Lobster with Ol’ Dirty Bastard

Poetry. Michael Cirelli has invented his own electric school of lyric, stamping an unflinching signature on soul-infused stanzas that are alternately tender, tough, revelatory and always, alwaays unapologetic. What’s most amazing is that he possesses a voice that doesn’t seem to have occurred before–its definitive drum works its way into your head and stays there, making you crave more of the infectious music he drops, exactly the way he drops it. Damn–Patricia Smith Michael. Cirelli is from Providence, Rhode Island. He is the Executive Director of Urban Word NYC, an award-winning literary arts organization for teens. He is also the author of Hip-Hop Poetry & the Classics (Milk Mug, 2004), and received his MFA in poetry from the New School. His poems have appeared in the New York Quarterly, Texas Review, Hanging Loose, Word Is Bond, Spindle, among others. He has also been featured in World Literature Today, Spoken Word Revolution Redux, HBO’s Def Poetry Jam, and King Magazine: The Illest Men’s Magazine. He lives in Brooklyn.