July 29, 2022 • 61 mins
Otis Mensah is the first hip-hop poet to be awarded a poet laureate title in the UK by the City of Sheffield. Influenced by the expressive freedom of Jazz, Otis documents his journeys of introspection through vulnerable expression that speaks to racial identity, masculinity, loneliness and being othered. He has had numerous commissions and live performances include the Glastonbury Music Festival. His poetry collection, Metamorphosis, gives voice to unspoken trauma in everyday-life and we also talked about why poetry can speak, but we may not talk to each other.
As the first Hip-Hop artist to be awarded a poet laureate title in the UK, he wants to use the position to break down barriers, smash the stuffy stereotype, and remind people that poetry is meant to be for the people. The Guardian.
Otis could be described as the most courageously vulnerable artist of the 21st century.
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Series Music - Courtesy of Barry J. Gibb
Closed Captions are added to all interviews in this series. Read only, text versions of every interview can also be found here: https://www.canartsaveus.com
Discover Otis Mensah here: https://otismensah.com/
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Welcome to this podcast seriesasking the question Can art save
us? I'm starting the firstnational and international
conversation about courage andcuriosity. What do these
qualities really mean? And whydoes it make a big difference to
our mental, societal anddemocratic health? I talk to
award winning and diverseartists across the arts to
(00:21):
explore these qualities in theirlives and work, both to inspire
and for us all to learn. I'mexploring why we need these
qualities to help change theglobal epidemic of mental
illness, loneliness,polarization of our communities,
and even global conflict. If thearts cultivate courage and
curiosity, I'm asking thequestion Can art save us?
(00:50):
And my guest this week is OtisMensah. He's the first hip hop
poet to be awarded a poetlaureate title in the UK by the
City of Sheffield. He has hadnumerous commissions and his
live performances include theGlastonbury Music Festival. Otis
describes his poetry as breakingdown barriers, smashing the
stuffy stereotype and remindingpeople that poetry is meant to
(01:12):
be for the people. He could alsobe described as the most
courageously vulnerable artistof the 21st century. Hello,
Otis, and welcome.
Hi, thank you so much for havingme and for the intro.
You're very welcome. It's justbeen phenomenal reading your
(01:33):
work your poetry, looking atyour performances. It's it's
quite astonishing, actually, thebreadth and wealth of your work
already. What I was interestedin, just to begin with is when
you discovered your love forpoetic vulnerability where this
all began?
(01:54):
Yeah, sure. So I think thejourney really began for me as a
teenager, I was looking for somesort of expressionistic outlet,
sort of dealing with theexistential angst that you do as
a teenager. And sort of quarreland wrestles with identity. And
(02:14):
I think wanting to sort of growinto my own skin and understand
what it was that I wasinterested in, want, wanted to
understand what art spoke forme. And what what I gravitated
towards, naturally as a sort ofintuition, I guess, visceral
based thing. And I started to, Idon't know, experiment, I
(02:36):
started to write raps with, withfriends in the school yard. And
it was very fun, it was veryuseful. It felt meaningful. But
I did notice that I believe Iwas injecting my own sort of
insecurities into my art form,especially as it surrounded my
peers. And I guess what I saw atthe time as sort of like, a
(02:57):
shield of pretense sort ofcontinued. And I realized that
what I needed in terms of beingable to express myself freely
and I guess, to sort of liftedthe burden of, of whatever it
was that I was going through, Ineeded some form of honesty,
some form of radical honesty,and I might not have had the
words in the canon to verbalizethat at the time. But I think me
(03:21):
falling in love with hip hopmusic and hip hop poetry, really
spoke volumes for saying thatthat's what I needed. And I got
into hip hop artists like TheRoots. I got into hip hop
artists like Kid Curry, whonotoriously spoke openly about
depression and anxiety, andperhaps feeling a little like a
(03:44):
social pariah amongst theirpeers, especially in a landscape
that could be especially in alandscape that didn't really
allowed him to do that. I thinka lot of his peers weren't
really, I guess, engaging inthat level of vulnerability that
he was. So that sort of stoodout as a testament for me and,
(04:05):
and sort of allowed me to seethat, oh, you can, it can be
cool to be honest and open andvulnerable. And not only can it
be cool, but it can also have aradical impact on your on your
own mental health and on yourown artistry, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. It's reallyinteresting, how we can change
(04:26):
meanings. So takingvulnerability as an example. You
know, when actually it'srelationship is so connected to
courage. But there are problemsaround identity, particularly, I
think, with the model ofmasculinity, where courage is
always around bravery and notexpressing emotions, because
(04:50):
that would be a sign ofweakness, for example. So what
kinds of identity tensions Doyou think you were struggling
with? What You were growing up?Um,
what kind of identity attention?So that's a big existential
question. I think, yeah. Yeah,there was a lot of tensions
(05:14):
around sort of not being caughtnot feeling comfortable in my
own skin. I think I wasnaturally an introvert in
perhaps a world that tells you,you know, introversion is weird,
or, you know, it's like, it'snot the normal thing to do. I
(05:34):
think I also had a slightlydifferent, I guess, passions,
some slightly different passionsthan the people around me. I
think a lot of my passionsbecame hyper specific. So when I
found something that I love,like hip hop music, I focus
really into it. And sometimesthat can make it hard to to sort
(05:57):
of step outside of that andrelate on a social level. I
think also, my naturalinclination was to sort of
isolate myself and I guess be bemore creative on my own, as
opposed to engaging in sort of,like typical social settings. So
I think that there on thesurface definitely created some
sort of, I don't know, socialtension, or sort of some sort of
(06:23):
otherness. And then, of course,you know, like, growing up as a
black mixed race person in, inthe UK, I was wrestling with,
with racialization and othering.And, and all that sort of mixed
in a pot together. Where Hip Hopreally did allow me to find
(06:44):
solace in that hip hop reallygave me a language to sort of
understand my own state ofexistence. So yeah, yeah, I
think I think that thattransitional point, as a
teenager into early adulthood,was really impactful for me as I
started to discover the art anddelve into it in more depth.
(07:06):
And was that the shift fromwhere you talk about feeling
like an outcast?
Yeah, I mean, you know, what Ithink perhaps happened is that
it took a lot of the tension ofhaving an art form that I could
relate to took a lot of thetension off that which not only
(07:29):
meant that I could sort of likeI said, have a have a language
and a canon to understand what wasgoing on around me politically,
socially. And what I feltpolitically and socially, even,
even on a surface level, eventhough it was the, the sowing of
those seeds, perhaps not indepth, but not only did Hip Hop
(07:51):
do that for me, but it alsoallowed me to understand that it
wasn't. So it wasn't sopeculiar, that I was interested
in the things that I wasinterested in that I was that I
felt the way that I felt. Andperhaps there was reasons,
societal reasons to why I feltlike that. So and I think, I
think what it what it made me dois feel less so like an outcast
(08:14):
in the end, and maybe made mefeel like I had a sense of
community that perhaps wasn'tbound by by geography, and the
social geography, but perhapswas bound by something a little
more metaphysical. And somethingthat could sort of like trans
transcend borders, as I startedto engage with all across the
globe, across Europe, across theinternet. And yeah, it made me
(08:38):
feel less alone. So in turn, itallowed me to function better
with my, my peers, it allowed meto function better in, in, in
school, which is why often Iadvocate for poetry as a form of
thing as a form of engagementthat can sort of, you know, help
towards a flourishing ofemotional intelligence and a
(09:01):
flourishing I guess, emotionalunderstanding of oneself and,
and once society and sociallandscape just because I think
it gives us a second to underunderstand to, I guess, value
ourselves and our and ourthoughts as individuals in a way
that society doesn't really giveus a chance to, you know,
(09:23):
everything is so fast in thissort of capitalist haze is that we
never really get a second toprocess emotions. So when poetry
allows for that space, I think alot of sort of metamorphosis can
begin.
Yeah, because I've seen thatyou've also described yourself
as "an advocate of patience andsifting through the noise" does
(09:46):
that relate to the kind ofmessage you're getting across.
Yeah, I think I think that'sthat's, that's very much what
what I intended to touch on it'sthis idea that capitalism It
just doesn't really allow forthat our, our state of existence
in this world that we're inright now, just doesn't really
(10:06):
allow for us to processemotions, it doesn't really
allow for us to maybe even sitwith sit with our, our traumas
or you know, it's like thingsthat I have grown to call
everyday traumas. And the reasonI call them everyday traumas is
because society forces us tosort of skip past them so, so
quickly and so. So hurryhurriedly. So I think art allows
(10:32):
for a space for us to recognizethat and perhaps start to think
about, well, what impact didsocieties societies voice have a
sort of what what impact didsociety's voice have on my
psyche? On my emotional wellbeing? And how is that impacted
my life? And how can I changethat? If I want to change that?
(10:54):
Or how can I just grow tounderstand it? You know?
Yeah, I think what you callunadulterated honesty,nseems
to be really core to, to how youwrite, and you're quite
prepared, it seems to have thatexposure, which is an act of
(11:15):
bravery. Because that's a hardthing to do, isn't it?
Yeah, it's definitely a hardthing to do, I think I'm perhaps
lucky in the sense that the artform that I fell in love with
naturally pushed me to be to beas open as possible naturally
(11:36):
pushed me to be as vulnerable aspossible, because it was about
sharing your unique experienceof the world, you know, and, and
I think what what happens is,when we do I don't know what
what I like to call, I don'tknow, some sort of introspective
excavation, or some sort of deepdive within what we find is our
(11:57):
true, unique experience of theworld and of perception and
reality. Not to say that, Idon't think it doesn't have its
dangers, you know, I think, youknow, sometimes it can be, it
can be way more valid, and waymore sort of wise to, to go into
(12:19):
those deep, vulnerable feelingsin your own time, whilst not
pushing them to create aproduct, whether that's a piece
of poetry for art's sake, orwhether it's from, you know,
from societal pressure to do so.But I think it's about what
feels right to you andnurturing, nurturing the best
(12:39):
way that you can feel open andvulnerable and honest with
yourself and not feelpressurized? You know?
Yeah, because when you talkabout that deep dive, that
process, if you like, of selfreflection, sometimes it's
talked about, you know, inmindfulness practice, but that,
that chance you have that deepdive is also a chance, just to
(13:03):
simply be curious. And even thatact of curiosity is is healthy,
did you find that? Yourcuriosity of words is immense.
So did you find that you kind ofallowed yourself to be in that
space? It was therapeutic insome way?
