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Rudy Francisco
American spoken word poet and writer From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Rudy K. Francisco (born July 27, 1982) is an American spoken word poet and writer.[1][2][3][4] He has won several poetry slams and written six books of poetry: Getting Stitches, Scratch, No Gravity, No Gravity Part II, Helium, and I'll Fly Away.[5] He made an appearance on TV One's Verses and Flow and performed his spoken word poems "Complainers" and "Rifle" on the Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon.[6][7][8][9]
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Early life
Rudy Francisco was born and raised in San Diego, California, and is of Belizean decent.[10][11] He wrote a love poem as part of a writing assignment in his senior year of high school and received high marks for it.[3][12]
Francisco was inspired watching HBO's Def Poetry Jam. He began to go to open mics in his area until they were closed due to gentrification.[8] With a group of local poets and activists called "Collective Purpose", he opened an open mic known as Elevated in San Diego, which has been open for over ten years.[3]
Francisco attended Alliant International University in San Diego. He completed a Bachelor of Arts degree in psychology and pursued a master's degree in industrial and organizational psychology.[13] Francisco was a resident assistant at his school and started hosting open mics.[12] He was invited to other open mics and met other poets through them.[13] He worked as a statistical analyst and completed three years of a Ph.D. program before quitting to do poetry full-time.[1][13]
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Poetry career
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Francisco first got into performance poetry after going to open mics and watching a show that featured the poet Shihan and falling in love with the style.[13] He says that reading The Music Lesson by Victor Wooten was pivotal moment in his life as a poet.[14] Francisco has performed in competitions as well as shows around the world.[12]
Francisco wrote his debut poetry book Getting Stitches in 2013, then Scratch in 2014, No Gravity in 2015, and his first full-length book Helium in 2017, which was published by Button Poetry. It took Francisco a year and a half to write the collection of 58 poems.[13] Helium received positive reviews.[5][15][16] When asked what Helium means in an interview, Francisco states that "helium allows you to defy gravity" and “in a lot of ways poetry always gave me that temporary escape.”[13] Themes for Helium include race, class, gender, love, and self-reflection.[13] His style for his poems encompasses "personal and political narratives through an honest and humorous approach."[10]
Francisco is the founder and current coach of the San Diego Poetry Slam Team, which won the 2017 National Poetry Slam Championship.[17][18]
Francisco performed his spoken-word poem "Complainers" on his first appearance on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon on March 1, 2018.[6][7] Rudy Francisco is the first to perform a full-length poem on the show. Many of his poems are on YouTube, some of which, like "Scars/To the New Boyfriend" have accumulated over two million views.[19] He has also grown a large following on Instagram with over 250,000 followers.[20]
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Personal life
Francisco has said that the slam community allows one be a part of a family, saying “some of my closest friends are people I have been on teams with or competed against. It is what keeps me coming back around.”[13]
Francisco has a five-year-old daughter.[13]
Tours and events
Francisco toured the UK in May and June 2018.[21] In early June of 2018, Button Poetry announced on Facebook that performances scheduled for India with Sabrina Benaim were cancelled due to "scheduling and organizational issues."[22] He performed at the August 2018 slam poetry competition in Chicago, representing the San Diego team.[13] Francisco went on tour in October in the UK with fellow poets Neil Hilborn and Sabrina Benaim.[21] On April 30, 2019, he performed at Beltway Poetry Slam in Washington, D.C. He was the host city coordinator for the May 13, 2019 Individual World Poetry Slam in Southern California.[13]
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Books of poetry
- Getting Stitches (2013)
- Scratch (2014)
- No Gravity (2015)
- No Gravity Part II (2016)
- Helium (2017)
- I'll Fly Away (2020)
- Excuse Me As I Kiss The Sky (2023)
Filmography
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Poetry awards
- 2007 San Diego Grand Slam Champion
- 2007 Poet of the People Slam Champion
- 2008 Member of the Hollywood Poetry Slam Team
- 2009 National Underground Poetry Individual Champion
- 2009 3rd place in the Individual World Poetry Slam
- 2010 La Poloma Slam Champion
- 2010 Chico Invitational Slam Champion
- 2010 San Diego Grand Slam Champion
- 2010 San Francisco Grand Slam Champion
- 2010 Member of the San Diego Poetry Slam Team (Regional Champion/6th ranked team in the nation)
- 2010 Individual World Poetry Slam Slam Champion
- 2017 National Poetry Slam Champion (as part of the San Diego Poetry Slam Team)[24]
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References
External links
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