"Medicine's First Prescription Was A Kiss"

I found this one interesting because he made a speech at an important event to support Heart and Stroke Foundation. To think that he made a spoken word poem for this event amazes me, not to mention the whole poem relates to what the foundation supports. I love that certain parts of the poem are faded in and out. I also love the first few lines of the poem "who diagnosed their patients asking 'can you show me where it hurts?'" I love it because it's a question that is always asked when you walk into a hospital or a doctors office with any type of pain. The pure visualization that is given from this poem leaves me astonished and awe struck. I noticed, however, that Shane Koyczan is looking down the whole time, I don't think he memorized all of it, but it was still amazing that he stood up and made a speech for this.

"Less To Do With Pain and More To Do With Beauty"

This is the animation version of the first spoken word poem I posted, I liked this because it gave me a visual with unique artwork that matched. However, there was no introduction or jokes like there was when he did it live for TedTalks. It also different because it's not just a violin playing like when he was on stage there is also a piano and someone singing slightly. The artwork left me sadder than when I saw the one on TedTalks it made everything more real and left me more shaken. Some of the artwork was shown on the screens when Shane Koyczan was sharing it on stage. I also noticed that there were some areas that he messed up when he was performing it live, but he still made it work. I also feel that the animated video left a bigger impact because certain words and phrases where "highlights" in the video leaving more of an impact than just speaking them. They both, however, made sure to leave the lasting impact of the word "Beauty".  

"If Oprah Winfrey Farts in a Bathtub And No Bubbles Come To The Surface is There An Alternate Universe Where Gas is Cheap?"

This is "Atlantis" performed live, I decided to another version of this to get see two different versions of the same poem. This one opened with a cough rather than the sound of music. Certain parts of this one was sped up when he was talking, I feel like there was more emotions behind this one. I love his facial expressions during certain jokes and his hand movements. He was able to pause with the jokes because the audience was laughing. However, I still like the other version better, it was kind of like reading a book and seeing it a certain way then watching the movie only to realize it was nothing like you pictured after all. I always enjoy that in Shane Koyczan poems they always involve body language, which makes everything easier to picture. In this version the poem no longer seems like a love poem to me it just seems like another one of his pieces of amazing work.

"Love Can be Demonstrated in Giving"

The music is very calming and when Shane Koyczan voice comes on it relaxes me even more. I love that there are things that I know in this poem, for example "Scientist say my efforts would be better off trying to find where the wild things went". I like that this video has nothing to watch, instead it allows me to close my eyes and just listen to it completely relaxed. I love the little comic relief about Oprah Winfrey farting in a tub. This poem seemed like the whole time he was trying to prove that he loved this girl. This whole poem makes me happier, in a way a little light weight, I felt loved after listening to the whole thing. If someone wrote this poem for me I would probably end up marrying them.

"I Took Lessons From Jesus Christ Lizards"

The first thing I notice is the white chalk like texture on a black blackground for the animation, I like this I find myself more drawn to it, excuse the pun. I like how the two became one in the art work. I enjoyed that he said "I took lessons from Jesus Christ lizards" it left me with such a visual, even without the artwork. I enjoyed that he said "the doctor filled our head with things like privacy"because normally people usually crave things like privacy and when they don't have it they don't have it they become angry. I love the ending too "I was running to find you" because it left me knowing that there was a connection between the two of them that no one would be able to understand.

"We Didn't Just Say It We Made It Be"

I find it amazing that this poem was written specifically for Canada. It shows how popular he is in his country. I never would have thought that Shane Koyczan would be so well known, maybe it's because not many people know him here in the United States. He makes Canada sound like an amazing place to visit and like the people there are inspiring like his poem. I love everything about this poem and how each line is something that everyone in Canada is proud of. I like that the whole idea is that Canada is more than what you would think, such as skiing and hocky.