(13:24):
Yeah, that's such a greatquestion. I mean, I believe my
my curiosity for language is,it's an interesting one. It's
paradoxical, and it's full ofnuance. I grew up in a very
faith based background, I grewup in the church, and I grew up
having to read the Bible, and orhaving the Bible, biblical
(13:47):
scripture, scripture read to me.And what that does, in a way is
give somebody who was younger,who perhaps doesn't have a grasp
of certain metaphorical imageryor certain vocabulary, it puts
it puts the vocabulary in theirface, and, and it shows them
that there is an emotionalimpact to the language without
(14:08):
there having to always be alogical, theoretical impact. You
know, I think about like thechurch setting when something is
said that perhaps I didn't havelogical grasp on in terms of its
vocabulary, I still noticed thatthere was an emotional impact of
it. And I think that was thesame for the congregation. If
the pastor was to read abiblical scripture, that felt
(14:31):
right, that rolled off thetongue, right. That I think the
the understanding and the deepermessage of what is being said
under the words, reaches on on aon a more sort of vibrational
emotional level, even if thelanguage doesn't quite reached
our level of understanding and Ithink that somewhat allows for
(14:53):
deeper understandings oflanguage to take language and
think well, how can we breakthis apart and look at it deeper
into deeper beyond its surfacesort of thing. And I think that
that taught me really early onto engage in poetry. You know,
it's like, I think it taught me,like an ease with language where
I didn't have to obsess over. AmI using the right literary
(15:16):
form? Does this word mean thisis this being used in the right
context, because I think oftengoing into an art form with that
kind of mindset around languagecan sort of stifle us and, and
put us in a box way too early.And I am also very, very
dyslexic. So I think naturally,my tendency is to take a word,
(15:40):
and, you know, miss, misuse it.And I think sometimes that can
be a beautiful thing, becausesometimes it allows you to
understand something thatperhaps you wanted to say that
you didn't, you didn't know, youknow, and then perhaps sometimes
allows you to get a way moreplayful grasp of language. So
(16:01):
yeah, my relationship tolanguage has definitely been
somewhat therapeutic. And it'sdefinitely definitely been an
emotional relationship, ratherthan a logical relationship.
Yeah, and that seems to describea really important relationship
around freedom, freeing uplanguage. So we talk about
(16:24):
breaking barriers, don't we, societal barriers, whether it's,
you know, race, identity, sex,there are far too many barriers
that that each of us can face.But it's interesting when you
start to actually consider thebarriers and confines of
language. And your reflection onthat. Yeah, your reflection on
(16:45):
that is really sending out animportant message.
I mean, I think it's so truewhat you say, because I think, I
don't know systems of power andoppression that exist within,
within our society often rely onlanguage to keep us confined.
You know, when when you look atthe, the words that have come
(17:08):
about from, from capitalism,from, from systems of power in
this society in this world, wesee that the language that has
been that has been sort of thatwe've been conditioned to engage
in or believe over time, is verymuch sort of like the pillars
(17:29):
that hold those systems of powerin place, amongst many other
things, of course, but I thinkyou're right, in pointing out
the language is definitely acore element and sort of player
in that sort of, in that powerstruggle, you know, so and I
think, often you'll see thatwhen when we start to have
discussions as as a communityabout breaking down, or you're
(17:51):
speaking against certain systemsof oppression, I think often
people have an issue withlanguage. And that always seems
to be a cause for contention. Soit's definitely something that
we need to think about. And I think, maybe think about ways
that we can, that we can get ridof that we can drop our
(18:11):
attachment to language, becauseI think sometimes we have
unhealthy attachment to wordsthat perhaps can just, you know,
stifle us further.
Yeah, I think that's reallysignificant because you can
easily see language as ahierarchy as well, there can be
academic elitism, for example,you know, that can inhibit other
(18:34):
people. Hence, you know, howinteresting it is that in many
ways, you're kind ofrevolutionising the hip hop
space in terms of poetry?Because, of course, it's so easy
for people to leap to thestereotypes of gangsta rap and
violence. Yeah. But actually,you might argue that it always
was a space for poetry andtherapy? Yeah, so,
(18:58):
so beautiful that you say that,because I think you're right,
this is usually the racist sortof narrative that that, that
gives birth to itself from thesociety that you know, like hip
hop, or let's say, this art formthat comes from black people, is
something that is violent, oruncivilized, or, you know,
something that is overlyconcerned with, with materialism
(19:23):
and material wealth, and and Ithink the issue is that there is
a version of the art form thatgets played out, and that gets
sort of like, pushed to thecenter. And I believe that's
very much because we live in acapitalist society that also
speaks to these themes ofmaterial wealth that speaks to
(19:43):
these themes of that speaks tothese themes of, I guess,
oppressive systems of power. Butwhen you, you're right, when you
look way deeper into theculture, and it doesn't even
take much digging to realize,you see that the very core
foundations of hip hop Were tode escalate, systems of white
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supremacy de escalate systems ofracism, de escalate, and not not
only de escalate, but combatthese systems of power, right at
the core on a community level,they're very radical and the
very emotional, the birth of hiphop came from this idea of the
safe space to house party waswas very much a setting where
hip hop culture was born from,and you would have people put it
(20:27):
putting cardboard onto the floorof people dancing as a means to
get out there, there as a meansto express themselves. But and
what that did in turn was notonly create a safe space for
emotional flourishing forexpression, but it also meant
that in a society where, wherethere's lots of poverty, where
there's lots of corruption,where there's the pressure of a
(20:50):
racist, sort of like governmentand society coming down in on
the community, it meant thatthis is a place where we can get
our anger, you know, this is aplace that where we can, where
we can speak about our justifiedanger against society. This is a
this is a place where we have avoice where we have a platform.
So that's really at the core ofhip hop. And I believe that's
(21:11):
why it is so radicallyvulnerable and honest, when you
look at the core of the culturein the office, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. And thatvulnerability, of course, is is
often expressions of realcourage to do that. I don't know
if you have necessarily seen thedocumentary series of the hip
(21:33):
hop series that looks at theSongs that Shook America? And
it's really, it's reallypowerful... I think
you might see that on a BBCiPlayer catch up. I think
it would be of interest to you because it identifies six songs
and it's from the point of viewthat it is shifting from
(21:55):
stereotypes of hardcore gangsterrap, and and it's almost like
violence for violence sake andit's much more in the territory
of the purpose of what all ofthe hip hop artists were doing.
And they were changing barriers.So even if you went into the
90s, in terms ofmainstream awareness,
(22:16):
Run DMC and Aerosmith, Walk thisWay, would have been a real kind
of mainstream hit for a lot ofpeople that wouldn't have really
been engaging with hip hop. Andof course, what they did was
really powerful, because theywere bringing black and white
audiences together, which iscrazy, that we still have to
even reference that because, youknow, that's what Dean Martin
(22:37):
and Sammy Davis Jr. Were doingand Frank Sinatra, you know, but
even now, we're relying on musicand in these examples, hip hop
culture to do that.
Yeah, I will definitelycheck that out. Yeah, yeah, that
sounds really interesting. Yeah,I'll definitely give that a
watch.
Yeah, because I think it's justa reminder that artists don't
(23:04):
necessarily have the luxury ofcreating their art, it's very
much about in being in an arenaof struggle. It's hard for
any artists, you know, it's hardfor any artists to get signed or
get a record deal. So of course, it's coming from barriers of
discrimination anyway, I justthink it really highlights that
(23:25):
our is so often an arena ofstruggle.
Yeah. And I think just to sortof like reiterate, to go back to
that point, I also do not have aproblem with with, let's say,
quote, unquote, gangsta rap orquote, unquote, like any, any
rap that plays to thisstereotype that we spoke about,
(23:49):
because I believe that it'strue, cool, you can sort of see
the story is being told. And so,you know, it's like, when people
are speaking from the realm ofexperience, I think that there's
nothing more sort of like,valuable than that. And I think,
I think that's how we've grownto understand like many
(24:09):
different experiences of manydifferent people's, you know, is
by engaging with they are, Ithink what my issue is, is when
you have outer groups, peoplewho are outside of the
community, let's namely, like inhistorical senses, in terms of
hip hop, sort of like whiterecord, label owners come in and
say, Well, this is themarketable idea of what we need
(24:33):
to represent of the culture.This is the thing that we are
going to congratulate more thananything else. And this is the
thing that we're going to give aplatform to rather than anything
else, I think that that thenbecomes an issue because it
becomes well who is in controlof the narrative here. And then
what sort of sort of racism isallowed to be injected into the
projection of the culture. Andas how society perceives
(24:56):
it, you know, so yeah, I thinkit's all about who is in control
of the narrative. And that'swhen it gets a little shady.
When you look at thingshistorically, you start to see
the record companies would swoopin, you know, offer somebody
units like $100,000, orsomething of that nature, and
then create a golden standard ofwhat should be created and what
should be projected in order togain some sort of financial
(25:19):
success. Which of which, ofcourse, is manipulation and a
form of cultural violence, youknow?
Yeah, so branding is part of a control problem, isn't it that
that power is marketing. And Ithink that's probably an even
heavier burden on artists,because even with that awareness
(25:41):
in mind, it's another set ofbarriers, isn't it? It's
another, it's another David andGoliath battle. Have you managed
the sense of branding aroundyourself for your own work?
That's interesting, it's not reallysomething that I, I give too
much thought to. Especially ifwe go back to this idea of
(26:06):
honesty and vulnerability, Iguess that becomes your guiding
principle in a way. And not onlyhonesty, just in sort of, like
literary expression, buthonestly, in sort of what feels
right, musically, what feelsright, in terms of the choices
you make within the community,what you know what, like what
(26:26):
feels right. And that's also wasa, that's also a constant
battle, because you're caught inthis system that we live in,
we're constantly having to weighup what feels right, versus what
is going to allow us to earnsome sort of financial
compensation for the work thatwe do, you know, and sometimes
those two things don't alwaysfit together. It's beautiful
when they do when they'reharmonious, and you can do what
(26:48):
feels right, and it earns youmoney. But many times, that's
not the case. So it's aconstant it's a constant battle
to like it's a constantmoralistic and ethical battle in
a way. And sometimes you justhave to let your your gut guide
you and sort of your intuitionguide you there, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. I wanted tosee if you knew the work of a
(27:12):
research Professor Brene Brown,because she became like a viral
hit on TED talks, you may havecome across her work. If not I
think it will interestyou because she's done a
massive study, where she talksabout the courage to be
vulnerable. And you talk aboutthe power of vulnerable
(27:34):
expression. And I think there'slots and lots of synergies
there. And she describesvulnerability as our most
accurate measurement of courage.And I wondered what your
thoughts were on that.
