I Luv Me Mudder and Me Mudder Loves Me...

One of the bright spots of the exchange has been discovering the remarkable British black poet, Benjamin Zephaniah. I vaguely knew a bit about this man prior to my arrival, but instructing the Year 7 students the past few weeks, and preparing them to write an essay of comparison, for his poems has truly been quite enjoyable. On any given day for the past several weeks you may have openend the door to the classroom and found a group of Year 7 students and their teacher jammin' to the beat!

My students fell in love with him as much as I did and one of the best activities they did was to perform the poem, "I Luv Me Mudder and Me Mudder Luvs Me" in Benjamin's unique style. My friend and co-worker, Ruth, once worked with the poet and she contacted him. He agreed to answer four questions from our students in an email before we leave for Christmas break! NHS English department will be glad to know that we have this connection for future reference. I will definitely be introducing this poet to my students at home, as some of his poems are of a rather mature nature, as demonstrated in the clips below, but I think they will really find his poetry accessible and inspiring...I did.

Discover Benjamin Zephaniah through the links below, I am sure you will love him too!







Below is the email response that our Year 7 group received from Benjamin Zephaniah. The third question in the list came from a student in my class!

How has poetry changed your life?

I've done poetry all my life so I don't really know anything else. I did go through a bad period in my life when I was getting in trouble with my parents and the police, and I think poetry help me then. I had something to concentrate on, something that could help me to have ambition and dream of a better life. The real answer is that poetry hasn't just saved my life, it is my life.


What is your favourite word and why?

I like all words but the words I like the most are made up words like Jabberwocky. It just sounds like in should mean something but a poet made it up. I also like overstanding, understanding is okay, but sometimes you just need a little more. Oh yes, and I like mushymushy, it means hello (on the phone) in Japanese.

If you could shape, design and control a world of your own, what would it look like?

My world would have no armies. Governments would be forced to sort out their problems without killing. Like most other people have to. I would not tolerate homelessness and every house would have a mango tree. There would still be cars but they would only be allowed in certain areas, pedestrians would have priority. And people wouldn't have to works so hard, half year working, half year having fun.


Which events or experiences in your life most affect your poetry?

Many events affect my poetry, sometimes I experience something and it doesn't affect my poetry until many years later. I think the thing that affects my poetry more than anything else is travel. I usually travel to what we now call developing countries, when I am there I see so much poverty, and so many people suffering from diseases and homelessness, that when I arrive home I feel I have to try to remind people how bad things can be and how lucky we are. The other thing that affects my poetry is remembering all the things that made me laugh when I was young. This is why some of my poetry is very serious, some is quite funny, and sometimes I manage to do both in one poem.

Benjamin