Dwayne Betts

This is my manifesto. Komunyakaa is ill, in a good way. Anyway, this is what I try to do when I write. I fail enough to know how difficult it is. Hope you guys enjoy this one. More »

If you know hip-hop, then you know the story of Tupac Shakur and Christopher Wallace (Biggie Smalls). More »

I'm here on a Saturday, special edition. Hoping to drop something decent on you before I bid you adieu and TNC is back in full effect. I have two, maybe three posts to drop. Hope you guys enjoy. Here it goes: More »

A few weeks ago I was a visitor at Arizona State University. I gave a few talks, spoke at the law school and went out to a detention center to speak with some young folks. I talked with the guards and staff that worked at the center. More »

wanted to say something about the importance of poetry, and then I thought a good poem speaks for itself. I've come to regret a lot of what I feel I missed out on in public school. More »

Right now my moms is at an airport in Maryland waiting on a plane to send her to Germany, then to Kuwait, then to Iraq. She turns fifty years old on Thursday. More »

[Posted By Dwayne Betts]"I leave you missing like the f------ O'Bannons" - Lil Wayne.Seems like lil Wayne was wrong and Ed O'Bannon has always been here, at least according to Ed O'Bannon, who sued the NAACP in 2009 over the use of his image, and the images of other student athletes. Here's the quote from the suit:"While the NCAA, its member conferences and schools, and its for-profit business partners reap millions of dollars from revenue streams ...,… More »

Dwayne Betts.Okay - seriously. Who is Nate Robinson? I know him more for being in a Joe Budden's line (And I'm a be like Nate Robinson and back up the point) than for anything he has done on the court. Don't get me wrong, Nate can dunk. He deserves props. But he is no Spud Webb. Spud Webb defeated a cat with the nickname "the Human Highlight Reel." Nate Robinson defeated? You know, I can't even remember.I don't know when it happened, but today's elite players have… More »

Posted by Dwayne Betts.Ta-Nehisi has given me the honor of blogging for him again, and by way of introduction I'm going to tell you folks about a woman that changed my life in ways that words couldn't really measure. Who am I? Reginald Dwayne Betts. Husband, father of a little boy, poet, expert spades player (best on the East coast by some accounts) expert ish talker, etc. Who am I? Forever indebted to Ms. Lucille Clifton, and regretful that far too often the women… More »

{Dwayne Betts}My last poetry post, which by the magic of blogging appears after my last post. I just couldn't go without a few more poems. You folks take care. Check out these three young brothers: John Murillo, Randall Horton and Marcus Jackson coming at the word in a different way.INVOKING MARVIN AT MIDNIGHT (First appeared in the Beltway Poetry Quarterly) by John Murillo. Picture the preacher's son secular sanctified.spotlight and… More »

{Dwayne Betts}It's been a pleasure blogging here for the past week. The commenters here are intelligent and just crazy enough to make everything interesting. All that is to say my week has been a dope one. I learned that this blogging thing ain't no joke. Ta-Nehisi has to sure 'nuff prepare when he decides to post something and I commend him for keeping this joint thoughtful and provocative.So, with my goodbye - I wanted to tell you about my last Thursday. Around… More »

{Dwayne Betts}Success is counted sweetestBy those who ne'er succeed.To comprehend a nectarRequires sorest need.Not one of all the purple HostWho took the Flag todayCan tell the definitionSo clear of Victory.As he defeated - dying -On whose forbidden earThe distant strains of triumphBurst agonized and clear! More »

{Dwayne Betts}For a long time I thought Joe Dumars was ahead of the curve as far NBA execs went. But his pick up of Gordon and Villanueva seem contrary to logic. Gordon is a gunner, a two guard in a point guard's body. How he will play alongside Hamilton is anyone's guess - and as I remember, Stuckey was the point guard of Detroit's future. It seems like Dumars is putting together a team of ex Huskies with the hopes of getting Geno Auriemma to come and coach them… More »

{Dwayne Betts}Two months into my first real job teaching poetry at a middle school in Southeast D.C. the English teacher whose class I took over once a week got hit in the eye while breaking up a fight. Two weeks later, after the student who'd struck her hadn't been expelled, she decided not to return. This was a seventh grade English class, first quarter of the school year. So early that the kids sneakers were still uncreased, the chalk still at the edges of the… More »

{Dwayne Betts}There are poems that last because they sound good, and then there are poems that last because they say something that we need to hear. I've always been a fan of Robert Hayden - but this poem in particular reminds me of the importance of fatherhood. Just say the last two lines to yourself again and again, and though it's about fathers - the lines apply fathers, mothers, sons, daughters, lovers. Read it. Then read it again.Those Winter SundaysBY ROBERT… More »

[Dwayne Betts]You can't live in DC and not be impressed, on some level, by Councilman Marion Barry's political staying power. And if you asked about the source of that power, you would probably get ten different answers from ten different people. Earlier today I got a glimpse of how Barry maintains his relevancy. Barry is introducing a bill to have the Human Rights Act of 1977 amended to afford protection to ex-offenders. Let me say that again slower - Barry is… More »

{Dwayne Betts}I met my wife in a bookstore and read her my poetry before our first conversation was over. So, of course I loved poetry Friday's. Here's Yusef Komunyakaa's "Facing It." This is - nah, I won't explain it. Just enjoy.Facing ItBY YUSEF KOMUNYAKAAMy black face fades,hiding inside the black granite.I said I wouldn't,dammit: No tears.I'm stone. I'm flesh.My clouded reflection eyes melike a bird of prey, the profile of nightslanted against morning. I… More »

[Dwayne Betts]Since the Ricci opinion came out, it seems only right to talk about two cases that will be before the court soon. The issue of JLWOP will come before the Supreme Court soon - law firms all over the country are preparing amicus briefs in the effort to sway the courts one way or the other. The two cases in question are both Florida cases, chosen because they are both instances of JLWOP for crimes that didn't result in murder. In one, Joe Sullivan was… More »

[Dwayne Betts]The Rockets team physician is saying that the injury to Yao's left foot could end his season and possibly his career. It's early now, too early to say definitively what happen. Yao could have the surgery that Cleveland's big Z had - but right now little is known except an injury that was expected to get better is now worse.What does this mean for the league? We know it means little for the Rockets, they weren't winning anyway - but Yao was to China… More »

{Dwayne Betts}I'm not want to be sympathetic to someone who stole 13 billion dollars by low estimates and 50 billion dollars by high estimates. But it's insane the staggering sentences the court system in most states in the United States mete out. I'm talking about people on a regular basis walking around with 30, 40 and 50 year sentences in states that don't have parole, as if 85% of 30 isn't life in most circumstances.The insanity of such high sentences is really… More »