Yeah, that's so interesting.Yeah, I mean, to an extent I
(28:00):
agree with them. Like, I thinkthat vulnerability is definitely
a, I guess, a more sort ofobjective way of measuring
courage, because you can sort ofsay, well, this person put
themselves in the sort ofposition to be exposed, whether
that's exposing an insecurity,whether that's sort of, you
(28:23):
know, exposing themselves bysharing an art form that is that
is difficult or engaging with anart form that is difficult. But
I think, yeah, what that does,it does create a sense of
community and it does reallysort of like unite people. And I
think that's, that's why I fellin love with the art form that I
did is because in let's say, KidCurry being open about his
depression, about feelingoutcast, it created a point of
(28:46):
relation, I didn't feel so alonein those in those situations,
but it took his courage to dothat. Then there's, there's a
dichotomy sort of inside of methat says, whilst vulnerability
can be a form of courage, it canalso be very performative. And
there's, there's, we see thishistorically. And we see this in
(29:06):
our current landscape thatcapitalism has has a sneaky way
of injecting itself into anysort of radical, I guess,
radical activity. And I thinkcapitalism has a way of doing
that with vulnerability where itbecomes about how honest and how
open can you be in order tomarket yourself as such, you
(29:28):
know, and it's like, you havebrands of latching on to the
idea of vulnerability in orderfor them to sell a product. And
I think we see this with withconcepts of like self care, for
example, you know, self carebeing somewhat something
radical, and as we said, in aconstant rush of things, it can
be so meaningful to take thatmoment of self care if if what
(29:50):
that moment means is giving timefor your emotional flourishing,
for giving time for whatever itis you truly need. However, what
we see is we see sort of brandsbeing like, take time to eat
Your favorite brand of ice creamor you know, take some time to
go shopping at the Gucci store,for example. So capitalism has a
sneaky way of usurping theseradical ideas. And I also am
(30:15):
aware that there's, there's aparadox in vulnerability,
being honest and vulnerable,sometimes it can be unwise, and
it can be unhealthy, it can behurtful, you know, if we push
people to be vulnerable at thewrong time, we can perhaps
disturb traumas that weren'tready to be disturbed, that
weren't ready to sort of beexplored, or perhaps in a
landscape or a space that wasn'tsafe for those things to be
(30:39):
exposed. So I think it is verymuch down to the individual's
volition and sort of using theguiding principle for that. And,
and also, I think sometimes,people who have been the most
courageous, perhaps don't havethe luxury of being the most
vulnerable sometimes, you know,people who have been through
traumatic events who havesurvived unimaginable things,
(31:02):
you know, I think about, I thinkabout some of my family heritage
heritage, and some of my familythat escaped Nazi Germany and
sort of survived the Holocaust.And I think, like that was
already such a mountainous thingto survive, that perhaps being
vulnerable about it and speakingopenly about it would be would
(31:27):
be tremendously difficult to tobring up all that trauma
straight away, you know, so Ithink it's, I think, sometimes
we've, we have exercisedthat courage to the, to the
maximum, and we need, then asafe space at some point to talk
about it. But sometimesvulnerability in in the moment
isn't always the isn't alwaysthe best option, you know.
(31:52):
Yeah. And because also, it'sremoving a relationship that can
arrive with shame, you know, ifyou feel vulnerable, and you
associate that to being weak,and then you feel ashamed, which
none of none of which isjustified. But unfortunately,
it's so often the connectionsthat are made, it's indeed being
(32:12):
very careful, whether it's yourown self reflection, or in a
therapy type relationship, thatas you approach vulnerability,
you're not inviting in shame.The mind is too good at
automatic negative thinking, andprejudiced, habitual thinking.
(32:33):
And I think what your poetry isdoing is literally smashing
those barriers of language. Aswe mentioned earlier, you're
you're inviting people to thinkagain, about their own thoughts.
Thank you so much. Yeah, just anadditional thought on that, I
think. Sometimes it's atremendous privilege to to be
(32:55):
vulnerable in an artistic sense,you know, sometimes, I believe
it's, it's, it's privileged,that also allows for that, you
know, and, and when I say that,I mean, to be vulnerable, in
this artistic sense, sometimesrequires space for reflection,
and space for philosophy. And,and if you're in a place in
(33:19):
society, where you areconstantly having to work, where
you're constantly having toexercise all your emotional,
physical energy, just to merelysurvive, then this idea of
autistic vulnerability becomesvery much a sort of privilege.
And and something that noteverybody can can exercise the
time for, you know?
(33:41):
Oh, absolutely. I think that isreally, really significant. And
it's one of the factors that'sproblematic in terms of how the
art suffers from elitism.Because, yeah, there's a lot of
privilege in order to be able tobe an artist, unless, of course,
(34:02):
you are in that, that space ofsuch deep exposure, that risk is
what you know, anyway, it's kindof one extreme or the other. No,
I think, I think it really doesremind you that art is very much
(34:23):
a radical act, dependingparticularly on the
circumstances of the artist.Yeah. Do you feel
radical in you'reown right from that
point of view?
Oh, that's interesting. Um, Imean, I would, it would be so
nice to say yes, it would be sonice and like, it would align
(34:45):
with what I believe outside ofoutside like if I was to
separate myself, from meengaging in my art, to say that
the film was radical would be inline with my belief system. But
if I was to Be 100% Honest, Ithink sometimes selfish
intention is the reason why Iwould create the art form that I
(35:07):
create. And then my hope issomehow somehow miraculously, in
me being honest through someform of selfish, selfish
intention. And that selfishintention being sometimes to
literally see myself representedon the page, or to archive my
very existence in a world that Ifeel constantly fearful about,
(35:28):
or in a world that I feelconstantly. Like I have no grasp
or control over in a world whereI feel my mortality. These are
somewhat all selfish reasons.But what my hope is that in
churning that out, we all existunder this thing called the
human condition. And the hope isthat people will do relate and
(35:50):
the hope is, then it can go onto have some sort of
transformative effect or somesort of community centric
effect. But I would like tothink it's radical. To be
totally honest, I think it ismore self induced, and I think
it is more sort of like anintrospective, intimate
(36:10):
relationship, you know?
Yeah, of course, we're talkingtoday in the horrifying context
of of a war of the war onUkraine. And yeah, the
existential threats, that war,the vulnerability that the world
(36:31):
is facing, you know, that gripof anxiety, and the horror of
the kind of paralysis we allhave around it as well, it's,
you know, something so such anatrocity can't just be stopped.
I wondered, even if you hadthoughts on that kind of global
(36:52):
scale around trauma, when wementioned trauma earlier, you
know, in the importance of beingable to express trauma, albeit
carefully so that there's nofurther damage. Can you even
begin to imagine how there'sgoing to be expressions of
(37:12):
trauma out of Ukraine alone, youknow, let alone Yemen, let alone
Afghanistan, let alone Syria,for example. And I just wondered
what your thoughts were, whenyou look at all of these men who
are being told to stay andfight, what your own anxieties
are around around their trauma.
(37:35):
You know, is it's horrifyingand, and it's, it's an exact
representation of where we arein the world right now. And I
honestly and wholeheartedly, donot have the level of wisdom and
understanding, to, to, toengage, hopefully, in that in
(37:59):
that conversation. Because Ithink I can only ever speak from
a level of privilege I have notengaged in any, I've not been
affected by immediately by anyform of war. I mean,
historically, and in my family,I have been affected by forms of
war and forms of racialoppression. But I can I can
(38:20):
definitely not speak on on sortof that, that level of trauma,
because I think, I think oftenin we manoeuver through society,
and we see, you know, we'reseeing a constant influx of, of
pain and murder and death. Andthough it is horrifying, I think
what it does, by not having thisproximity towards it, and not
(38:42):
having a true understanding ofit, and also not having, as I
said back to this capitalisttendency to not give us time to
actually process these things.What it truly does is create a
sense of numb. And I thinksometimes, in my case that
nomming is coming fromapproximate a distant proximity
to to war and death and witches,which is a sense of privilege.
(39:04):
So I truly cannot speak on it,you know, all that all I can say
is I know that it's horrifyingwhat is happening in in Ukraine.
It's also horrifying, the murderthat has been happening in
Palestine, the murder thathappens in Syria. And I think,
sadly, what what happens is wewe often as a western society,
(39:32):
and as a product of whitenessand racism in society, can so
easily distance ourselves fromthe murder that happens in
Syria, the murder that happensin Palestine, Afghanistan, but
we all of a sudden feelsomething so visceral about
what's happening in Ukraine aswe should, as we should feel,
(39:53):
what is happening, but I thinkit definitely makes a note of
our level of privilege and How?What speaks to us? You know? And
yeah, I, I personally do notbelieve in any form of war, I do
not believe in any form ofmilitary, I do not believe in. I
(40:14):
think the end result is alwaysmurder and death. And I think
the point is to always thinkabout well, how can we, how can
we support communities andindividuals and oppressed
peoples who are always impactedthe worst by these situations?
And yeah, I am far too, sort of my my privilege is far
(40:37):
too comfy for me to truly talkon the trauma that those people
are experiencing in real time,you know.
What you do, however, do in yourwork is talk very clearly about
compassion. But in terms ofcompassionate action, you know,
it's not just a point of view, Ithink it's interesting, where
(40:59):
you describe yourself, I'llquote, you as "a catalytic
converter, transforming externalworld toxins into poems of hope".
And I thought that was reallypowerful, because it's kind of
stating your purpose, you know,your poetic purposes,
compassionate, compassionateaction. How would you expand on
(41:22):
that?
You know, thank you so much forquoting that. So that's, that's
a line from from the book,Metamorphosis. And how
would I expand on that I thinkit very much is the axis to
everything, or the axis toeverything that we've been
speaking about, you know, thisidea that the world gives us
(41:42):
something, and if you have timeto process it, if you have the
mental space, and, and, youknow, the opportunity to process
it, what we can do is createsomething beautiful out of that
not only something beautifulthat other people can really
relate to, but something thatallows us to understand our
state of existence, and ourstate of struggle. So I'm very
(42:05):
much for thinking about how totake the scenic route with
language, thinking about how tobeautify what we have our pain
and, and adorn it in a way thatthat we can experience and have
joy out of it. You know,there's, there's the biblical
scripture, whatever, whatever the devil has made, for
bad, God will make for good, youknow, and to take that outside
(42:28):
of its sort of, like, biblicalcontext or the you know, it's
like its spiritual connotations.But to just put it into the
realm of art, as it relates tolife, whatever pain and whatever
trauma has been, has been forcedon towards, I believe art gives
us an opportunity to not onlyfind therapy in it, but also
(42:49):
find joy in it, you know, atsome point.
Yeah, yeah. And it's, it'sremaining mindful of that the
power of optimism and hope andjoy, to not only be defeated,
you know, by all the stressesand horrors of life, Otis, what,
(43:09):
what would you say, explains whya poem can speak, but we may not
talk to each other?
Wow, that's such an interestingquestion. Wow. So that's, that,
that really speaks to me. Ithink it's because I think
(43:30):
there's many reasons but I thinkone of the reasons is because
vulnerability, being core tothis question, I think, we
struggle to, we struggle to faceourselves and we see ourselves
in other people. And it's, it'salmost, it's almost sometimes
too much of a high volume ofourselves to experience, you
know, to look somebody in theface and experience their
(43:52):
humaneness. And do that withcompassion, with empathy, with
understanding, is sometimes fartoo overstimulating for our for
ourselves to sort of bearespecially when we're dealing
with our own insecurities,especially when we're dealing
with our own societal, I don'tknow, struggles and the systems
of oppression and trying tonavigate those, sometimes it's
(44:13):
so hard to see those and relateto those and other people, which
is sad, and it's a bit of acurse of the human existence.
But then I do believe that theart is a form of is a bridge in
that sense. And it allows us toput ourselves in the piece of
art in a way that maybe is alittle more digestible and maybe
speaks to something that's alittle more emotionally
(44:34):
universal, where we can see ourour fellow person in something
that we can understand, youknow, in something that we can
process in our own time. Somehowsomething, something of what
Jericho Brown, the incrediblepoet said comes to mind, and he
speaks about poetry. I'mparaphrasing of course, but he
(44:54):
speaks about poetry havingrelationship to beauty and in
the, like the aesthetic ofbeauty, and you know how he
would relate that to our, ourneed for trees on us, you know,
it's a relationship of beauty,we don't quite know why we need
trees, or why we need poetry.But if we didn't have them, we
(45:15):
would definitely notice it andsomething would be a lot more
bleak. So I find that I findwhat he said, they're so
beautiful. And it allows me tosort of resonate with this idea
that perhaps something doesn'talways have to be analyzed, or,
you know, sort of picked apartobjectively and logically, but
(45:38):
sometimes things can just speakto us emotionally, you know,
thinking about back to what wespoke about with the, the level
of language that we that weresonate to the emotional side
of language, the emotional faceto language, and thinking about
what transformative impact thatcan have on us, as opposed to
was always living in our head,you know, always, it always
(45:59):
coming from our head, whathappens if we were to allow it
to come from something a littlelower down, you know?
