Dreams + Tragedy

Stand up for me
Breathe with me
1-2
Now let’s try to say ‘Ohm” instead of exhaling
1-2 / 1-2
This sound is special
It’s neither positive nor negative
It’s like us
A mixture of dreams and tragedy

This is a poem about dreams and tragedy
When I hear in the news
That a 16 year old found a cure for cancer, I’m happy for humanity but I’m mainly wondering what the fuck I am achieving at 26?
When I hear a 13 year old started his own company and sold it to Google, I’m like fuck ! It’s over for me. I’m 26, Google will never buy my company
When I hear an 8 year old sing and break dance on The Voice, I’m like that’s ok. I never wanted to dance and sing on stage anyway. But then I wonder. Maybe my parents killed my dream in the egg when I was a kid. I could’ve been Carmen Miranda!

This is a poem about dreams and tragedy
Why don’t I change the world today? Why not today? Why don’t I leave my job and start a billion dollar business? I’m going to start a blog, it’s going to be huge, people will like it on Facebook, they will knock on my door at night, pull me out of my bed and carry me on their shoulders. They will hold me up and dragons will come and shower me in their fire. My flaming robe will shout to the world I am the son of Lady Daenerys.
But … What if no one likes my page, what if they laugh at my poems, what if the dragons burn my skin, what if I end up alone without sex behind my screen eating feijao and cold mandioca.

This is a poem about dreams and tragedy
Anxiety is not a modern invention. Here is a survey. Who here has ever dreamed of spending some time in prison to figure things out? Ok. What about some long sabbatical somewhere lost in the mountains or the forest? Anxiety is the daughter of choice. Choice is the son of freedom. We might love to be free. But sometimes, just for a while, we don’t want to have to choose. Just for a while. The more free you are, the more you can choose and the more wrong you can be. My sisters, my brothers.
It’s ok
You don’t have to change the world today

This is a poem about dreams and tragedy
But what if I never change the world?
What if I leave in silence without a trace?
What if no one remembers what I did?
Breathe with me
Here is a story. In the 1st Harry Potter, Harry is staring at the magic mirror and sees the philosopher’s stone land in his pocket though Voldemort never succeeds in acquiring it, however much he stares at the mirror. Later, after Harry defeats the evil lord, Dumbledore explains what he created: A mirror that gives the stone to those who want it but not to own it. The only difference between Harry and Voldemort.
Those who want it but not to own it. This is life for you. Want it. Don’t try to own it. And head every day to bed with a smile and a plan. The world is doing well. As long as you smile and plan. Breathe with me.
We’re here to breathe

Eu Sou Novo Aqui

Eu sou novo aqui
Eu nao entendi
The first two sentences I learned in this country
And I slowly understood Brazil was an allegory
Of the world I wanted to see

Eu sou novo aqui
Eu nao entendi
I am new here
I don’t understand
So I can do whatever I want
I cut the sacred queue at the bar
I skate wherever I want
And since I can do whatever I want
Today, I am the master of your breath, I am the maestro of your voice
Stand up for me
Breathe with me
1-2 / 1-2
And now instead of breathing out I want you to do "Ohm"
1-2
Did you feel it? Our souls singing the same song

Eu sou novo aqui
Eu nao entendi
We live in the most amazing world possible and we somehow keep forgetting it
A 17 year old invented a glue to heal wounds
A student found a way to make your phone detect cancer
A Brazilian neuroscientist invented a mental whats-app
When was the last time you sat down and looked out the window?
We are running in a race against people we don’t know
To win a prize we’re not sure we want
Here is the story of a rich entrepreneur who works all day every day
One good day he decides to take a week of vacation on an island
Crazy
He meets a fisherman and gets close
He inquires about what he does
And asks him why he doesn’t expand his activity
“Why?” asks the fisherman
“Well, you’d make more money, hire boats and get more fish” says the entrepreneur
“Then what?”
"Then you can make even more money and you wouldn’t have to work"
"Then what?"
"Then you’d be able … to come fish on an island"

