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Local Poet - Romella D'Ore Kitchens |
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MEET Romella D'Ore Kitchens
© Copyright 2005. All rights reserved.
No portion of this work may be duplicated or
copied without the expressed written consent of the author.
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Romella D'Ore Kitchens, has been writing and performing poetry in the Pittsburgh area for the last twenty-five years. She is an Autumn House Press Poet, a member of the Pittsburgh Poetry Exchange and a past member of the Kuntu Writer's Workshop under the guidance then of the now deceased world acclaimed writer, Rob Penny and many talented Pittsburgh writers.
She has been on the radio show "Prosody" at WYEP hosted by the venerable poet and teacher Jan Beatty. Her poem "The Cooking Lesson" was published by Essence Magazine in the 1990's. She was the 2005 Judge for the Acorn Rukeyser Chapbook contest in Canada. She has had work in Black Obsidian, The California Quarterly, Chiron Review, Ship of Fools, 5AM magazine, The New Pittsburgh Quarterly, Iodine Poetry Review and others. She has performed at many interesting local, trendy spots like The Lava Lounge, The Bee Hive, The Three Rivers Arts Festival, Hemingway's (on numerous occasions) and for groups including Vintage ( in East Liberty), Citi-Parks, the now defunct Harambee and more, She has been on The Black Horizons Televison show with Chris Moore and the Ralph Proctor Show. She has combined her ability to paint, quilt and draw with poetry and presented thematic displays of art including: "Art a Black Woman Creates When She Has Been Called A Nigger."
She has used drummers and dancers for many performances an, is now doing performances with a avant garde jazz band named the Cap Gun Quartet. She interpretates poetry through the use of created and authentic song together and does performance poetry as well as presentation of the written word. She has a Masters Degree in Special Education and a Double Masters Degree in Education. Her joys include church, nature, making Afrocentric quilts, photography, and enjoying the life God gives us.Her last performance was on October 15, 2005 with the Cap Gun Quartet at the Hill House in Pittsburgh with the world-known, Pittsburgh born poet, Gerald Stern, Terrance Hayes and Richard Jackson.
You can see and hear Romella: The Club Cafe Reading, December 29, 2005 at 7:30 pm. She will also be judging a poetry slam at the University of Pittsburgh for their Urban Art Show on December the 9th, 2005, location: Henry Clay Frick Art Gallery. For more information call the gallery through the University.
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Cottonwoods
by Romella D’Ore Kitchens
These trees, as innocent as
African nuns praying. . .
This is where the
Lynchings took place.
These dark, French gray
Trunks with eager-spread
Limbs like just released
Rhodesian school children
On the brightest days,
These are where the ropes
Hung from and where the
Knotty, knobbed twist of life
Was severed and afterwards,
Things we back to silence
Again.
These leaves like the
Well-pressed uniforms,
Like the textured pages
Of optimistic school books
Are the property of the leaves
Which were shaken from their
Stems over the natural resistance
To suffering began then ended.
They grow close these days,
These trees.
And, ivy hangs from them
Like lost ligatures.
Cassina Way
by Romella D’Ore Kitchens
Black and upwardly mobile.
We lived in a Black enclave
Then.
Teachers and other professionals
All in a quiet ally way. . .
Until the day your wife shot you.
You this handsome, light skinned
Black man with pomaded hair
And a pencil thin mustache.
Black matinee idol. Scholarly
School teacher with fine suits
And dreams for more.
You tired of her. . .
Had found another Black woman,
Light with blonde hair. . .
A woman who spoke, “Good
English,” and wore lovely
Clothing.
You wanted her, your ill-spoken
Wife, who wore her hair nappy
And loved you just for bringing
A cartoon of cigarettes home out.
We, your neighbors, heard your argue.
Saw her weep, go in and get the shot
Gun and shoot you as your ran from
Your yard.
Black matinee idol. So prim. So proper.
Your body slumped on our front door
Step, its lean weight against our screen.
My mother, a nurse, checked your pulse
From a crouched position behind you,
Pushing your deadness slightly forward.
I was a child then.
But, I remember your blood,
The police, her wails of shock
At her own actions, the yellow
Gloves my mother put on her
Well-manicured hands to place
Bleach in water and wash the
Tell-tale signs of your suffering
Away. .
I remember us packing-up
And moving, to a bigger house.
Moving away from the hard, stone steps,
From the entry way to peaceless
Existence, away from
The cobble stoned alley way to
Your death.