Yeah. I'm interested in yourexperience of becoming a poet
laureate and your experience ofmanaging that label, if you
(46:20):
like, it kind of makes youalmost like an official
spokesperson, or, or does itimpose anything that you didn't
expect? I just wondered whatkind of judgments you may have
dealt with?
Yeah, sure. I mean, when I, whenI was asked to do the role in
2018, it was it was a privilege.And it was also sort of like a
(46:45):
big, anxiety inducing idea aswell, because I was aware that
there was a responsibilitybehind it. And I was aware that
I was going to be askedquestions that I perhaps
sometimes wouldn't be prepared,wouldn't have been prepared to
answer, you know. And I thinkwith a role that has been
(47:06):
traditionally exercised underideas of elitism ideas of white
supremacy, it was always goingto be something radical to, for
me to be the poet laureate,especially with no literary
training, traditionally, noliterary training, given the
fact that I didn't come from,let's say, a classical or
(47:28):
traditional poetry background,my, my artistic influences from
the realm of music is from therealm of jazz, from the realm of
hip hop, from the realm ofspoken word and performance
poetry, which often gets snuffedby the elitist idea, you know,
when trying to exist in spacesof academia or spaces of more
(47:49):
traditional poetry. So I startedto learn that very quick, I
started to realize that that wasthe case. However, on the flip
side, it was very easy to ignorethat in the face of all the
beauty that the role broughtabout, you know, I got the
opportunity to speak to groupsof young people that I would
have never had the opportunityto, to talk about this beautiful
(48:09):
art form that I learned throughhip hop, this art form of
expression, this art form of rappoetry. And I think it was
meaningful to talk to peopleabout that and sort of let them
know what sort of transformativeeffect it had on me and sort of
see if there is grounds andspace for it to have that
transformative effect on them.You know, I've got to do things
(48:30):
like deliver my first publiclecture on hip hop philosophy
and poetry and, and I got todeliver my deliver seminars as
part of the the actualliterature curriculum at
Sheffield University and thingsof that nature. So yeah, the
beauty far outweighed thechallenges. Of but yeah, it was
(48:56):
always interesting for me to beasked sort of like, who are your
favorite poets and them alwayssort of expecting me to, I don't
know, say William Wordsworth forI remember, when I first when I
first became poet laureate,there was a there was some sort
of like sub article on theonline version, I think it was
in The Star of how, oh, thismentor is not a real poet like
(49:16):
William Wordsworth. And I alwaysfound that quite amusing.
Especially when in the face oflike, it'd be like one of my
favorite poets are Black Thought of The Roots and sort of seeing
people, you know, shake under,under the idea that this elitist
idea couldn't continue on, butalso shake under the idea that
(49:38):
perhaps they weren't the expert.Perhaps they had something to
learn perhaps there was a levelof curiosity there too, which is
always beautiful. It's alwaysbeautiful to shake people's
ideas about art and shakepeople's preconceived ideas
about the art that matters inour culture and in in our
(49:58):
personal lives, you know, So itwas an interesting journey.
Yeah, absolutely. And, and whenyou're facing those challenges,
you know, because you have a newlabel or a new definition or
identity, you know, of what youdo. When you feel fearful, how
do you manage it?
(50:20):
Yes. No, that's, that's a greatquestion. I think. I think to be
honest, when it comes to sharingmy art, I tend not to feel
fearful. And that can sound sortof egotistical, or it can even
sound as though it's coming froma place of deep courage. But
sometimes I don't think it is, Ithink sometimes it comes from a
(50:41):
place of naivety, you know, Iwas definitely raised in an art
form, that tells you that yourideas matter that your ideas
that as, as I spoke aboutbefore, that you have a unique
story to, to sort of share andsort of once you grasp the
feeling of that, even though theidea can be shaken by by, you
(51:04):
know, as artists, we compareourselves to other people and
our self esteem can often be onthe chopping block. So you know
what, but when that's not thecase, and when you do have this
form of unbridled self assurancein your story, as I think all of
us should do. Fear isn't afactor that that seeps into
(51:26):
sharing our you know, so I havean interesting relationship with
fear because I experienced feara lot. In my day to day life, I
experienced fear a lot. When itcomes to thinking about
mortality when it comes tothinking about choices when it
comes to thinking about societalexpectations, should I say, or
(51:47):
family, or, you know, any of theabove romance or any of the
above, I experienced so muchfear. And it's so beautiful to
me that art is this safe space,where actually fear is something
that that can't see its way inand sort of art and expression
is this imperishable or unbridled state of sort of,
(52:10):
sort of existence and sharing,you know?
Yeah. From that point of view,is the performance space, the
live performance space naturalto you? Or is that an act of
courage?
I would love to say it's an actof courage, but it is 100%
natural to me, I feel a littlemore closer to the person that I
(52:35):
am, when I'm performing onstage, I feel like I can truly
be myself. That's not to saythat there's not fabrication and
that's not to say that there'snot performance given that exists
on the stage. Butit just feels aligned with what
I have always conditioned myselfto believe is my purpose. You
know, so I think two thingsalign my my childhood teenage
(52:59):
self is saying, yes, you will,right. And, on the on the flip
side, I'm also getting somehealthy, some healthy dopamine
and some healthy, sort of seeingmy ideas represented in the
world and seeing them you know,you create in this sort of
introvert intimates space thatis often cut off from the rest
(53:22):
of the world or just your lifeas an artist, creating and
ongoing with your creativeendeavors, is sometimes
isolating. So to see your ideascome to life, as they pertain to
people and how people feel andpeople's emotions and actual,
tangible, non ineffable physicalcommunity is so, so joyous, and
(53:45):
it's so so meaningful. Sowhenever I get chances to
perform, it just feels right andfear doesn't get chance to sort
of niggle its way in.
Yeah, that's really interesting.It's a really interesting way of
being able to control fear isn'ttaking over. It does seem that
(54:06):
there's a role for encouragingcuriosity and courage in ways
that aren't asking too much, butto really inviting some sense of
freedom and some sense ofownership instead of what can
feel like capitalisticoppression a dumbing down or a
(54:28):
numbing, like you said earlier,you know, that starts to deprive
people from their own acts ofcuriosity and courage. Would you
say there's a case to almostencourage that to encourage
engaging in being curious andbeing courageous in ways that
which may be through art?
(54:51):
Yeah, I think, you know, I feellike that that's the, that's the
resonance of which I will Ivibrates best, you know, when we
can feel that our courage issort of pushing us into our, our
sense of purpose, or pushing usinto a space where we not only
feel comfortable, but go beyondfeeling comfortable, and we're
(55:13):
able to flourish. And what doesthat mean? That means that we're
able to emotionally acceptourselves, perhaps even able to
physically accept ourselves,despite societal, society's
voice always having something tosay about that. I think when we
can feel like that, we're in ourtrue, we're in our true skin,
(55:36):
and we're in our true sort ofpurpose for life, if you will.
And I'm a firm believer ofwhatever realm or vehicle that
that takes that that's okay. Youknow, I believe artists can
exist in any form and walk oflife. You know, an artist
doesn't always have to besomebody who creates the product
of art. But an artist can besomebody who injects their
(55:58):
artistry into their social work,who injects that artistry into
their therapy, who injects thatartistry into the way that they
engage with the community. Ithink there's so many things in
this, there's so many thingsthat we lack in the society. So
if you have found a way tocreate a solution for for the
(56:18):
huge, sort of boundless lackthat that this world gives us, I
think that's an art in and ofitself. And I think that's in
line with a humanistic andsoulful purpose.
Yeah, yeah. And purpose is soimportant. As you know, having a
clear purpose is so important.Yeah. Unbelievably, it is the
(56:44):
the hour flies by too fast. Butoh, there is a question I'd like
to I, it's amazing how fast itgoes, you'll have to be a guest
in every season. But um,something I would be interested
in, in closing on it in responseto the series, the question
(57:08):
that's posed, Can art save us? I'mreally interested in your
description of art, and I'llquote you "Pain gave birth to
art. Although they never did seeeye to eye arts cared only for
liberation from its predecessor."Yeah, I love that. And I just
(57:29):
wondered if you wanted to, youknow, for the listeners to talk
about, you know, what was inyour mind and what it is you're
saying?
Yeah, no, thank you so much forsharing that. So then then
again, that's another quotefrom, from the book Safe
Metamorphosis. And, you know, itwas speaking to this idea that
the artist always has to delveinto a cauldron or, or a puddle
(57:56):
or a well of pain in order tocreate something. And I thought
about that idea. And I thoughtabout how meaningful it is to
see our pain represented in away that I said, is sort of
beautified, but alsounderstandable that we can
relate to create a sense ofcommunity. But then I think
(58:17):
about the sort of negativeconnotations that that might
have, does that mean artistshave to exist under a constant
state of proximity to pain? Anda thought about? Well, no,
actually, it doesn't. Becauseour as the line says, art really
doesn't care too much about yourpain, it really only cares about
the transformation. It reallyonly cares about the
(58:37):
metamorphosis that can come fromit. And that's where art can
sort of save the world andchange the world. I don't
believe art for art's sake, cansave the world and change the
world. But I believe art'sability to have sort of
liberation from the pain that wego through, can really spark the
(58:58):
change in society that we need,you know, you know, I think
about any form of socialmovement that has existed, I
always say I dare you to findthe piece of art that wasn't
playing in the background thatwasn't fulfilling people with
the soul that they needed tokeep on going. And so in that
sense, yes, art, art has, has agreat need to sort of see itself
(59:23):
free from pain. And I think whatwe can do is we can learn from
that and inject that into oursocieties, into our communities,
and just into our own personallives.
Yeah, and then that's such abeautiful and important
sentiment and statement really,again, when we're in a war
(59:43):
context, unbelievably, you knowthe issue of pain. Otis,
I can't thank you enough foryour time and your generosity of
your time today. We'll make surethat listeners know where to find you
in the text to the podcastseries. Just to close, are there
(01:00:05):
any any final words you'd liketo share in terms of whoever is
going to be listening, whetherit's words of hope, or just a
sentiment that you'd like peopleto take away from listening to
this podcast today.
Um, I guess something thatresonates with me is, is this
(01:00:32):
idea that, that we shouldn'tlet ourselves be confined by
by rules and, and sort ofwhatever it is that you're
trying to engage in, in whateverart form that you see yourself
being freed by or freed insideof participating in, don't let
yourself be stifled by the rulesof that art form, or the
traditions of that art form.Whether that's literary modes,
(01:00:56):
whether that's conventions, andagain, I think, understanding
that we have such a deep senseof purpose within within us,
that doesn't always have to besort of represented logically,
but sometimes can have soulfuland emotional meaning and power.