Eu sou novo aqui
Eu nao entendi
Tomorrow's entrepreneurs are monks, philosophers, poets and psychologists
We thought we needed technology for our calls
Truth is we needed technology for our souls
Why should we care?
A Brazilian girl is giving voice to Rio
An Argentinian girl is democratising democracy
An Israeli is exposing corruption
Why should we care?
Let me run you through Moore’s law of the heart
Just like we can fit computers that used to fill a room in a cellphone
We can fit more kindness in our hearts
Your heart can grow to
When you read your mind grows
When you care your heart grows
There is a parallel universe where we can say "I love you" without needing to hear it first, without waiting for the 6th date

Eu sou novo aqui
Eu nao entendi
I am new here
I don’t understand
There are wars being fought outside
The Amazon is being decimated
People are being made refugees in countries that are not their own
And there are wars happening around you
Bosses, girlfriends, angry friend and siblings
And from these wars, refugees emerge
Anger, Anxiety, Fear, Sadness
All come take refuge inside you
Let them in, let them stay, legalise them
Let them put up a tent and look at them
Give them time
One day, they too will go away
They too will leave this land

Eu sou novo aqui
Eu nao entendi
Just like I found my Brazil
There is a country out there waiting to be found
There is a country out there waiting to be founded
There is a country out there waiting for you
It’s not an e-topia or a utopia
It’s a you and me-topia
There, we’ll sit next to each other looking out the window
And we’ll breathe
Breathe with me

Voces sao novos aqui
Voces nao precisam de entender
We can all re-discover the world
We’re all gringos at the end

Bill Nighy

This is a piece performed in Dalston at a Spoken Word London event. Hope you like it :D

Edward Norton

Tyler Durden: Quit your job. Start a fight. Prove you're alive. If you don't claim your humanity you will become a statistic. You have been warned
___
We are not numbers - We are riders - We are feared and respected - more feared than respected 
We stand high on our rides, chest hair showing, torso bumped - more hair than chest
We are the free electrons of the city - we are the city - our lungs clean its filthy air - our skins capture its heavy metals - more cleaners than riders

We are not numbers
We are legion - No car, no bus, no pedestrian can look us in the eye
Nothing stops us but the time between the moment the light is orange and the moment it goes green
And a sound : Beeeeep

We are not numbers
We are the velib community - but call us the riders
For when we meet each other - in the silent nod we give to the fellow Velibers determined, like us at burning the next red light - we hear it in the silence of that nod - Our day is coming sister / Our day is coming brother

Listen up - The day has come Velibers

___
Tyler Durden: Welcome to Veliber Club:
The first rule of the veliger club is you do not talk about the veliger club
The second rule of the velib club is nobody actually knows about the velib club
the third rule is beat the cars, all the cars - piss the bus driver off - beat the privately owned bike riders no matter what - our pride is in question
the fourth rule is terrorise pedestrians - no pity no mercy
the fifth rule is if it’s your first time on a Velib ride, you won’t even need to know these rules to start applying them
___
To all my velib riding friends, it’s time we teach our fellow citizens what we’ve learned.
Velibs are a metaphor for freedom - The things you own end up owning you. You cannot own life. I’ll never need to own a Velib to enjoy it
Velibs are a metaphor for happiness - Life is not a race - you’ll never beat a car but you’ll enjoy every step of the foolish process to beat it past a red light
Velibs are a metaphor for movement - You gotta keep moving - the second you stop, you fall - You are the master of this ship because You are the engine of this ship
Velibs are a metaphor for life - Life feels heavy like a Velib - until you master it - but the better you get at it, the more your realise how much you suck
Velibs are a metaphor for nothing - Velibs are a not about anything else - Velibs are about Velibs - moment-to-moment magic - this seat you’re on is a the proud invention of the first ecologists - this seat you’re on is made of molecules that once powered the core of a star - you are riding a star - the seat you’re on is made out of atoms and what are atoms ? Are they solids ? No they’re vibrations - you are riding a black hole
___
Tyler Durden: Fight Club was the beginning, now it's moved out of the basement, it's called Project Mayhem.
___
Spoken Word was the beginning, now it’s moving out of the basement and unto Velibs. It’s called Project Velib-Spoken Word (we’ll find a better name later). Velibs will be our stallions and our flag will be a rolling wheel.

