swifts  &  s l o w s · a quarterly of crisscrossings

saunter, slither
Tauwan Paterson

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BEATS GENERATING
for and after Patti Smith

Saunter,
Slither,
Engage them.
Howl,
Murmur,
Present.
Rock and Roll,
Baby.
Buzz,
Static,
SHIFT-
the culture
YOU
Cultured.
Drum,
Bass,
RIFFS.
From the roughs,
A diamond,
Gunpowder;
Ammo
Pure
Grit.
Gatherer of
Jaws
Dropped
Open.
Collector of
Enraptured
Stares
You
Wild
Wild
Stallion.
Mumble,
Mumble,
Ramshackle.
Mystical
Rambler
Adrift.
Growl
Presence
IT!
THIS—
Is
IT!

“BELIEVE ME, SWEETIE, I GOT ENOUGH TO FEED THE GREEDY!”
(after Gwendolyn Brooks & Vince Staples)

We be Prophets
We be KINGS
We speak and
they be like:
This joint right here?
THAT’S THAT GOSPEL! cause
we forever
dropping that knowledge
Keeping it 100
We open our mouths, jewels and gems fall out
We
Coming correct
with that heat
That
CLICK CLACK CLAP! and that
BOOP BOP BAM!
That fire
What’s good
and what it is
We Big Fish
We Poets
Hip-Hop
Soul singahs
We ART-
ISTS
Too cultured and too ghetto
On the mount
we elevated
We on
BEEN ON
We ain’t dead
ain’t been
chalked out
We gets it cracking
go stupid
STAY ON
no doubt
We Poets
Like
Miss Gwendolyn
said:
We strike straight
we Jazz June
We Big Fish
Yeah…
We

real cool

“BELIEVE ME, SWEETIE, I GOT ENOUGH TO FEED THE GREEDY!” takes its title from the Biggie Smalls track “Big Poppa”. The poem also contains words from and is inspired by Vince Staples’ debut album “Big Fish Theory”, and contains lines from Gwendolyn Brooks’ poem “We Real Cool”.

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Hailing from South Central, Los Angeles, Tauwan Patterson is a Black + Queer Poet and recent graduate of the MFA Creative Writing Program at Queens University of Charlotte, North Carolina. His work has appeared in online literary magazines Cool Beans Lit, 3rd Wednesday Magazine, and Muse-Pie Press’ Shot Glass Issue #41, and will also appear in the forthcoming Moonstone Arts Center anthology “Which Side Are You On?!”, the Winter Issue of Rise Up Review, Porkbelly Press’ “Love Me, Love My Belly” zine, the Rising Phoenix Review, the Academy of the Heart and Mind, and The Amazine. With his poetry Tauwan aims to, in the words of the great Poet and Thinker Marcus Jackson, announce his freedom and presence. Making a sound that echoes in the end that says Tauwan Patterson. No more. No less.