And sometimes that's completelyenough, you know, so that
(01:01:19):
everybody's story matters thateverybody has something to
share. And that we can sharethat our own volition in our own
time, using our own forms ofcommunication and our own forms
of art. And that's meaningfulenough.
Thank you. Thank you so much,Otis, and I am very much looking
(01:01:40):
forward to the next book ofpoems and following your work.
Thank you again.
Thank you so much.
Welcome to this podcast seriesasking the question Can art save
us? I'm starting the firstnational and international
conversation about courage andcuriosity. What do these
qualities really mean? And whydoes it make a big difference to
our mental, societal anddemocratic health? I talk to
award winning and diverseartists across the arts to
(00:21):
explore these qualities in theirlives and work, both to inspire
and for us all to learn. I'mexploring why we need these
qualities to help change theglobal epidemic of mental
illness, loneliness,polarization of our communities,
and even global conflict. If thearts cultivate courage and
curiosity, I'm asking thequestion Can art save us?
(00:50):
And my guest this week is OtisMensah. He's the first hip hop
poet to be awarded a poetlaureate title in the UK by the
City of Sheffield. He has hadnumerous commissions and his
live performances include theGlastonbury Music Festival. Otis
describes his poetry as breakingdown barriers, smashing the
stuffy stereotype and remindingpeople that poetry is meant to
(01:12):
be for the people. He could alsobe described as the most
courageously vulnerable artistof the 21st century. Hello,
Otis, and welcome.
Hi, thank you so much for havingme and for the intro.
You're very welcome. It's justbeen phenomenal reading your
(01:33):
work your poetry, looking atyour performances. It's it's
quite astonishing, actually, thebreadth and wealth of your work
already. What I was interestedin, just to begin with is when
you discovered your love forpoetic vulnerability where this
all began?
(01:54):
Yeah, sure. So I think thejourney really began for me as a
teenager, I was looking for somesort of expressionistic outlet,
sort of dealing with theexistential angst that you do as
a teenager. And sort of quarreland wrestles with identity. And
(02:14):
I think wanting to sort of growinto my own skin and understand
what it was that I wasinterested in, want, wanted to
understand what art spoke forme. And what what I gravitated
towards, naturally as a sort ofintuition, I guess, visceral
based thing. And I started to, Idon't know, experiment, I
(02:36):
started to write raps with, withfriends in the school yard. And
it was very fun, it was veryuseful. It felt meaningful. But
I did notice that I believe Iwas injecting my own sort of
insecurities into my art form,especially as it surrounded my
peers. And I guess what I saw atthe time as sort of like, a
(02:57):
shield of pretense sort ofcontinued. And I realized that
what I needed in terms of beingable to express myself freely
and I guess, to sort of liftedthe burden of, of whatever it
was that I was going through, Ineeded some form of honesty,
some form of radical honesty,and I might not have had the
words in the canon to verbalizethat at the time. But I think me
(03:21):
falling in love with hip hopmusic and hip hop poetry, really
spoke volumes for saying thatthat's what I needed. And I got
into hip hop artists like TheRoots. I got into hip hop
artists like Kid Curry, whonotoriously spoke openly about
depression and anxiety, andperhaps feeling a little like a
(03:44):
social pariah amongst theirpeers, especially in a landscape
that could be especially in alandscape that didn't really
allowed him to do that. I thinka lot of his peers weren't
really, I guess, engaging inthat level of vulnerability that
he was. So that sort of stoodout as a testament for me and,
(04:05):
and sort of allowed me to seethat, oh, you can, it can be
cool to be honest and open andvulnerable. And not only can it
be cool, but it can also have aradical impact on your on your
own mental health and on yourown artistry, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. It's reallyinteresting, how we can change
(04:26):
meanings. So takingvulnerability as an example. You
know, when actually it'srelationship is so connected to
courage. But there are problemsaround identity, particularly, I
think, with the model ofmasculinity, where courage is
always around bravery and notexpressing emotions, because
(04:50):
that would be a sign ofweakness, for example. So what
kinds of identity tensions Doyou think you were struggling
with? What You were growing up?Um,
what kind of identity attention?So that's a big existential
question. I think, yeah. Yeah,there was a lot of tensions
(05:14):
around sort of not being caughtnot feeling comfortable in my
own skin. I think I wasnaturally an introvert in
perhaps a world that tells you,you know, introversion is weird,
or, you know, it's like, it'snot the normal thing to do. I
(05:34):
think I also had a slightlydifferent, I guess, passions,
some slightly different passionsthan the people around me. I
think a lot of my passionsbecame hyper specific. So when I
found something that I love,like hip hop music, I focus
really into it. And sometimesthat can make it hard to to sort
(05:57):
of step outside of that andrelate on a social level. I
think also, my naturalinclination was to sort of
isolate myself and I guess be bemore creative on my own, as
opposed to engaging in sort of,like typical social settings. So
I think that there on thesurface definitely created some
sort of, I don't know, socialtension, or sort of some sort of
(06:23):
otherness. And then, of course,you know, like, growing up as a
black mixed race person in, inthe UK, I was wrestling with,
with racialization and othering.And, and all that sort of mixed
in a pot together. Where Hip Hopreally did allow me to find
(06:44):
solace in that hip hop reallygave me a language to sort of
understand my own state ofexistence. So yeah, yeah, I
think I think that thattransitional point, as a
teenager into early adulthood,was really impactful for me as I
started to discover the art anddelve into it in more depth.
(07:06):
And was that the shift fromwhere you talk about feeling
like an outcast?
Yeah, I mean, you know, what Ithink perhaps happened is that
it took a lot of the tension ofhaving an art form that I could
relate to took a lot of thetension off that which not only
(07:29):
meant that I could sort of likeI said, have a have a language
and a canon to understand what wasgoing on around me politically,
socially. And what I feltpolitically and socially, even,
even on a surface level, eventhough it was the, the sowing of
those seeds, perhaps not indepth, but not only did Hip Hop
(07:51):
do that for me, but it alsoallowed me to understand that it
wasn't. So it wasn't sopeculiar, that I was interested
in the things that I wasinterested in that I was that I
felt the way that I felt. Andperhaps there was reasons,
societal reasons to why I feltlike that. So and I think, I
think what it what it made me dois feel less so like an outcast
(08:14):
in the end, and maybe made mefeel like I had a sense of
community that perhaps wasn'tbound by by geography, and the
social geography, but perhapswas bound by something a little
more metaphysical. And somethingthat could sort of like trans
transcend borders, as I startedto engage with all across the
globe, across Europe, across theinternet. And yeah, it made me
(08:38):
feel less alone. So in turn, itallowed me to function better
with my, my peers, it allowed meto function better in, in, in
school, which is why often Iadvocate for poetry as a form of
thing as a form of engagementthat can sort of, you know, help
towards a flourishing ofemotional intelligence and a
(09:01):
flourishing I guess, emotionalunderstanding of oneself and,
and once society and sociallandscape just because I think
it gives us a second to underunderstand to, I guess, value
ourselves and our and ourthoughts as individuals in a way
that society doesn't really giveus a chance to, you know,
(09:23):
everything is so fast in thissort of capitalist haze is that we
never really get a second toprocess emotions. So when poetry
allows for that space, I think alot of sort of metamorphosis can
begin.
Yeah, because I've seen thatyou've also described yourself
as "an advocate of patience andsifting through the noise" does
(09:46):
that relate to the kind ofmessage you're getting across.
Yeah, I think I think that'sthat's, that's very much what
what I intended to touch on it'sthis idea that capitalism It
just doesn't really allow forthat our, our state of existence
in this world that we're inright now, just doesn't really
(10:06):
allow for us to processemotions, it doesn't really
allow for us to maybe even sitwith sit with our, our traumas
or you know, it's like thingsthat I have grown to call
everyday traumas. And the reasonI call them everyday traumas is
because society forces us tosort of skip past them so, so
quickly and so. So hurryhurriedly. So I think art allows
(10:32):
for a space for us to recognizethat and perhaps start to think
about, well, what impact didsocieties societies voice have a
sort of what what impact didsociety's voice have on my
psyche? On my emotional wellbeing? And how is that impacted
my life? And how can I changethat? If I want to change that?
(10:54):
Or how can I just grow tounderstand it? You know?
Yeah, I think what you callunadulterated honesty,nseems
to be really core to, to how youwrite, and you're quite
prepared, it seems to have thatexposure, which is an act of
(11:15):
bravery. Because that's a hardthing to do, isn't it?
Yeah, it's definitely a hardthing to do, I think I'm perhaps
lucky in the sense that the artform that I fell in love with
naturally pushed me to be to beas open as possible naturally
(11:36):
pushed me to be as vulnerable aspossible, because it was about
sharing your unique experienceof the world, you know, and, and
I think what what happens is,when we do I don't know what
what I like to call, I don'tknow, some sort of introspective
excavation, or some sort of deepdive within what we find is our
(11:57):
true, unique experience of theworld and of perception and
reality. Not to say that, Idon't think it doesn't have its
dangers, you know, I think, youknow, sometimes it can be, it
can be way more valid, and waymore sort of wise to, to go into
(12:19):
those deep, vulnerable feelingsin your own time, whilst not
pushing them to create aproduct, whether that's a piece
of poetry for art's sake, orwhether it's from, you know,
from societal pressure to do so.But I think it's about what
feels right to you andnurturing, nurturing the best
(12:39):
way that you can feel open andvulnerable and honest with
yourself and not feelpressurized? You know?
Yeah, because when you talkabout that deep dive, that
process, if you like, of selfreflection, sometimes it's
talked about, you know, inmindfulness practice, but that,
that chance you have that deepdive is also a chance, just to
(13:03):
simply be curious. And even thatact of curiosity is is healthy,
did you find that? Yourcuriosity of words is immense.
So did you find that you kind ofallowed yourself to be in that
space? It was therapeutic insome way?
(13:24):
Yeah, that's such a greatquestion. I mean, I believe my
my curiosity for language is,it's an interesting one. It's
paradoxical, and it's full ofnuance. I grew up in a very
faith based background, I grewup in the church, and I grew up
having to read the Bible, and orhaving the Bible, biblical
(13:47):
scripture, scripture read to me.And what that does, in a way is
give somebody who was younger,who perhaps doesn't have a grasp
of certain metaphorical imageryor certain vocabulary, it puts
it puts the vocabulary in theirface, and, and it shows them
that there is an emotionalimpact to the language without
(14:08):
there having to always be alogical, theoretical impact. You
know, I think about like thechurch setting when something is
said that perhaps I didn't havelogical grasp on in terms of its
vocabulary, I still noticed thatthere was an emotional impact of
it. And I think that was thesame for the congregation. If
the pastor was to read abiblical scripture, that felt
(14:31):
right, that rolled off thetongue, right. That I think the
the understanding and the deepermessage of what is being said
under the words, reaches on on aon a more sort of vibrational
emotional level, even if thelanguage doesn't quite reached
our level of understanding and Ithink that somewhat allows for
(14:53):
deeper understandings oflanguage to take language and
think well, how can we breakthis apart and look at it deeper
into deeper beyond its surfacesort of thing. And I think that
that taught me really early onto engage in poetry. You know,
it's like, I think it taught me,like an ease with language where
I didn't have to obsess over. AmI using the right literary
(15:16):
form? Does this word mean thisis this being used in the right
context, because I think oftengoing into an art form with that
kind of mindset around languagecan sort of stifle us and, and
put us in a box way too early.And I am also very, very
dyslexic. So I think naturally,my tendency is to take a word,
(15:40):
and, you know, miss, misuse it.And I think sometimes that can
be a beautiful thing, becausesometimes it allows you to
understand something thatperhaps you wanted to say that
you didn't, you didn't know, youknow, and then perhaps sometimes
allows you to get a way moreplayful grasp of language. So
(16:01):
yeah, my relationship tolanguage has definitely been
somewhat therapeutic. And it'sdefinitely definitely been an
emotional relationship, ratherthan a logical relationship.