We’ll link hooks to our bikes and labour the jardin du luxem-bourg to plant tomatoes and feed the people
We’ll power our power plants and cycle our way to energy independence by giving free exercise to all fat people
We’ll drive our velibs into office doors and church barriers to break them down - We own the night right ? We’ll help homeless people sleep in churches and empty offices at night
We’ll build a new religion - the Velibers - Our god is movement - And we’ll pray for the wheel the pedal and the holy gear
We’ll bind wifi routers to every bike and get the web to the streets - We’ll jam our bikes in every station - you’ll have random red lights popping out at every stop in a specific pattern that’ll allow to override the system, crack it open and access the script for the traffic lights - jam these as well - and have the government forbid anyone from using a car - we’ll all be back to the wind wheels my friends

___
Tyler Durden: Quit your job. Start a fight. Prove you're alive. If you don't claim your humanity you will become a statistic. You have been warned___

Because a Velib ride is not a means to an end - There are no means, there is no end - everything is a beginning - Even the bad velib with a clunky chain (the urban legend) that almost killed many of us taught us how to keep starting - like an eternal green light, the eternal click sound, the eternal go every time you take a bike out

Kevin Spacey

Ricky: It's like God's looking right at you, just for a second, and if you're careful... you can look right back.
Jane: And what do you see?
Ricky: Beauty.

___

At age 8, I had a different understanding of God. my grandpa used to take me every single summer day to the church Reincarnation of christ at age 8 - church jungle - I stopped fearing death then and there, I was going to live forever. But my duty was to leave for the world a trace of myself, so I started capturing ideas and thoughts and keeping them safe
 I started writing every single thought I had, it was important
At age 10, I started reading comics, mainly Donal Duck and discovered Gyro Gearloose and his inventions. So I started stealing his ideas from the comics thinking nobody would notice; I thought I was on the way to a Nobel Prize. that’s how I ended up patenting not a robot but the robot
 I thought I invented the robot. I didn’t understand that the ideas already existed outside of my comics - I just captured them and kept them safe
At 12, I became a biologist and killed and collected every single mosquito I found in our home in Beirut and kept it to observe it on my microscope

___

And that's the day I realized that there was this entire life behind things, and this incredibly benevolent force that wanted me to know that there was no reason to be afraid, ever. Video's a poor excuse, I know. But it helps me remember - I need to remember.Sometimes, there's so much beauty in the world - I feel like I can't take it, like my heart is just going to cave in.

___

I couldn't accept a life without myself - it would've been too harsh for the world at large -
So I’d capture life and keep it in a jar - Thoughts, ideas, mosquitoes
Had Instagram been around i would’ve logged every second of my life
Had I been a lawyer, I would’ve been the best because if it wasn’t on paper, it wasn’t there
I was proving life was there, by writing it down
I was auditing existence
And a negative balance sheet would’ve killed me
I couldn’t imagine what death would be like - what life would be like without me

FINGERS IN TRIANGLE - They call it negative space - what is not

Negative space is : 
The silence in a song
The (... Silence …)
It’s nothing but it’s something
It’s ephemeral yet it’s timeless

___

Carolyn: Lester, you're going to spill beer on the couch.
Lester: So what? It's just a couch.
Carolyn: This is a four thousand dollar sofa, upholstered in Italian silk. This is not just a couch!
Lester: It's just a couch!

Joanne Milne is a english woman who's been deaf all her life
thanks to a cochlear implant, she was able to hear for the first time on the 28th of March 2014. The first thing she heard were the days of the week. And Joanne cried. It was the most emotional day of her life. (Public : "Monday")
Can you hear it like it was the first time ? I'm goign to say it again, close your eyes. "Monday"
Open your eyes

When asked what was the most amazing sound she had heard since she started hearing Joanne mentioned moving into a new house and hearing a ticking sound - it took her 3 hours before she asked someone what is this sound ? And they told her it was the clock - the clock was the most amazing sound she had heard

I want to go deaf every other day
I want to go blind every other day
I want to be mute every other day

I don’t want to capture life
I want to die every other day
And live in negative space
So I can taste
Life as it is

___

I guess I could be pretty pissed off about what happened to me, but it's hard to stay mad when there's so much beauty in the world. Sometimes I feel like I'm seeing it all at once, and it's too much. My heart fills up like a balloon that's about to burst. And then I remember to relax, and stop trying to hold on to it, and then it flows through me like rain, and I can't feel anything but gratitude for every single moment of my stupid little life. You have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm sure. But don't worry. You will someday.

