Colorado’s Poet Laureate Bobby LeFebre gave a live reading of his poem “An Exercise in Ritual” on October 6 during the Grand Opening Celebration of the new Parsons Theatre. The poem was written and dedicated to the Theatre.  LeFebre declares “what a gem this space is, not only for the North Metro Area, but for the larger arts and culture ecosystem.  Northglenn is seemingly a small community.  A small community with an enormous heart.  A small community with immense foresight.  A small community with a huge love for its people.  As Northglenn grows, so too will its connection to its people.  That’s what culture does.  It makes us feel a part of something.  It creates bridges where otherwise maybe walls would be.”

“Congratulations and thank you for your commitment to your story, to our collective story, for creating something truly special that has the potential to advance equity, give voice to the purposely silenced, be intentionally reflective of the diverse communities that wish to see themselves on stages and in programming”, states LeFebre.

View his recital in the video below and read its transcript.

To read more about Bobby LeFebre, visit his website bobbylefebre.com

See his full presentation on our YouTube Channel.

 

An Exercise in Ritual

 

We gather here together in this sacred circle like we always have.

Here, around this fire that has always burned.

The same fire that lives in our bellies and makes an inferno of our hearts.

 

This spirit we summon.

This beauty we conjure.

This inventiveness we invoke.

 

What is a vessel but a carrier of the coveted?

A transmitter of quintessence.

A conduit of culture.

 

Come and meet us at the place where ritual is given a body.

Where ceremony is given a face.

Where our existence transfigures into a song we warble in unison.

 

For he who sharpens his imagination is a visionary.

She who gives shape to intuition is a prophet.

They who hone mortality beseech the immortal.

 

Look at what we are building together.

We, the masons of reimagining.

The architects of metamorphosis.

The repositories of our collective consciousness.

 

Blessed be the makers.

The ones who set themselves ablaze willingly to warm the masses.

The ones who traverse the unknown giving life to the unseen.

 

Join us as we turn ourselves inside out.

Watch as we illuminate what kindles inside our bones.

These places where we find and lose ourselves at the same time.

These messages we devise with purpose

These aesthetics we mold from the supple clay of our minds.

 

Join us at these holy places of abandon.

These playgrounds of ingeniousness.

These geneses of more-inspired tomorrows.

 

For who does not admire a flower unfolding?

Who does not feel the warmth of the sun shining boldly upon their face?

Whose feet do not move at the coaxing of the drum’s sound?

 

Come and meet us at a new juncture where expression devoid of consciousness is merely decoration.

Where art is an insistent incubator for justice.

Where equity and access are an altar we decorate with the flowers of promise and purpose.

 

For what is it to highlight the margins but to attempt to balance the scales.

What is a raised fist, but a war cry in the language of the purposely silenced.

What is dissent, but an innate aversion to the confines of the status quo.

 

Art and culture is a communal land that does not know borders.

A common language we are all born speaking fluently.

A right that has been paraded around as a privilege for far too long.

 

Come and help us rip the esoteric from the sky.

 

Let our hands reach for the stars,

grasp them,

and share their tangible glow with anyone drawn to their light.

 

And here, we will all shine and wander together.

Here we will eradicate all of the man-made barriers we impose upon one another.

This beautiful burden we carry.

This responsibility tethered to our pens, our paint, pirouettes, percussion, and performance.

 

This work.

This digging.

These hands unearthing the truth.

 

This joy.

This beauty.

This struggle.

 

These songs.

These testaments.

These heirlooms.

 

These markers of humanity that remind us that we are here.

That we are alive.

That we always have been.

And that we will always will be.