Finances are always the (first) problem of a startup company, then advertising. But DCP had a hold on advertising. I wasn’t the only client. DCP had to pull off an amazing opening. DCP was able to cut publishing cost by dealing with an Afro-Cuban printing press. 2000 copies of The Ronin Poetz were created. Post 9/11 fear gave booksellers the opportunity to keep The Ronin Poetz off shelves. Scheduled book signings and tour dates were canceled. But Black bookstores and venue spots kept the door opens. A national commercial was created for the epic poem (the first African American, narrative epic poem) and a NYCity local commercial ran in Spanish. The first run of The Ronin Poetz sold successfully and garnered positive reviews. Some critics had problems with the ‘4’, ‘2’, and ‘u’, Prince-inspired scripting. (At least there wasn’t a graphic of an eye for the word ‘I’.) But that was a minor hiccup. People were accepting The Ronin Poetz.
The Ronin Poetz's first run was also bare of the prologue, and had two errors that have since been corrected. My tour took me down the East coast, into the south, and parts of Cali. It was badass. I do regret that I wasn’t able to hit-up Chicago and Detroit. A major college tour was planned, me hooking up with two other poets, one of which inspired me to turn The Ronin Poetz into a stage play. The play was written. The college tour fell apart. The poets disappeared, mainly because we weren’t getting paid thousands. They didn’t want to split the couple thousand we were getting as a whole. Egos decided that we should get a couple thousand each. And as much as I’m sure we were worth that, we were barely known. So, I stuck to my small tour. The Q & A sessions led to lectures. I started lecturing in the summer of 2003 with a grassroots company. Queens and Brooklyn became my spots, for performances and lectures (respectively).
The copies of The Ronin Poetz were sold out by 2004. DCP broke a little more than even, and towards the winter of 2004, started to secure a deal with distribution and printing that was extremely easy on the wallet.
