In 1999 C.C. Carter took top honors at the Guild Complex’s Gwendolyn Brooks Open Mic Poetry Awards with a performance of her signature poem “The Herstory of My Hips,” a loud ‘n’ proud celebration of her full figure and multicultural background. “These hips are for you to snuggle / for you to cuddle,” it runs. “For you to sink into and dream / for you to get lost in all your fantasies / wrap yourself around and let me squeeze you hips / lock you in and yell ‘si mama’ hips.”
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Carter, 38, lived in Chicago until she was 15, when her family relocated to New York City. She returned eight years ago, got a job teaching English and theater in Dolton, and a year later entered an open mike competition at Paris, a now extinct club in Uptown. To her surprise, she won. Soon she was performing at the Green Mill, Lit-X, the Bailiwick Arts Center, and Mountain Moving Coffeehouse, becoming a fixture on the local scene. Her first collection of poetry, Body Language, was published by Kings Crossing last year and is a finalist for a Lambda Literary Award, which honors achievement by gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender writers. Two weeks ago she inaugurated a weekly open mike at Leo’s Den Cocktail Lounge in Grand Crossing, and next week she’ll participate in a Guild Complex-sponsored event celebrating the contributions black gay and lesbian writers have made to 20th-century literature.
“Does that stop you from being an American voice in literature? No, it doesn’t. It didn’t stop Walt Whitman….It didn’t stop any of the European white literary canon people. So why is it going to stop us? Why should it stop us to just add that one little thing that could make a difference in the interpretation of the literature and make a difference in somebody?”
Carter will read from and discuss her work as part of the Guild Complex’s “Black Like Us: A Celebration of Queer Black Literature.” Moderated by poet Duriel Harris, the event also features Northwestern University chair of African-American studies Dwight McBride and University of Illinois at Chicago English professor Sharon Holland, and will be preceded by an open mike. It starts at 7:30 PM on Wednesday, February 26, at the Chopin Theatre, 1543 W. Division. Admission is $5, $3 for students and seniors; for more information call 773-227-6117.
