"Read All About it"
Behind the Beat Challenge
I sat organizing the space in my room, when the song played. I had just moved back into my mom’s house, after one of the most difficult phases in my life, and I needed clarity. The #Metoo movement was not really a thing yet, and though I had the support of friends and family members, things still weren’t easy. I felt I’d lost my voice, my sense of truly being. The bubbly prank-playing jokester was no longer present. She had been stolen away, making an exit-stage left, with no sign of ever returning.
As I sat in the corner, pondering on what life should be, I remember the initial beat dropping. It was a ballad with a strong but slightly somber melody, that had me thinking that I was already feeling depressed, and I need not any extra feels. As I reached to change the Pandora station, the first line caught my attention.
“You’ve got the words to change the nation
But you’re biting your tongue
You’ve spent a lifetime stuck in silence
Afraid you’ll say something wrong”
The song spoke to me, as most songs often do - in some sort of cosmic way, but this was different. It spoke to my soul. It was as if it were calling out to me. Emeli Sande’ didn’t know me, or my situation. She didn’t know that days prior to my incident, I had opened for my favorite Tony-award winning poet, who offered the chance for me to be her mentee. But after everything occurred, my pen went mute. I didn’t want to be seen or heard, and I went through extensive measure to do so. I wanted to fade to black. I couldn’t even see myself truly beginning again. Things seemed a little too difficult, but in came her lyrics.
“If no one ever hears it how we gonna learn your song
So come on, come on
Come on, come on
You’ve got a heart as loud as lightening
So why let your voice be tamed?
Maybe we’re a little different
There’s no need to be ashamed
You’ve got the light to fight the shadows
So stop hiding it away
Come on, come on.”
I had, at that point, served on the speaker’s board for a local women’s center. Telling my story had become a bit easier, but still difficult. I was sharing it with those who had been through the same thing, or something similar. It was healing. I saw that I wasn’t alone in what I was feeling. It was my chance to help the next woman overcome, but yet using my art to express my joys, hurts and pains, after being violated, wasn’t so easy. After all, my art was why my assailant chose me. He said all poets were the same, “freaks”, so I hid away. That evening, I continued to listen to the lyrics. “Who am I to let this situation beat me,” I thought. I sat for a while, and went to YouTube. I listened again. I listened until I felt the urge to pick up a pen. It was in that moment that I found solitude and the strength to begin again. The poem I wrote took a week. I had so much flowing out of me, and I didn’t know where to begin. It came out in puzzle pieces, much like how I felt, but it was beautiful. It was freeing. As I took each piece, and placed them together, I felt as if it were my words that was serving as glue to put me back together again…to help me find my voice, to once again breathe. That’s what my piece was about, me breathing.
Emeli Sande’ helped me to breathe. She helped me to live and chose a life of service. Often times when we think about music, or any type of art, we don’t think about activism or the healing that it can bring. Depending on the artist, it can be all about the beat, and just about the beat. But lyrics….lyrics are the heart and soul of a song. Lyrics can change lives. She literally changed mine, and in the process, has helped me to help others with the art of MY words. I’ve won a few competitions, have even performed at a few prestigious events, but it started with me listening to an artist who chose to affirm the next individual. Thank you Emeli Sande’! You literally gave me life.
#affirmingartist #gratitude #EmeliSande #behindthebeat #readallaboutit
-Emeli Sande’- “Read All About It”
About the Creator
Tojia Dawkins
Love. Serve. Create. Inspire.
-All Around Creative, but Poetry is My Specialty.
IG-@I_am.nudity
YouTube - Soon to Come!!!
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