Interview with Poet Regie Cabico
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Regie Cabico, in his own words, is as much a Tina Turner impersonator and “overall fairy godmother” as he is performer and educator. On stage, he has collected top prizes poetry, including the National Poetry Slam champion and Nuyorican Poets Cafe Grand Slam champion, and has reached audiences worldwide through appearances of Def Poetry Jam on HBO and NPR’s Snap Judgement. In the classroom, he has galvanized students, both adults and children alike, to use poetry as a tool of socio-political change.
As the first in a new cross-posting collaboration between Hola Cultura and Electric Llama, we are excited to present the following interview with Cabico about why he loves labels, why many are afraid of poetry, and how American slam poetry can, and should, innovate.
QUESTION: You’re here as an American pioneer – do you embrace other labels. Do you embrace labels like “Filipino poet” or “gay poet?”
REGIE: I love labels. I want to collect as many labels as I can. The more labels I have, I look at them as little passports into the larger world. People think you get pigeonholed, but you jut want to get all the holes. Then you get one big hole and everyone falls into your hole, which sounds a little dirty, but I believe in holes.
Q: You did a poem called “Check One” – how were your experiences with labels. Did you always have this attitude about it?
REGIE: That poem was one of the poems I started out with. To do slam poetry you have to be really passionate about something. I was just really tired of people not knowing, asking me where I was from, or not being “enough” – not being “Asian enough” or trying to tell people who I am and not having certain stories told. I do embrace labels, and that poem still works today. You look at poetry slams, people of color, queer people, and a lot from disenfranchised communities prospered in the slam movement. Now there’s a homogenous tone. I’m really hoping new voices and variety, and other ways of communicating the three minutes of text can change. I’m really about innovation and hearing new things up there.
Q: How do you innovate? How was your writing style changed? Have you incorporated the musical theater that you also work on in your poetry?
REGIE: Innovation is about humor. I think American slam poetry is very, very serious. As you can see, there is a lot of anger. But I feel like humor is not celebrated. Humor is innovation to me. I try to be funny – I think in my old age I’m just more bitter and cynical, so I’m really trying to find some funny things. When you have pain you can be funny. In order to be funny, the hard part is, you have to be over it. If you’re not over it, you can’t be funny.
Q: Is your poetry now you talking about what you see, more than an expression of your inner feelings? What has changed as you have gotten older?
REGIE: I think it’s always about pain. When you have pain you can be funny. In order to be funny, the hard part is, you have to be over it. If you’re not over it, you can’t be funny. I think that’s why people aren’t funny, because they aren’t over it. In order to be funny, you need to let it go. There are still topics in my life that are still hard.
Q: What are the hardest topics?
REGIE: I think hard topics are family. I think family dynamics, family dysfunction are hard topics to write about. Mental illness in the family is something that I’m struggling with to convey. I think innovation is making people laugh, but also making people cry. Can you in three minutes take people through all those different emotions? To me that’s another kind of innovation. Heartbreak is always easy, but I think other people are very good, political – they can hit the issues, but that’s a challenge to me. The older you get, the more you see injustices. The challenge is to keep it fresh, and keep it now. I think it’s a fear. Poetry is dangerous.
Q: How do you cope with the injustices? Is your poetry your main mechanism?
REGIE: My whole mission is to give people voice and to get stories heard. I am a poetry activist, in that I think people are afraid of poetry in this country. They understand visual art, they understand music art – they see it, they hear it. But with poetry it’s such a dangerous thing; the way poetry is taught in this country, it’s slowly changing. If we become a society of poets, we can be better people.
In this country, there’s a political theater, and I think our slam poetry is political theater. People forget we have freedom of speech and that we can say what we need to say. For me, this is art for social change. Even when I take it to schools, people are afraid of the poetry slam. They are thinking “oh my god, what are the fifth graders going to say?” or “oh my god, don’t get them excited! They’re writing about thongs and Red Bull – they’re so innocent Regie!” I think it’s a fear. Poetry is dangerous.
There’s something about writing together and reading together, that creates a bond as there is where you plant together and harvest together.
Q: Can you talk about your work with ECO City Farms? How do you work with the kids? What do you try to teach them?
REGIE: Like Margaret Morgan-Hubbard said, farmers and poets share similarity of harvesting words and images: harvesting food for the body and food for the souls. The farming is the root of it, but it’s creating a place where people can be heard. There’s something about writing together and reading together, that creates a bond as there is where you plant together and harvest together. Those two things are very powerful. My whole goal is that people are heard and people listen to each other. I think in general, students are not listening to each other. It’s a competitive situation. If people could celebrate difference we’d be better off.
Q: Do you ever feel burdened being a voice for other people? Do you ever feel like your job is impossible? How do you know when it’s complete?
REGIE: The proof is in the writing and the proof is in the process. It’s very, very hard and there’s a lot of pressure to get people to tell their story and get people to listen. I try to establish a supportive ensemble, where people can feel safe to say what they need to say. That’s really the challenge if that can happen that’s great. Sometimes that doesn’t happen, and then you’re spending your whole time to calibrate the students. I’ve been in tough situations. I’ve been in Bellevue Hospital; I’ve been in jails and different facilities where it’s the end of the world. Especially in middle school—nobody wants to teach middle school. To me, that’s the hardest, most crucial time. It’s the definitely the emergency room of schools. People are shocked and I’m astounded how brave they can be, and how eloquent they are with what they can come up with.
Q: Where will you be in five days, five months and five years?
REGIE: In five days I’m going to be writing in my room. In five months, my astrologer says I’ll find a romance. I might be Oregon, in Eugene, for the Shakespeare festival. In five years, hopefully dating someone, writing more poems and my book will be out.
—interview + photos by Antonio ‘Mina’ Hernandez
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