"Sara's Heart isn't Actually Sara's Heart it's Just Another Way to Tell Time"

This poem opened up with an amazing piano, it immediately set the mood to be a sad one. I was not let down when he went on to say that he doesn't have use of his right arm it goes on to sound like he has a drinking problem. I love that later on the violin is added, however it doesn't lighten the mood in anyway. Sara, the person he is writing to, sounds broken and she is always expecting to be hurt in someway and that Shane Koyczan hasn't yet and therefore he isn't trying enough. She sounds as if she is battling depression and that she always put herself down and this poem is Shane Koyczan's way of proving his love to her and that he never second guessed her. However I found that the music became to busy and it was harder for me to concentrate on the words. I wasn't expecting the ending, I felt like crying myself in the end, I feel like I could hear Shane Koyczan crying too.

"We See Others in Ourselves"

The first thing I noticed was the the violin being plucked, I found it uplifted my mood to a good place. As if the poem was going to be happy, however after listening to previous poems I am not so sure that I can believe strings being plucked on a violin. I then enjoyed how my childhood memories where brought forward running around with my older brother playing cops and robbers or hide and seek and when my younger sister played and we tagged her she would say we didn't get her. Eventually she would just stop playing because she didn't want to be it. I love the movement and playful attitude of Shane Koyczan it keeps my mood uplifted, but again in the beginning of Shane Koyczan's poems they are usually uplifting, but they don't always show such an uplifting tone. My memories from childhood about calling my crush about homework where brought up to. I love that the crowd's reactions b=in the video laughing and enjoying the memories that the poem is bringing to them too. I love that the black and white adds to the effect of the poem. I feel that he is making a connection to me in this poem like he is talking directly to me. The chorus in the middle with the violin makes me relaxed, Shane Koyczan comes back relaxed and prepared to share more wise words with the audience. This spoken word poem was not at all sad or upsetting like the past ones I have posted. I feel inspired after listening to this poem.

"It's Gravity That's Been Getting us Down"

I have decided to do a poem related to cancer, seeing as it's breast cancer awareness month. I also chose a Shane Koyczan poem where he performing one of his earliest performances. I enjoyed that he opened the poem that he is in the hospital and that he said it didn't matter why he was there and nothing else mattered either. I enjoyed that he made the poem about a small boy that is suffering from cancer. I felt that I could relate to him to Shane Koyczan because when you find someone has cancer it's strange especially when the signs are so obvious, like the lose of hair. He puts in things that kids actually say like "this is from a weird girl" the weird girl being his sister. He also made me think how when someone does have cancer, especially smaller children, they seem to be wise beyond their age because what they are going through forces them to grow up. I love the visual aids provided by just words, the emotions provoked by them too. I think that was based on a true story because Shane Koyczan seemed like he was going to cry as he was talking about the boy. I find it amazing that a 9 year old in a hospital bed not only inspired a poem, but wisdom as well.

"Me and Failure Only Speak Sign Language"

This poem is hilarious in the beginning. Shane Koyczan showed his "raw" side with making me think about things that I never wanted to think about in terms of my parents. I also love the random fact in the beginning about the WWII and the British Museum. I enjoy the line "there was no one there to tell you 'this is gonna to hurt' and it did and does, but it was and will always be a fond memory for your parents." I like that he included the past, present, and future with this line it made me relate to him immediately, he was able to say this isn't just a one in awhile hurt this is life and it's going to hurt sometimes. When he discusses that he can't have children I felt pain for him, especially when he states "it forces me to think of my life in a very final way, that I will not continue after I'm gone." It made me sad to think someone as remarkable as Shane Koyczan can't pass on his genetics. It opens my heart and mind to men and how they want so badly to have children and how sometimes adoption doesn't cut it, to think that after that person their family branch ends. I love that this poem was more upbeat and comedic. In the end I was left jarred when he states "that's the kind of story you tell your kids" it was immediately after a hilarious story, I was chuckling and when he brings that back I was immediately brought back down the emotional roller coaster. The message of this poem was a reminder that you should always live each day trying allowing the kid in me to say yes and to always give love a chance by shutting up and saying something.

