Fuck David Kleinfeld

When I interviewed KRS-ONE about three years ago, I learned something pretty insightful about the way he creates his music. He just throws things out stream-of-consciousness style and catches what sticks. The man is a talented musician because he knows how to A) Throw relevant things out of his brain and B) Catch them and C) See if he can use them.

I taught a creative writing class last week at Newtown High School in Queens. I gave the classroom an exercise called "How to steal properly." I showed them a couple poems I wrote that I blatantly stole from the Bible and tweaked a bit to my advantage. I was a little worried that mixing religion into a public school would've gotten me in trouble but come on, I really don't care! My point was pretty simple: If you steal from good sources, your work will be good. [I actually stole that idea from Einstein--I practice what I preach!]

After I showed them that idea, I sensed the vibe of the classroom and ran with it. I made them all freewrite, KRS style, for about two minutes. I made them all read what they wrote. One kid wrote a freestyle. I was pretty good. I told him to come up with a hot 16 for round two. One girl was so damn shy she didn't read anything. I coaxed her to write anything for round two..anything! Another girl annoyed me and I threw her negativity back at her. The girl next to her, however, was pretty talented and I encouraged her to keep going. There were more students...one wrote some issues he had in his personal life relating to being Guyanese...another wrote a lusty poem to his girlfriend...I challenged him on round two to tweak his poem and make it to his mother instead; editors make ME change my work so I figured, why not give him a dose of reality. There was another pretty young thing who wrote about Nirvana and Beck and all this other 90's music. I was like, what year is this? I told her to keep at it. The girl next to her was there for the first time ever. She had a pretty nice quality to her work and I told her to continue...of all the students, she had the stream of consciousness thing down best. There were also two teachers. One is a friend of mine, the other is liker her assistant or something. They were both pretty good. A little on the sad side, but both good. . .

Which brings me to my point. A lot of what we prize in school as far as creative writing goes is sadness. I wonder why. The girl who I said was the most talented in the last paragraph, had a heartwearming story about how she misses her grandmother in the hospital. I liked it insofar that it let me be nosy into her life...I don't even remember her name but I know how sad not being able to visit her grandmother in the hospital made her feel. It's weird that I prize being able to be nosy but that's the way it is, at least, in school. I don't think anyone with a happy stream of consciousness would be in a writing class...so I guess that's why sadness is so revered?

I remember Hemingway saying something to the effect of, "Being a writer is a lonely world of isolation and despair." I don't know. He's right but I don't know. I remember each of the teachers who shared what they wrote. They were so damn pitiful...my friend talked about her light dimming...it used to shine and now it doesnt...the other teacher talked about her growing age and her confusion with her place in the world...and they were both good. Sad but good. I don't know. Maybe we need to prize joy more than pain.

My favorite one was the kid who wrote the hot 16. I asked him who his favorite rapper is. He said eminem. I told him he needs to put a cadence--a flow--to his lyrics. I gave him a homework assignment...to take one of Eminem's flows and apply it to those lyrics...I said that I've never heard a non-caucasian emulate Eminem's flow...I hope he listened to what I told him.