Yeah, and that seems to describea really important relationship
around freedom, freeing uplanguage. So we talk about
(16:24):
breaking barriers, don't we, societal barriers, whether it's,
you know, race, identity, sex,there are far too many barriers
that that each of us can face.But it's interesting when you
start to actually consider thebarriers and confines of
language. And your reflection onthat. Yeah, your reflection on
(16:45):
that is really sending out animportant message.
I mean, I think it's so truewhat you say, because I think, I
don't know systems of power andoppression that exist within,
within our society often rely onlanguage to keep us confined.
You know, when when you look atthe, the words that have come
(17:08):
about from, from capitalism,from, from systems of power in
this society in this world, wesee that the language that has
been that has been sort of thatwe've been conditioned to engage
in or believe over time, is verymuch sort of like the pillars
(17:29):
that hold those systems of powerin place, amongst many other
things, of course, but I thinkyou're right, in pointing out
the language is definitely acore element and sort of player
in that sort of, in that powerstruggle, you know, so and I
think, often you'll see thatwhen when we start to have
discussions as as a communityabout breaking down, or you're
(17:51):
speaking against certain systemsof oppression, I think often
people have an issue withlanguage. And that always seems
to be a cause for contention. Soit's definitely something that
we need to think about. And I think, maybe think about ways
that we can, that we can get ridof that we can drop our
(18:11):
attachment to language, becauseI think sometimes we have
unhealthy attachment to wordsthat perhaps can just, you know,
stifle us further.
Yeah, I think that's reallysignificant because you can
easily see language as ahierarchy as well, there can be
academic elitism, for example,you know, that can inhibit other
(18:34):
people. Hence, you know, howinteresting it is that in many
ways, you're kind ofrevolutionising the hip hop
space in terms of poetry?Because, of course, it's so easy
for people to leap to thestereotypes of gangsta rap and
violence. Yeah. But actually,you might argue that it always
was a space for poetry andtherapy? Yeah, so,
(18:58):
so beautiful that you say that,because I think you're right,
this is usually the racist sortof narrative that that, that
gives birth to itself from thesociety that you know, like hip
hop, or let's say, this art formthat comes from black people, is
something that is violent, oruncivilized, or, you know,
something that is overlyconcerned with, with materialism
(19:23):
and material wealth, and and Ithink the issue is that there is
a version of the art form thatgets played out, and that gets
sort of like, pushed to thecenter. And I believe that's
very much because we live in acapitalist society that also
speaks to these themes ofmaterial wealth that speaks to
(19:43):
these themes of that speaks tothese themes of, I guess,
oppressive systems of power. Butwhen you, you're right, when you
look way deeper into theculture, and it doesn't even
take much digging to realize,you see that the very core
foundations of hip hop Were tode escalate, systems of white
(20:04):
supremacy de escalate systems ofracism, de escalate, and not not
only de escalate, but combatthese systems of power, right at
the core on a community level,they're very radical and the
very emotional, the birth of hiphop came from this idea of the
safe space to house party waswas very much a setting where
hip hop culture was born from,and you would have people put it
(20:27):
putting cardboard onto the floorof people dancing as a means to
get out there, there as a meansto express themselves. But and
what that did in turn was notonly create a safe space for
emotional flourishing forexpression, but it also meant
that in a society where, wherethere's lots of poverty, where
there's lots of corruption,where there's the pressure of a
(20:50):
racist, sort of like governmentand society coming down in on
the community, it meant thatthis is a place where we can get
our anger, you know, this is aplace that where we can, where
we can speak about our justifiedanger against society. This is a
this is a place where we have avoice where we have a platform.
So that's really at the core ofhip hop. And I believe that's
(21:11):
why it is so radicallyvulnerable and honest, when you
look at the core of the culturein the office, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. And thatvulnerability, of course, is is
often expressions of realcourage to do that. I don't know
if you have necessarily seen thedocumentary series of the hip
(21:33):
hop series that looks at theSongs that Shook America? And
it's really, it's reallypowerful... I think
you might see that on a BBCiPlayer catch up. I think
it would be of interest to you because it identifies six songs
and it's from the point of viewthat it is shifting from
(21:55):
stereotypes of hardcore gangsterrap, and and it's almost like
violence for violence sake andit's much more in the territory
of the purpose of what all ofthe hip hop artists were doing.
And they were changing barriers.So even if you went into the
90s, in terms ofmainstream awareness,
(22:16):
Run DMC and Aerosmith, Walk thisWay, would have been a real kind
of mainstream hit for a lot ofpeople that wouldn't have really
been engaging with hip hop. Andof course, what they did was
really powerful, because theywere bringing black and white
audiences together, which iscrazy, that we still have to
even reference that because, youknow, that's what Dean Martin
(22:37):
and Sammy Davis Jr. Were doingand Frank Sinatra, you know, but
even now, we're relying on musicand in these examples, hip hop
culture to do that.
Yeah, I will definitelycheck that out. Yeah, yeah, that
sounds really interesting. Yeah,I'll definitely give that a
watch.
Yeah, because I think it's justa reminder that artists don't
(23:04):
necessarily have the luxury ofcreating their art, it's very
much about in being in an arenaof struggle. It's hard for
any artists, you know, it's hardfor any artists to get signed or
get a record deal. So of course, it's coming from barriers of
discrimination anyway, I justthink it really highlights that
(23:25):
our is so often an arena ofstruggle.
Yeah. And I think just to sortof like reiterate, to go back to
that point, I also do not have aproblem with with, let's say,
quote, unquote, gangsta rap orquote, unquote, like any, any
rap that plays to thisstereotype that we spoke about,
(23:49):
because I believe that it'strue, cool, you can sort of see
the story is being told. And so,you know, it's like, when people
are speaking from the realm ofexperience, I think that there's
nothing more sort of like,valuable than that. And I think,
I think that's how we've grownto understand like many
(24:09):
different experiences of manydifferent people's, you know, is
by engaging with they are, Ithink what my issue is, is when
you have outer groups, peoplewho are outside of the
community, let's namely, like inhistorical senses, in terms of
hip hop, sort of like whiterecord, label owners come in and
say, Well, this is themarketable idea of what we need
(24:33):
to represent of the culture.This is the thing that we are
going to congratulate more thananything else. And this is the
thing that we're going to give aplatform to rather than anything
else, I think that that thenbecomes an issue because it
becomes well who is in controlof the narrative here. And then
what sort of sort of racism isallowed to be injected into the
projection of the culture. Andas how society perceives
(24:56):
it, you know, so yeah, I thinkit's all about who is in control
of the narrative. And that'swhen it gets a little shady.
When you look at thingshistorically, you start to see
the record companies would swoopin, you know, offer somebody
units like $100,000, orsomething of that nature, and
then create a golden standard ofwhat should be created and what
should be projected in order togain some sort of financial
(25:19):
success. Which of which, ofcourse, is manipulation and a
form of cultural violence, youknow?
Yeah, so branding is part of a control problem, isn't it that
that power is marketing. And Ithink that's probably an even
heavier burden on artists,because even with that awareness
(25:41):
in mind, it's another set ofbarriers, isn't it? It's
another, it's another David andGoliath battle. Have you managed
the sense of branding aroundyourself for your own work?
That's interesting, it's not reallysomething that I, I give too
much thought to. Especially ifwe go back to this idea of
(26:06):
honesty and vulnerability, Iguess that becomes your guiding
principle in a way. And not onlyhonesty, just in sort of, like
literary expression, buthonestly, in sort of what feels
right, musically, what feelsright, in terms of the choices
you make within the community,what you know what, like what
(26:26):
feels right. And that's also wasa, that's also a constant
battle, because you're caught inthis system that we live in,
we're constantly having to weighup what feels right, versus what
is going to allow us to earnsome sort of financial
compensation for the work thatwe do, you know, and sometimes
those two things don't alwaysfit together. It's beautiful
when they do when they'reharmonious, and you can do what
(26:48):
feels right, and it earns youmoney. But many times, that's
not the case. So it's aconstant it's a constant battle
to like it's a constantmoralistic and ethical battle in
a way. And sometimes you justhave to let your your gut guide
you and sort of your intuitionguide you there, you know.
Yeah, absolutely. I wanted tosee if you knew the work of a
(27:12):
research Professor Brene Brown,because she became like a viral
hit on TED talks, you may havecome across her work. If not I
think it will interestyou because she's done a
massive study, where she talksabout the courage to be
vulnerable. And you talk aboutthe power of vulnerable
(27:34):
expression. And I think there'slots and lots of synergies
there. And she describesvulnerability as our most
accurate measurement of courage.And I wondered what your
thoughts were on that.
Yeah, that's so interesting.Yeah, I mean, to an extent I
(28:00):
agree with them. Like, I thinkthat vulnerability is definitely
a, I guess, a more sort ofobjective way of measuring
courage, because you can sort ofsay, well, this person put
themselves in the sort ofposition to be exposed, whether
that's exposing an insecurity,whether that's sort of, you
(28:23):
know, exposing themselves bysharing an art form that is that
is difficult or engaging with anart form that is difficult. But
I think, yeah, what that does,it does create a sense of
community and it does reallysort of like unite people. And I
think that's, that's why I fellin love with the art form that I
did is because in let's say, KidCurry being open about his
depression, about feelingoutcast, it created a point of
(28:46):
relation, I didn't feel so alonein those in those situations,
but it took his courage to dothat. Then there's, there's a
dichotomy sort of inside of methat says, whilst vulnerability
can be a form of courage, it canalso be very performative. And
there's, there's, we see thishistorically. And we see this in
(29:06):
our current landscape thatcapitalism has has a sneaky way
of injecting itself into anysort of radical, I guess,
radical activity. And I thinkcapitalism has a way of doing
that with vulnerability where itbecomes about how honest and how
open can you be in order tomarket yourself as such, you
(29:28):
know, and it's like, you havebrands of latching on to the
idea of vulnerability in orderfor them to sell a product. And
I think we see this with withconcepts of like self care, for
example, you know, self carebeing somewhat something
radical, and as we said, in aconstant rush of things, it can
be so meaningful to take thatmoment of self care if if what
(29:50):
that moment means is giving timefor your emotional flourishing,
for giving time for whatever itis you truly need. However, what
we see is we see sort of brandsbeing like, take time to eat
Your favorite brand of ice creamor you know, take some time to
go shopping at the Gucci store,for example. So capitalism has a
sneaky way of usurping theseradical ideas. And I also am
(30:15):
aware that there's, there's aparadox in vulnerability,
being honest and vulnerable,sometimes it can be unwise, and
it can be unhealthy, it can behurtful, you know, if we push
people to be vulnerable at thewrong time, we can perhaps
disturb traumas that weren'tready to be disturbed, that
weren't ready to sort of beexplored, or perhaps in a
landscape or a space that wasn'tsafe for those things to be
(30:39):
exposed. So I think it is verymuch down to the individual's
volition and sort of using theguiding principle for that. And,
and also, I think sometimes,people who have been the most
courageous, perhaps don't havethe luxury of being the most
vulnerable sometimes, you know,people who have been through
traumatic events who havesurvived unimaginable things,
(31:02):
you know, I think about, I thinkabout some of my family heritage
heritage, and some of my familythat escaped Nazi Germany and
sort of survived the Holocaust.And I think, like that was
already such a mountainous thingto survive, that perhaps being
vulnerable about it and speakingopenly about it would be would
(31:27):
be tremendously difficult to tobring up all that trauma
straight away, you know, so Ithink it's, I think, sometimes
we've, we have exercisedthat courage to the, to the
maximum, and we need, then asafe space at some point to talk
about it. But sometimesvulnerability in in the moment
isn't always the isn't alwaysthe best option, you know.