Kevin, I got it. To see the world as new every single day - you need to die every single day. Destroy your thoughts and your senses. This my friend is a manifesto for a 9/11 of our soul

Jared Leto

Jared Leto plays Nemo Nobody in Mr Nobody. At 118, he recalls his 5 year old self. Jared is narrating: Everything we see exists, we can see it. I can see mommy's eyes, but I can't see my eyes. The little baby can see his hands, but he cannot see himself. So, does he really exist? Do I really exist?
Nemo's Mother: [appears from behind a sheet] Boo!

___

When I was 6, I could hear my thoughts but I couldn't hear other people's thoughts so I concluded I was the only person in the world who could think
When I was 8, my grandfather took me to church every summer day at 6pm for 3 months. I didn't understand why I had to go through the chants of 70 year old women and a priest with a leg in the tomb. But it slowly dawned on me and I concluded I was the second coming of Christ - but I didn't tell anyone, I kept the secret
When I was 10, I landed in a catholic school and the first day of my first catechism course, doubt became my religion - I would believe in god in the morning and become a nihilist towards lunch when I was hungry - The priest used to start the course with: “Ask God for anything you want" - and every time, I'd pull out the day's newspaper, quote the deaths in Irak and ask God when he was planning to do something about it - the priest never did anything - Neither did God. I concluded I could not believe in God anymore
At 12, I remember sitting down and looking at people around me baffled. How can they can keep walking ? How do they go about their lives without an answer to why ? Why why why ? Why will I do the next step ? Why would I utter the next ... ? I concluded: we live because we cannot die. We live because we have no choice. We live because we can't do otherwise. So I lived.

___

Nemo nobody, Mr Nobody, aged 118, 15 minutes away from his death: Why am I me and not somebody else ?

___

Split-brain patients are people who due to an operation have their left hemisphere disconnected from their right hemisphere for medical treatment. The two stop communicating. When shown pictures of naked people, their left brain perceives it and they start to giggle. They notice their body giggling, they just don't understand why. Now when the doctor asks them why they are giggling, their right hemisphere needs to answer knowing that it hasn't received the visual data from the left hemisphere. "Why are you giggling asks the doctor ?" And the patient answers: "Because you keep asking me funny questions, doc" - Though the patient has no idea why he is laughing, the mind still fabricates an answer. The mind always finds a meaning. Confabulation

Apple recently released the latest version of its operating system: The Flat designing, multi-tasking, airdropping, fingerprint buying, tune switching, rocket launching, world saving iOS 7 - the website says Learn more about the most advanced Operating System in the World. But I’ve seen the most advanced OS in the world. I present to you: Meaning OS - Spotify your fears, shazam your love, tweet your melancholy, instagram your disgust … Meaning OS Almost like magic

Here's the meaning of life for you (Poet shows empty hands and fingers - like a magician)

___

The young journalist asks: Everything you say is contradictory. You can't have been in one place and another at the same time. Of all those lives, which one is the right one?
Nemo Nobody aged 118, 10 minutes away from his death: Each of these lives is the right one! Every path is the right path. Everything could have been anything else and it would have just as much meaning.

___

Come see, come see.
Welcome to the meaning factory:
We carve the void of our lives
Make teapots out of nothingness
And fill them with emptiness
For your eyes only

We are meaning machines building sensical towers - 
towering careers, 
sky-scraping love lives, 
cloud reaching belief systems - 
we make a puzzle out of life when there are no pieces in the first place

Here's the meaning of life for you (Poet shows empty hands and fingers - like a magician)

___

Nemo Nobody aged 118, 5 minutes away from his death, soft voice says 
"It should be written on every schoolroom blackboard: life is a playground or nothing."

___

SMS
Stop Making Sense
Here are the two cents
Of the man who’s brought down every tower in his mind
Be the terrorist of your heart
Be the ghost of your mind
And for your brain’s sake
Do make the same mistake
Go and commit the 9/11 of your soul

Here's the meaning of life for you (Poet shows empty hands and fingers - like a magician)

But look
From nothing
Spawns something - anything
For the beauty of the void is that it's limitless

Arnold Shwarzeneger

I was ripped in 2012
I had a vein that went from my neck to my left calf
I called it Susan for no specific reason but the rhyme
I had six packs that said "hello ladies" (look at your man)
I had a neck that said "I work out"
And my friends called me Wolverine but probably more because of the teeth than the muscles

