common vs. cummings

I re-discovered poetry fairly recently and have found great comfort and inspiration in the words of folks like Wendell Berry, E. E. Cummings and Mary Oliver. When I was in college I enjoyed reading Shakespeare's sonnets and was excited to learn about modern poets like Stephen Dunn. I managed to leave that behind somehow, choosing to put on a pair of headphones instead of picking up a book. I went from William Woodsworth to just Wordsworth. As I was reading the 100 Selected Poems of E. E. Cummings several months ago I was struck at the similarities between his writing and that of our more creative rappers, like say...Common.

Cummings created his own language. It had it's own rules and definitions and he paid no regard to conventional standards for writing. Sound familiar? Remember 1996 and the rise of Ebonics? Like Cummings, the hip-hop community employs it's own form of English, often altering sounds, shortening words or making up new definitions to get their point across. This is not new. What I'm appreciating, however, is the joy in unraveling the meaning behind all these words. It's a like a puzzle. There are Cummings poems that I have read over and over and I still have no real idea about what the guy is saying. There are rap songs I've been listening to since I was 12 that I'm still finding new meaning in to this day. I love the way both Cummings and folks like Common play with words.

Check out Common's first verse on "Faithful" (from Be):

I was rolling around, in my mind it occurred
What if God was a Her?
Would I treat her the same?
Would I still be runnin' game on Her?
In what type of ways would I want Her?
Would I want her for her mind
Or her heavenly body
Couldn't be out here bogus
With someone so godly
If I was wit her would I still be wantin' my ex
The lies, the greed, the weed, the sex
Wouldn't be ashamed to give Her part of my check
Wearing a cross, I mean Her heart on my neck
Her I would refelct
On the streets of the Chi
Ride with her. cause I know for me, she'd die
Though good and bad
Call on her like I'm chirpin Her
Couldn't be jealous Cause other brothers worship Her
Walk this Earth for Her Glory, I'm grateful to be in Her presence
I try to stay faithful

Pretty witty, if you ask me. Now check out his verse from "My Way Home" (on Kanye's Late Registration):

They say home is where the hate is
My dome is where fate is
I stroll where souls get lost like Vegas
Seen through the eyes of rebel glasses
Pray to God that my arms reach the masses
The young smoke grass in grassless jungles
Rubberband together in cashless bundles
We wear struggling chains
Divided only hustle remains
Making sense of it we hustle for change
Revolution ain't a game
It's another name
For life fighting
Someone to stay in they corner like Mike Tyson
Hypes fighting for hits to heighten they hell
Don't he know he only get as high as he fell
Show money becomes bail
Relationships become jail
Children are unheld
I wish love was for sale
Behold the pale
Horse got me trapped like R. Kell, I bail.
and it..

Then the song breaks into the "chorus," a sample of Gil Scott-Heron's "Home is Where the Hatred is" (Heron, a poet in his own rite, is often credited for birthing rap music with his spoken word/soul songs of the early '70s. You may have heard his poem "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised." If you haven't, I suggest you look it up.)

Now, here's a short Cummings poem to start with:

when god decided to invent
everything he took one
breath bigger than a circustent
and everything began

when man determined to destroy
himself he picked the was
of shall and finding only why
smashed it into because

Why has this not been quoted in a rap song yet? The word play in that last stanza is the stuff Talib Kweli and Lupe Fiasco dream of!

Here's some more from Cummings:

love's function is to fabricate unknownness

(known being wishless;but love,all of wishing)
though life's lived wrongsideout,sameness chokes oneness
truth is confused with fact,fish with fishing

and men are caught by worms(love may not care
if time totters,light droops,all measures bend
nor marvel if a thought should weigh a star
-dreads dying least;and less,that death should end)

how lucky lovers are(whose selves abide
under whatever shall discovered be)
whose ignorant each breathing dares to hide
more than most fabulous wisdom fears to see

(who laugh and cry) who dream,create and kill
while the whole moves,and every part stands still

His use of spacing or lack thereof, is purposeful. He uses parenthesis as most would use comas or periods. This is truly his own language.

I'm sure there are better examples out there of the similarities between Cummings poetry and rap music. I just happened to be listening to Common's album Be during the same period I was reading Cummings. I couldn't help but read Cummings and smile. I wonder if he would have been a fan of hip-hop?