General Introductions to Magic and the Art of Choice

If You Make Magic LONG Enough,

It WILL Find A Way To Swallow YOU Whole.

I Would LIKE To Know what IT Feels Like…

To Be Swallowed Whole By MAGIC.

-Iyeoka Ivie Okoawo

Shaping The Pulse Of A Moment

If she looks like she’s searching for magic, she probably is.  Part of the MAGIC in my journey comes when I am able to recognize the bluest of blues and identify which moment is the GIFT in a given circumstance.  More gift can be your next breath. More gift can be the feeling of being understood right down to the grooves and the splinters embedded in the driftwood.  The PULSE moves on as a day to day journey of learning, remembering and connecting the dots to heighten the signs you believe in that show you just how clearly you have found the right one.

The Art of Choosing My Current

My current has taken me to Big Sur where I am completing an Artist-In-Residence at the Big Sur Spirit Garden in California.  Here I am processing my 18 months of touring and transition, of testifying and transformation. I am updating my poems. I am documenting the new songs that are still producing music inside of me.  I am reflecting on my extraordinary experiences at TED and the 2 weeks spent in Venice CA to complete work on my album after returning from my Fellowship and the conferences in Oxford, England. I am working on my STAY POET book. I am gathering a collection of my finest spoken and page poems for my very first book of poetry.  All this, while my heart still travels with my TriBe of family and friends in Boston, my family in Nigeria, my global TED Fellows fam, my Boston Poetry SlamTeams and all the rest of my fambots attending the 21st  National Poetry Slam competition taking place this week in Saint Paul MN full of poets making choices of which poem to share for 3 minutes and 10 seconds of a magic moment.

At some point, you may wonder how I got here…wherever “here” becomes.  I am simply following the current. From here, when I am at peace with my choices, it is a lovely ocean that stretches from the tornado to the rainbow.

To my Word Speaking Tribe I recommend a further depth of reflections regarding the art of choices and I guide you to TED presenter Sheena Iyengar. She is one of the women I enjoyed listening to at TED Global in Oxford and one that I was grateful to reference once I settled back into my residency in Big Sur CA.  I enjoyed her mention of Robert Frost in the end and her shout out to POETRY. In my opinion, Sheena offered an interesting group of different thought processes under simple names and references we could understand. As a poet, I appreciated her offering.

Iyeoka Ivie Okoawo is an internationally acclaimed performance poet, a guest Visiting Teacher at the Esalen Institute and the current Big Sur Spirit Garden Artist in Residence. Her month-long residency will conclude in a theatrical performance of her poems and songs from her upcoming Album on Saturday, August 21st at 8pm.