(31:52):
Yeah. And because also, it'sremoving a relationship that can
arrive with shame, you know, ifyou feel vulnerable, and you
associate that to being weak,and then you feel ashamed, which
none of none of which isjustified. But unfortunately,
it's so often the connectionsthat are made, it's indeed being
(32:12):
very careful, whether it's yourown self reflection, or in a
therapy type relationship, thatas you approach vulnerability,
you're not inviting in shame.The mind is too good at
automatic negative thinking, andprejudiced, habitual thinking.
(32:33):
And I think what your poetry isdoing is literally smashing
those barriers of language. Aswe mentioned earlier, you're
you're inviting people to thinkagain, about their own thoughts.
Thank you so much. Yeah, just anadditional thought on that, I
think. Sometimes it's atremendous privilege to to be
(32:55):
vulnerable in an artistic sense,you know, sometimes, I believe
it's, it's, it's privileged,that also allows for that, you
know, and, and when I say that,I mean, to be vulnerable, in
this artistic sense, sometimesrequires space for reflection,
and space for philosophy. And,and if you're in a place in
(33:19):
society, where you areconstantly having to work, where
you're constantly having toexercise all your emotional,
physical energy, just to merelysurvive, then this idea of
autistic vulnerability becomesvery much a sort of privilege.
And and something that noteverybody can can exercise the
time for, you know?
(33:41):
Oh, absolutely. I think that isreally, really significant. And
it's one of the factors that'sproblematic in terms of how the
art suffers from elitism.Because, yeah, there's a lot of
privilege in order to be able tobe an artist, unless, of course,
(34:02):
you are in that, that space ofsuch deep exposure, that risk is
what you know, anyway, it's kindof one extreme or the other. No,
I think, I think it really doesremind you that art is very much
(34:23):
a radical act, dependingparticularly on the
circumstances of the artist.Yeah. Do you feel
radical in you'reown right from that
point of view?
Oh, that's interesting. Um, Imean, I would, it would be so
nice to say yes, it would be sonice and like, it would align
(34:45):
with what I believe outside ofoutside like if I was to
separate myself, from meengaging in my art, to say that
the film was radical would be inline with my belief system. But
if I was to Be 100% Honest, Ithink sometimes selfish
intention is the reason why Iwould create the art form that I
(35:07):
create. And then my hope issomehow somehow miraculously, in
me being honest through someform of selfish, selfish
intention. And that selfishintention being sometimes to
literally see myself representedon the page, or to archive my
very existence in a world that Ifeel constantly fearful about,
(35:28):
or in a world that I feelconstantly. Like I have no grasp
or control over in a world whereI feel my mortality. These are
somewhat all selfish reasons.But what my hope is that in
churning that out, we all existunder this thing called the
human condition. And the hope isthat people will do relate and
(35:50):
the hope is, then it can go onto have some sort of
transformative effect or somesort of community centric
effect. But I would like tothink it's radical. To be
totally honest, I think it ismore self induced, and I think
it is more sort of like anintrospective, intimate
(36:10):
relationship, you know?
Yeah, of course, we're talkingtoday in the horrifying context
of of a war of the war onUkraine. And yeah, the
existential threats, that war,the vulnerability that the world
(36:31):
is facing, you know, that gripof anxiety, and the horror of
the kind of paralysis we allhave around it as well, it's,
you know, something so such anatrocity can't just be stopped.
I wondered, even if you hadthoughts on that kind of global
(36:52):
scale around trauma, when wementioned trauma earlier, you
know, in the importance of beingable to express trauma, albeit
carefully so that there's nofurther damage. Can you even
begin to imagine how there'sgoing to be expressions of
(37:12):
trauma out of Ukraine alone, youknow, let alone Yemen, let alone
Afghanistan, let alone Syria,for example. And I just wondered
what your thoughts were, whenyou look at all of these men who
are being told to stay andfight, what your own anxieties
are around around their trauma.
(37:35):
You know, is it's horrifyingand, and it's, it's an exact
representation of where we arein the world right now. And I
honestly and wholeheartedly, donot have the level of wisdom and
understanding, to, to, toengage, hopefully, in that in
(37:59):
that conversation. Because Ithink I can only ever speak from
a level of privilege I have notengaged in any, I've not been
affected by immediately by anyform of war. I mean,
historically, and in my family,I have been affected by forms of
war and forms of racialoppression. But I can I can
(38:20):
definitely not speak on on sortof that, that level of trauma,
because I think, I think oftenin we manoeuver through society,
and we see, you know, we'reseeing a constant influx of, of
pain and murder and death. Andthough it is horrifying, I think
what it does, by not having thisproximity towards it, and not
(38:42):
having a true understanding ofit, and also not having, as I
said back to this capitalisttendency to not give us time to
actually process these things.What it truly does is create a
sense of numb. And I thinksometimes, in my case that
nomming is coming fromapproximate a distant proximity
to to war and death and witches,which is a sense of privilege.
(39:04):
So I truly cannot speak on it,you know, all that all I can say
is I know that it's horrifyingwhat is happening in in Ukraine.
It's also horrifying, the murderthat has been happening in
Palestine, the murder thathappens in Syria. And I think,
sadly, what what happens is wewe often as a western society,
(39:32):
and as a product of whitenessand racism in society, can so
easily distance ourselves fromthe murder that happens in
Syria, the murder that happensin Palestine, Afghanistan, but
we all of a sudden feelsomething so visceral about
what's happening in Ukraine aswe should, as we should feel,
(39:53):
what is happening, but I thinkit definitely makes a note of
our level of privilege and How?What speaks to us? You know? And
yeah, I, I personally do notbelieve in any form of war, I do
not believe in any form ofmilitary, I do not believe in. I
(40:14):
think the end result is alwaysmurder and death. And I think
the point is to always thinkabout well, how can we, how can
we support communities andindividuals and oppressed
peoples who are always impactedthe worst by these situations?
And yeah, I am far too, sort of my my privilege is far
(40:37):
too comfy for me to truly talkon the trauma that those people
are experiencing in real time,you know.
What you do, however, do in yourwork is talk very clearly about
compassion. But in terms ofcompassionate action, you know,
it's not just a point of view, Ithink it's interesting, where
(40:59):
you describe yourself, I'llquote, you as "a catalytic
converter, transforming externalworld toxins into poems of hope".
And I thought that was reallypowerful, because it's kind of
stating your purpose, you know,your poetic purposes,
compassionate, compassionateaction. How would you expand on
(41:22):
that?
You know, thank you so much forquoting that. So that's, that's
a line from from the book,Metamorphosis. And how
would I expand on that I thinkit very much is the axis to
everything, or the axis toeverything that we've been
speaking about, you know, thisidea that the world gives us
(41:42):
something, and if you have timeto process it, if you have the
mental space, and, and, youknow, the opportunity to process
it, what we can do is createsomething beautiful out of that
not only something beautifulthat other people can really
relate to, but something thatallows us to understand our
state of existence, and ourstate of struggle. So I'm very
(42:05):
much for thinking about how totake the scenic route with
language, thinking about how tobeautify what we have our pain
and, and adorn it in a way thatthat we can experience and have
joy out of it. You know,there's, there's the biblical
scripture, whatever, whatever the devil has made, for
bad, God will make for good, youknow, and to take that outside
(42:28):
of its sort of, like, biblicalcontext or the you know, it's
like its spiritual connotations.But to just put it into the
realm of art, as it relates tolife, whatever pain and whatever
trauma has been, has been forcedon towards, I believe art gives
us an opportunity to not onlyfind therapy in it, but also
(42:49):
find joy in it, you know, atsome point.
Yeah, yeah. And it's, it'sremaining mindful of that the
power of optimism and hope andjoy, to not only be defeated,
you know, by all the stressesand horrors of life, Otis, what,
(43:09):
what would you say, explains whya poem can speak, but we may not
talk to each other?
Wow, that's such an interestingquestion. Wow. So that's, that,
that really speaks to me. Ithink it's because I think
(43:30):
there's many reasons but I thinkone of the reasons is because
vulnerability, being core tothis question, I think, we
struggle to, we struggle to faceourselves and we see ourselves
in other people. And it's, it'salmost, it's almost sometimes
too much of a high volume ofourselves to experience, you
know, to look somebody in theface and experience their
(43:52):
humaneness. And do that withcompassion, with empathy, with
understanding, is sometimes fartoo overstimulating for our for
ourselves to sort of bearespecially when we're dealing
with our own insecurities,especially when we're dealing
with our own societal, I don'tknow, struggles and the systems
of oppression and trying tonavigate those, sometimes it's
(44:13):
so hard to see those and relateto those and other people, which
is sad, and it's a bit of acurse of the human existence.
But then I do believe that theart is a form of is a bridge in
that sense. And it allows us toput ourselves in the piece of
art in a way that maybe is alittle more digestible and maybe
speaks to something that's alittle more emotionally
(44:34):
universal, where we can see ourour fellow person in something
that we can understand, youknow, in something that we can
process in our own time. Somehowsomething, something of what
Jericho Brown, the incrediblepoet said comes to mind, and he
speaks about poetry. I'mparaphrasing of course, but he
(44:54):
speaks about poetry havingrelationship to beauty and in
the, like the aesthetic ofbeauty, and you know how he
would relate that to our, ourneed for trees on us, you know,
it's a relationship of beauty,we don't quite know why we need
trees, or why we need poetry.But if we didn't have them, we
(45:15):
would definitely notice it andsomething would be a lot more
bleak. So I find that I findwhat he said, they're so
beautiful. And it allows me tosort of resonate with this idea
that perhaps something doesn'talways have to be analyzed, or,
you know, sort of picked apartobjectively and logically, but
(45:38):
sometimes things can just speakto us emotionally, you know,
thinking about back to what wespoke about with the, the level
of language that we that weresonate to the emotional side
of language, the emotional faceto language, and thinking about
what transformative impact thatcan have on us, as opposed to
was always living in our head,you know, always, it always
(45:59):
coming from our head, whathappens if we were to allow it
to come from something a littlelower down, you know?
