2019 Gumbo final - Book - Page 51
Calvin Morris
Poetry becomes performance
lthough I walk through the valleys of the frat house, I
shall fear no Caucasian foolishness.”
For communication studies sophomore Calvin Marquis
Morris, known by stage name Kalvin Marquiz, writing
his truth in poetry is not enough. He seeks to bring life to his
poetry through performance by engaging with his audience and
transforming his written work into a spectacle.
Morris considers himself queer in all aspects of his identity, and
uses magical realism in his poetry to explore topics like race,
sexuality, gender identity, police brutality and other systems that
harm marginalized people. He said it is his duty as a writer to make
people in marginalized communities, especially black people in the
South, feel they are seen and know life is worth living.
“I try to talk about all the grief and all the death and all the bullshit
that we face in life, but also very much delve into what other
possibilities that can be had despite this grief, or in spite of this
grief, or because of this grief,” Morris said. “What world can we
collectively imagine that is better than this one, or what moment can
we live in to bring us joy when there’s so much sorrow around us?”
(Above)
Signs directing guests hang
on display at the Delta Mouth
literary festival on Saturday,
April 7, 2018 in the Women's
Center on LSU campus.
(Right)
Audience members listen to
a panel at the Delta Mouth
literary festival on Saturday,
April 7, 2018 in the Women's
Center on LSU campus.
Morris is a performance artist. He writes poetry, performs spoken
word poetry, acts, sings and writes songs. He aspired to be a
singer-songwriter as a child, but when the dream didn’t seem
achievable, his focus turned to poetry.
“If poetry is my wife who I’m in a relationship with contractually,
who I married because her family had money and I was poor, then
music is like the love of my life who I go see on the side and I write
sonnets about,” Morris said.
Morris delved into poetry and writing professionally through
WordCrew, a youth spoken word collective, in 2016. He performed
with the group at the Delta Mouth Literary Festival last semester.
Morris said his favorite thing about poetry his that he doesn’t have
to use complete sentences to convey abstract thoughts, images
and emotions without it being false. Spoken word allows him to
talk about life in a broader, metaphorical way that speaks to the
audience on a more universal scale.
“I think poetry has this nice way of allowing me to be like, ‘I’ve
transformed into a f**king Phoenix, and I slapped the white girl
who touched my hair,’ which didn’t happen but it’s like it still has
the same truth,” Morris said. “It still reveals this greater truth about
what it means to be black and what the experience had provoked
in me.”
Morris draws inspiration for his work from all aspects of his life,
ranging from going to Splash and boy problems to jokes he’s made
that sounded like mantras his grandmother would whisper.
“I write poems about like, making awkward eye contact with
people,” Morris said. “I’m working on a poem right there that
explores what it means to be black and queer, and how all our
words to describe what it means to be black or dark skin are
related to food and how that deals with how we are seen as
something to be consumed or something that is like appetizing for
white audiences.”
Morris said he is closest to his friends who are supportive, give
him confidence in his poetry when he wavers and push him to
be better. He said his family only gets his “happy church negro”
poetry, as they are openly homophobic and he believes allowing
for a healthy space between them and some of his work allows
them to still be his family until they’re ready to accept him.
Ultimately, Morris’ poetry is not only for others who may need it,
but himself. This is evident with his poem “Dreams of Mississippi
Burning” in the September edition of The Adroit Journal, which
explores his complex relationship with his mother, the conflict
between her expectations and sexuality, and survivor’s guilt from
her miscarriages.
“I’ve always seen poetry as a way for me to fully — not even
embrace, but for me to understand my own identities —
understand my own personhood and that was something that they
could not be a part of for me to be my fullest and my best self in
the truest form of myself that I needed to be,” Morris said.
Story // Ashlei Gosha
Photo // Lauren Watson
Design // Dakota Baños
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