry Radio, VI-Radio and CUNY. His highly anticipated album, Rebirth of the Mic', was released in April 2006, and he won another National Underground Poetry Award in 2007 for his poem, "The Last Poet on the Open Mic". ShadoKat has a Bachelor of Arts degree in Black Studies and Creative Writing, and continues his graduate studies at Fairleigh Dickinson University.
Alumni Newsletter
I didn’t cry until I saw their pictures in the alumni newsletter.
Didn’t wipe my eyes, didn’t want to see their names too clearly
We have these ways of disconnecting ourselves
Like umbrellas and headphones
But life is persistent.
My mother told me, ‘Without struggle, character lays dormant.’
It comes in the form of late night phone calls
and test results.
Wears whiskey as cologne,
piercing the home you’ve burrowed in your sheets
life is hard to the core
like journalists who saw each body as possibility for a Pulitzer
Remember that vampires see blood baths as free dinner
I open my eyes and read the names aloud
hear gunshots splinter poems and engineering designs
and a father’s fist slamming on the kitchen table
phone hanging off the receiver like a dislocated limb
I turn the page
civil engineering from Louisville, Kentucky
graduate student from Mumbai, India
senior from Martinez, Georgia
feels like I’m trying to cup my hands
to stop blood from leaking through my fingers
they interrupted Nikki’s poem to show the gunman’s face again
and a news reporter fashioning himself a hero
as if bravery is equivalent to standing on the edge of campus,
asked
how can we ever show remembrance to the victims?
what can you say to cameras when
I’ve seen them interview bullet holes in the concrete
for ratings.
They will lay down 29,000 coffins
cause that’s what they expect from us
In the 17th century
they tied a bell to the finger of bodies buried in case they should come awake
and I heard the first school bell chime moments after the first student laid still
With the increase of tuition,
but no money toward a back-up plan for us
now the ringing swelling
into a chorus
how many angels do you think received their wings that day.
How many in all?
Why you think they call it a death toll?!
We are either the angels
or the survivors
We are still alive on these days
a twelve year old boy who attacks a group of high schoolers
for calling his sister a bitch
how many dead ringers were running toward Liberty Street
after the first plane hit
Imagine the gunman’s surprise
at a door barricaded by a French teacher, the gasps
as the first bullet dug into her back
Imagine her last breathe visibly floating from her lips
as she embraced death to save lives
and another bell begins to chime
We are the warriors
Anyone who's ever been raped and has enough
life thread left to make love
African mothers who baptized themselves and their children
off the bow of a slave ship
and managed to take a one of their captors with them
We are the destined
the called upon and the reluctant
the angry and the pacifistic
In this life
It takes more rain for some hearts to blossom
So in response to seemingly endless amounts of bad fortune
Walk up in God’s face and jack him for some blessings
WE DON’T GO INTO THE NIGHT WITHOUT JACKHAMMERS!
candlelight vigils and the first day back in class
this is for words plus action
this is cause words are action
its not always what we did while the bullets were flying
its what we are doing after
when they finally get around to interviewing u
they always ask you where you are from
point to an empty place in the sky,
tell them
you used to shine there
but you descended
cause
you can't hear the bells
from that high