Yeah. I'm interested in yourexperience of becoming a poet
laureate and your experience ofmanaging that label, if you
(46:20):
like, it kind of makes youalmost like an official
spokesperson, or, or does itimpose anything that you didn't
expect? I just wondered whatkind of judgments you may have
dealt with?
Yeah, sure. I mean, when I, whenI was asked to do the role in
2018, it was it was a privilege.And it was also sort of like a
(46:45):
big, anxiety inducing idea aswell, because I was aware that
there was a responsibilitybehind it. And I was aware that
I was going to be askedquestions that I perhaps
sometimes wouldn't be prepared,wouldn't have been prepared to
answer, you know. And I thinkwith a role that has been
(47:06):
traditionally exercised underideas of elitism ideas of white
supremacy, it was always goingto be something radical to, for
me to be the poet laureate,especially with no literary
training, traditionally, noliterary training, given the
fact that I didn't come from,let's say, a classical or
(47:28):
traditional poetry background,my, my artistic influences from
the realm of music is from therealm of jazz, from the realm of
hip hop, from the realm ofspoken word and performance
poetry, which often gets snuffedby the elitist idea, you know,
when trying to exist in spacesof academia or spaces of more
(47:49):
traditional poetry. So I startedto learn that very quick, I
started to realize that that wasthe case. However, on the flip
side, it was very easy to ignorethat in the face of all the
beauty that the role broughtabout, you know, I got the
opportunity to speak to groupsof young people that I would
have never had the opportunityto, to talk about this beautiful
(48:09):
art form that I learned throughhip hop, this art form of
expression, this art form of rappoetry. And I think it was
meaningful to talk to peopleabout that and sort of let them
know what sort of transformativeeffect it had on me and sort of
see if there is grounds andspace for it to have that
transformative effect on them.You know, I've got to do things
(48:30):
like deliver my first publiclecture on hip hop philosophy
and poetry and, and I got todeliver my deliver seminars as
part of the the actualliterature curriculum at
Sheffield University and thingsof that nature. So yeah, the
beauty far outweighed thechallenges. Of but yeah, it was
(48:56):
always interesting for me to beasked sort of like, who are your
favorite poets and them alwayssort of expecting me to, I don't
know, say William Wordsworth forI remember, when I first when I
first became poet laureate,there was a there was some sort
of like sub article on theonline version, I think it was
in The Star of how, oh, thismentor is not a real poet like
(49:16):
William Wordsworth. And I alwaysfound that quite amusing.
Especially when in the face oflike, it'd be like one of my
favorite poets are Black Thought of The Roots and sort of seeing
people, you know, shake under,under the idea that this elitist
idea couldn't continue on, butalso shake under the idea that
(49:38):
perhaps they weren't the expert.Perhaps they had something to
learn perhaps there was a levelof curiosity there too, which is
always beautiful. It's alwaysbeautiful to shake people's
ideas about art and shakepeople's preconceived ideas
about the art that matters inour culture and in in our
(49:58):
personal lives, you know, So itwas an interesting journey.
Yeah, absolutely. And, and whenyou're facing those challenges,
you know, because you have a newlabel or a new definition or
identity, you know, of what youdo. When you feel fearful, how
do you manage it?
(50:20):
Yes. No, that's, that's a greatquestion. I think. I think to be
honest, when it comes to sharingmy art, I tend not to feel
fearful. And that can sound sortof egotistical, or it can even
sound as though it's coming froma place of deep courage. But
sometimes I don't think it is, Ithink sometimes it comes from a
(50:41):
place of naivety, you know, Iwas definitely raised in an art
form, that tells you that yourideas matter that your ideas
that as, as I spoke aboutbefore, that you have a unique
story to, to sort of share andsort of once you grasp the
feeling of that, even though theidea can be shaken by by, you
(51:04):
know, as artists, we compareourselves to other people and
our self esteem can often be onthe chopping block. So you know
what, but when that's not thecase, and when you do have this
form of unbridled self assurancein your story, as I think all of
us should do. Fear isn't afactor that that seeps into
(51:26):
sharing our you know, so I havean interesting relationship with
fear because I experienced feara lot. In my day to day life, I
experienced fear a lot. When itcomes to thinking about
mortality when it comes tothinking about choices when it
comes to thinking about societalexpectations, should I say, or
(51:47):
family, or, you know, any of theabove romance or any of the
above, I experienced so muchfear. And it's so beautiful to
me that art is this safe space,where actually fear is something
that that can't see its way inand sort of art and expression
is this imperishable or unbridled state of sort of,
(52:10):
sort of existence and sharing,you know?
Yeah. From that point of view,is the performance space, the
live performance space naturalto you? Or is that an act of
courage?
I would love to say it's an actof courage, but it is 100%
natural to me, I feel a littlemore closer to the person that I
(52:35):
am, when I'm performing onstage, I feel like I can truly
be myself. That's not to saythat there's not fabrication and
that's not to say that there'snot performance given that exists
on the stage. Butit just feels aligned with what
I have always conditioned myselfto believe is my purpose. You
know, so I think two thingsalign my my childhood teenage
(52:59):
self is saying, yes, you will,right. And, on the on the flip
side, I'm also getting somehealthy, some healthy dopamine
and some healthy, sort of seeingmy ideas represented in the
world and seeing them you know,you create in this sort of
introvert intimates space thatis often cut off from the rest
(53:22):
of the world or just your lifeas an artist, creating and
ongoing with your creativeendeavors, is sometimes
isolating. So to see your ideascome to life, as they pertain to
people and how people feel andpeople's emotions and actual,
tangible, non ineffable physicalcommunity is so, so joyous, and
(53:45):
it's so so meaningful. Sowhenever I get chances to
perform, it just feels right andfear doesn't get chance to sort
of niggle its way in.
Yeah, that's really interesting.It's a really interesting way of
being able to control fear isn'ttaking over. It does seem that
(54:06):
there's a role for encouragingcuriosity and courage in ways
that aren't asking too much, butto really inviting some sense of
freedom and some sense ofownership instead of what can
feel like capitalisticoppression a dumbing down or a
(54:28):
numbing, like you said earlier,you know, that starts to deprive
people from their own acts ofcuriosity and courage. Would you
say there's a case to almostencourage that to encourage
engaging in being curious andbeing courageous in ways that
which may be through art?
(54:51):
Yeah, I think, you know, I feellike that that's the, that's the
resonance of which I will Ivibrates best, you know, when we
can feel that our courage issort of pushing us into our, our
sense of purpose, or pushing usinto a space where we not only
feel comfortable, but go beyondfeeling comfortable, and we're
(55:13):
able to flourish. And what doesthat mean? That means that we're
able to emotionally acceptourselves, perhaps even able to
physically accept ourselves,despite societal, society's
voice always having something tosay about that. I think when we
can feel like that, we're in ourtrue, we're in our true skin,
(55:36):
and we're in our true sort ofpurpose for life, if you will.
And I'm a firm believer ofwhatever realm or vehicle that
that takes that that's okay. Youknow, I believe artists can
exist in any form and walk oflife. You know, an artist
doesn't always have to besomebody who creates the product
of art. But an artist can besomebody who injects their
(55:58):
artistry into their social work,who injects that artistry into
their therapy, who injects thatartistry into the way that they
engage with the community. Ithink there's so many things in
this, there's so many thingsthat we lack in the society. So
if you have found a way tocreate a solution for for the
(56:18):
huge, sort of boundless lackthat that this world gives us, I
think that's an art in and ofitself. And I think that's in
line with a humanistic andsoulful purpose.
Yeah, yeah. And purpose is soimportant. As you know, having a
clear purpose is so important.Yeah. Unbelievably, it is the
(56:44):
the hour flies by too fast. Butoh, there is a question I'd like
to I, it's amazing how fast itgoes, you'll have to be a guest
in every season. But um,something I would be interested
in, in closing on it in responseto the series, the question
(57:08):
that's posed, Can art save us? I'mreally interested in your
description of art, and I'llquote you "Pain gave birth to
art. Although they never did seeeye to eye arts cared only for
liberation from its predecessor."Yeah, I love that. And I just
(57:29):
wondered if you wanted to, youknow, for the listeners to talk
about, you know, what was inyour mind and what it is you're
saying?
Yeah, no, thank you so much forsharing that. So then then
again, that's another quotefrom, from the book Safe
Metamorphosis. And, you know, itwas speaking to this idea that
the artist always has to delveinto a cauldron or, or a puddle
(57:56):
or a well of pain in order tocreate something. And I thought
about that idea. And I thoughtabout how meaningful it is to
see our pain represented in away that I said, is sort of
beautified, but alsounderstandable that we can
relate to create a sense ofcommunity. But then I think
(58:17):
about the sort of negativeconnotations that that might
have, does that mean artistshave to exist under a constant
state of proximity to pain? Anda thought about? Well, no,
actually, it doesn't. Becauseour as the line says, art really
doesn't care too much about yourpain, it really only cares about
the transformation. It reallyonly cares about the
(58:37):
metamorphosis that can come fromit. And that's where art can
sort of save the world andchange the world. I don't
believe art for art's sake, cansave the world and change the
world. But I believe art'sability to have sort of
liberation from the pain that wego through, can really spark the
(58:58):
change in society that we need,you know, you know, I think
about any form of socialmovement that has existed, I
always say I dare you to findthe piece of art that wasn't
playing in the background thatwasn't fulfilling people with
the soul that they needed tokeep on going. And so in that
sense, yes, art, art has, has agreat need to sort of see itself
(59:23):
free from pain. And I think whatwe can do is we can learn from
that and inject that into oursocieties, into our communities,
and just into our own personallives.
Yeah, and then that's such abeautiful and important
sentiment and statement really,again, when we're in a war
(59:43):
context, unbelievably, you knowthe issue of pain. Otis,
I can't thank you enough foryour time and your generosity of
your time today. We'll make surethat listeners know where to find you
in the text to the podcastseries. Just to close, are there
(01:00:05):
any any final words you'd liketo share in terms of whoever is
going to be listening, whetherit's words of hope, or just a
sentiment that you'd like peopleto take away from listening to
this podcast today.
Um, I guess something thatresonates with me is, is this
(01:00:32):
idea that, that we shouldn'tlet ourselves be confined by
by rules and, and sort ofwhatever it is that you're
trying to engage in, in whateverart form that you see yourself
being freed by or freed insideof participating in, don't let
yourself be stifled by the rulesof that art form, or the
traditions of that art form.Whether that's literary modes,
(01:00:56):
whether that's conventions, andagain, I think, understanding
that we have such a deep senseof purpose within within us,
that doesn't always have to besort of represented logically,
but sometimes can have soulfuland emotional meaning and power.
And sometimes that's completelyenough, you know, so that
(01:01:19):
everybody's story matters thateverybody has something to
share. And that we can sharethat our own volition in our own
time, using our own forms ofcommunication and our own forms
of art. And that's meaningfulenough.
Thank you. Thank you so much,Otis, and I am very much looking
(01:01:40):
forward to the next book ofpoems and following your work.
Thank you again.
Thank you so much.
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