I ate 12 eggs a day - for the protein
I felt I was getting dumber - pbly because of the protein
Every curiosity on my skin was a sign of a starting cancer - because of the protein
And my junk didn't really work ... (let the audience answer "because of the protein" then say) because of the steroids

I was a greek god

In a world of bros and push-up bras
I ran Aristotle Arnold up the flagpole because there's when there was no one to salute anymore
For to me as to them the body was the temple of the soul
If you want to grow the latter, you need to grow the former 
So I grew
And I shrinked and I grew
Veins, muscles
Muscles, veins
And Vain muscles
With one constant - one mute mighty mentor
Iron
Iron was my friend - Iron was my lord
And the harder I lifted my god, the more he gave me
More pain, more gain
No pain, no gain

But sometimes the pain becomes pain
And it's not the iron
It's the one muscle the gym-boy can't grow
The one that has its own work-out every single second
His heart
Sometimes the heart gets pinched
And these fingers  (show two fingers)
Become your new god

(I can read your dirty mind)
These fingers have been places you don't want to be
Doing things you don't want to see
These fingers are not the imaginary sword of a martial artist
Or the british version of fuck you very much

These fingers are hiroshima little boy
Because when the wolverine lifts
He's lifting the world
In his mind the iron is the father he never had
and never wanted to disappoint
When he stumbles
It's not a plan or a diet that's crashing
He's not falling off some bandwagon
It's the entire universe collapsing at his feet
He let us all down

These fingers are a black hole
When he puts them near his mouth
A vortex the size of an eye 
Sucks out everything inside him
Outside him
Do you know what it's like to be a 6 foot 2 man who feels guilty about eating a piece of cake

He'd wish these fingers were a pierce
to pop his stomach get 
the sin 
within
out
A needle to pierce his heart
let it bleed
He lets the blood fill his legs and his abs
His chest and his hands
The blood creates coves
Where the sugar dissolves the cake
Where the pain resolves the ache

Behind every finger there's story
Just like behind every wolverine a cub
Behind every Schwarzenegger an Arnold

Colin Firth

I sleep with women 
but i fall in love with men - 
Colin Firth, a single man

And the words strike a chord on the violin of my soul. Triggered a sonata I don't want to hear.

But i learned, i read somewhere the things you don't want to face are the ones you should. Because then: the obstacle becomes the way

I sleep with women 
but i fall in love with men - 
Colin Firth, a single man

I haven't felt a single meaningful thing since I've known you
And every single girl I've met since 2008 - since you has said a version of the same thing:
I don't want a second hand heart
And I've been looking for the mechanic who'd have a spare part

If my emotions were a landscape, you'd be the everest
and right next to it, monica belluci, in Malena
I was 10, and I cried, and I came, 10 times

I sleep with women 
but i fall in love with men

Synaesthesia is a condition where two senses get mixed
audio-synaesthetic see colours as sounds
sight-synaesthetic see words as coulour
Imagine an emotion synaesthetic
Where my emotions become colours
That's why I missed uni for 3 days
After I met you, I couldn't see from all the turquoise around
I couldn't hear from all the beats around

I sleep with women 
but i fall in love with men

How could this be a second-hand heart ?
My heart is a pool party
And every one is invited
The hobos, the gypsies, the dickhead who stole my bag and my booklet and my lock - I was a the gym
the uglies and the beauties

50 shades of grey
50 shades of gay
50 shades of straight

I sleep with men 
but i fall in love with men

I am a woman loving man in every fiber of my body but when I see a man's eyes, I can't stop myself from smiling, when I see the candor in his words, I can't stop from blushing

And from there, the second floor of the galaxy, where all i feel is ecstasy - I'm a first hand heart, and an emotion synaesthetic - a shock and an explosion who can only see the world as sounds. And you are a base, you are a beat, you my friend are a boombox falling down the stairs.

I sleep with women 
but i fall in live with women

How could there be an "I am" in an universe like this

From the 2nd floor of the galaxy, All the "I am" fade awayAnd the light in the back of my mind dissolves each identity like a vampire in a cellar.

I sleep with people 
and i fall in love with people

From the 2nd floor of the galaxy, All the "I am" fade away/ And the light in the back of my mind dissolves each identity like this light hits the foil and burns all the vampires in this cellar.