"Gravity will not be Held Responsible for People Falling in Love"

If you've had your first kiss I doubt you remember what he or she tasted like. Shane Koyczan reveals that he does not simply memorize his poems, instead he recalls a memory in his mind and remembers through association that the first girl he ever kissed tasted like tomatoes and the second girl tasted like pepper. He then delves into a comedic story about his first date and how he went over dressed. Each story that he tells links seamlessly with the previous. The attached video clip doesn't show Shane Koyczan himself, but I still felt moved by his words, even though I could not see his expressions. Through his amazing talent with words I felt that somehow Shane Koyczan had a memory of me somewhere in his mind. As usual there was a dark side of this poem which leaps out in contrast to the cheery majority when he recalls a man in a brown car, in which I could only assume to be a memory of an attempted kidnapping. The added spice of darkness that seem to be a common trait in Mr. Koyczan's work make each poem particularly captivating and always leave me with anticipation of his next poem. His dark musings remind me that his life has had plenty of lows to each of its highs and I can relate to that. I enjoyed the conclusion of the poem "Inside a black hole I wanted to grow tomatoes," I believe he was saying that he would love the girl that tasted like tomatoes forever because "time slows near a black hole".

"If I Knew Then What I Know Now"

The poem starts by following Shane Koyczan to a stage where he turns his back to empty audience seats and is facing the camera. I felt he was preparing himself to talk to me in a private place where he felt more empowered to share what he had to say; as if the stage gave him courage to share with me his deepest feelings. I also enjoyed how certain expressions, such as his hand movements, were highlighted by the camera. "We so often say 'you're so soft', and the person that touched them last might have said it for the 28th time, but today I'm number 29." This line is strangely romantic, as if he was hoping that he would be the last person to say this to her. Even if he wasn't, it felt like he was content with it if only because he was one of the few men in the world that would be able to say so. His facial expressions during his performance added slight humor and gave life to the words as he was saying them. It seems that Shane Koyczan has a talent for knowing when to slow the pace of certain words in a sentence while speeding through others. Even when speeding through phrases at astounding speeds his words are very clear and the rapid pace adds a dramatic feeling of importance to the message he is trying to convey. This poem is much softer in feel than "To This Day". It is more focused around love, the emotions that come with this feeling and how he felt personally with the girl he first loved.

"Get a Better Mirror"

Shane Koyczan opens with an amazing story and metaphors and each one is more moving the last. Early in his presentation, he muses "We are expected to define ourselves at such an early age and if we didn't do it others did it for us."  This really resonated with me personally because it's true, from the moment we step into school we are asked what we want to be when we grow up, I personally still want to be a mermaid. Koyczan then proceeds to offer comic relief for a short time only to make a stark turn-around into a much darker place and as an audience we are all taken for the ride. He says things that are sympathetic to many of our lives as teenage high school students, "They asked me what I wanted to be and told me what not to be." As a child we are often told that we can be whatever we want to be. However, as we grow older our parents or teachers usually tell us that certain dreams are harder to achieve and that maybe we should think of something more 'attainable' or in my case, of wanting to be a mermaid, not attainable at all. Through his incredable speaking ability, Shane Koyczan digs up all of our painful memories of the first time we were told our dreams couldn't all come true. In the shadows of such bleak subject matter, Shane Koyczan's humor grips the audience and laughter comes easily when he starts telling the tale of 'pork chops' and 'karate chops'. I myself laughed, but when he suddenly ends the story saying that he no longer eats pork chops I felt dirty for laughing, almost as if I was a bully laughing at his misfortune. The poem grows more intense and when the violin plays Shane Koyczan has a firm grip on both my attention and emotions as his voice starts booming. The most relate-able part for me was "He was a broken branch grafted to a different family tree" because I myself was adopted. As someone who wishes to be an educator and hears Shane Koyczan say  "If a kid breaks and no one around chooses to hear. Do they make a sound?" and at the same time growing up I know that the kid makes a sound, but the school chooses not to hear, his message makes me truly desire to make a difference. To compare the school to a big top circus was amazing metaphor because all schools seem to be divided into cliques. He finishes his poem with a message of inspiration; closing on how life "has less to do with pain and more to do with beauty", calling the audience to look at the positive side to life, instead of the horrible realities because if we focus on them too long we might just lose ourselves to them.