GUYANA MY ALTAR BY MARC MATTHEWS

Over the last several years there has been a resurgence in and clamout for the retrieving of Afrikan orality/orature in Afro-Caribbean literature. This has expressed itself mainly through what has been called 'dub poetry'. Marc Matthews is a rare species of poet and has utilised a variety of experiments in creating language and language-feels. These range from standard English to nation-language and he finds his nation-tongue in Guyanese speech.

Matthews orality is also fused with myth, and he draws from the Amerindian legends, Afrikan ancestry and popular lore, as well as European sources to create a terrifying poetry of depth, spirit-centre, rhythm-patterns, tongue-speeches and a language of poetry.

Edward Kamau Brathwaite says;

the Caribbean's most important invisible verb, our leading underground poet' Whether at Umanayana or Queen's Park or Queen's Park Savanna/Oval, La Basse or Vieux Fort, Bridgetown or Boston or Brixton this man's voice & presence & what he have to say & how he savs it/had (always) to be reckoned with

The 'aura', some seh, was enough; after all, was he not, above most others, the oral poet/performer/person? The one, more than most others, who ed burn yr poems live, angular & loud & struttin or soft like olive oil & warm like fresh brown mammie baking bread & putting me to bed & bring dem off de page in/to yr bar/room/brawl/brain/storm or rox/y story..