[Music]
we lie in bed gazing up at the bedroom
ceiling she calls sky I carefully point
afar and say bun in Chee before speaking
its English counterpart my grandmother
looks at me shortly
she mimics the shape I make with my
tongue puffs the sound I make with my
mouth her watery eyes determined and she
says while to mean wall we have been
here many times before this bed our
classroom the wall another word today I
point to inanimate objects only the ones
with tree pairings I am familiar with
and migrate and teach my grandmother how
to speak English she says oh so try me
ruffle and this is how it began me
pointing her pronouncing sometimes I
find an object that I don’t know the
tree word for an infrastructure thing
for its bones in hopes of finding
something close sometimes we watch wheel
of fortune and guess the words before I
knew it she began teaching me tree two
and this is what we were for one another
a synonym and sharing her small frame
held many stories many words and yet
here I was pointing my mind is a careful
dictionary a reasoning in English though
I am not from this language she tells me
some days I am a choosing of words
thoughts in Reverse my grandmother’s
hands tremble now I hurried to scan my
mind for its tree worm and arrived at
nothing before she is gone does this
mean I have no language which is to say
I have no song does this mean my
grandmother knew the things I did not
say
so there was a woman who once lived
named Margaret a crea every a Entei whom
I was named after and who still lives on
through my poems Margaret was my
grandmother what you’ve just heard is a
poem I wrote entitled from my
grandmother when words fail my
grandmother or Nana is I would
affectionately call her passed away in
April 2014 god rest her soul at the
young age of 78
she was from a small village named op
Adama in the back white district of
Kumasi Ghana which he lived in laughed
and gave birth to my mother in all six
of my mother’s siblings who Nana was has
informed my work in more ways than I can
understand there are many women in my
family who owe our strength and vigor
Tanana and I am humbled to be one of
them before passing away in April 2014
my grandmother lives with my family and
I on Ohio for years it was in this
setting that I actually first met my
grandmother and it was in this setting
where I also first met myself before
coming to America Nana did not speak
English
and she spoke very little before she
left I imagined the language sounded
chaotic for her like a like a jumbling
of sounds in a rolling of words it was
this chaos then that persuaded not to
ask if I could teach her English what
I’m saying is my grandmother was the
first person to believe in my spoken
word in its precision in fluidity grass
threw fragments of natural conversation
in a moment my speaking of English
Africa had convinced my grandmother that
she too could speak English just by
hearing me speak it she was the first
person I taught anything to the one with
whom I exchanged languages with I came
to America at the age of two and so
naturally the only way I retained my
native tongue was through conversations
with my grandmother now I have to
differentiate I couldn’t have done this
with my mother perhaps whenever my
mother spoke to me in tree always
responded in English that’s because she
but for my grandmother she had no idea
how to communicate in English it was a
different kind of confrontation I was
forced then to learn and speak my native
tongue just so I could communicate with
her this call and response of English to
treat Rita English had solidified and
informed so many other dichotomies in my
life now we all have many roles and
identities that we interchange daily for
me that might look like what it means to
african-american as well as a woman but
for what seemed like the entirety of my
life experience I’ve been forced to
confront most importantly my dual
identity of being African as well as
American the experience also of being
African within America these identities
decide not so much Who I am
but where I’m from and where I belong
where I fit in the world on the one hand
I’m American on the other I’m also very
very African to clarify my experience is
different from many right I mean it’s
not to be confused with the many
experiences again of what I deem the New
Age African artist this includes but is
not limited to the African creative that
remains on the continent the African
creative that was born on the continent
of a race of Rod and the African
creative that was born and raised abroad
I fall somewhere in between the two
latter examples where the lines blur is
is I was born on the continent but
didn’t stay long enough to be raised
there this is where much of my poetic
work stems from an exploration of the
themes of the the value of culture and a
dedication to self-identity the stories
of my family further inform my work and
impacts my writing style the stories my
grandmother would share with me often
served as a validation of the themes of
the oratorical tradition that my people
have in our life an instance in the way
in which our words dance in our beliefs
of storytelling so while I discussed how
identity sort of influences and informs
my work it’s also important for me to
discuss how identity has convinced me
that the role that I play as a poet is
purposed I always loved the stories my
grandmother would share with me bad
always struggled to find my own voice
until I stumbled upon performance poetry
poetry fascinated me with its bending
and redefining of the rules of modern
language with the striking resemblance
to African storytelling and it forced me
to speak up to finally give voice to my
narrative and so in an effort to give
voice to my narrative I present to you
all the next poem entitled to the
process and if I write the things I
speak what truth will rise from my bones
and if I believe that writing is
breathing and if I sing the words I
breathe and if they take flight off the
page and carry to my heart into yours
and if I pace my living room floors
isn’t it the sound of mantra on my
tongue isn’t it still the rhythm the
conjuring and COO and language isn’t the
language the act of singing alive rising
the dust and if they said to speak less
and listen more do I not speak my truth
only when I hear it aren’t what my
ancestors gave me a ritual the loud the
gift and the listening of speaking like
the monsters we are afraid of and what
is the process of writing of breathing
isn’t it all knowing when to go forth my
daybreak with all this might in my chest
no matter how you try to silence me I
will say my fears mouth wide open mom I
want to be a poet this is the phrase I
uttered to my mother at the tender age
of 22 after America had deemed me
independent and had deemed me an adult
right fresh out of college finding
myself in finding my voice if this was
the way America saw me surely my mother
– however I was still very afraid when I
approached my very African mother and
told her mom I want to be a poet I
almost whispered it like it was a
forbidden thing which is to say mom this
is what I want to do with my life
mom this is what I believe I’ve been
purposed for mom I want to dispel the
notion of the starving artist and still
show up in the world this one mom I want
to be a poet to give you all some
context this decision was made in
opposition to the traditional law school
career path that my mother and I had
discussed for years
I mean commonly African parents are
known to require this of their children
in obligation to pursue careers they
believe to be prestigious in medicine
nursing law pharmacy engineering and so
many more but poetry had always been
purposed to my life it was more than
what I wanted to be it was who I was
and yet you all still would understand
my very single mother and her raising
three children an immigrant from Ghana
West Africa who was a teacher back home
but who had worked tirelessly for years
to now become a clinical to now become
certified as a clinical nurse
practitioner she responded mommy you
want to be a watts quite literally
african-american children shouldered the
burden of success of their parents if we
do not succeed they have not succeeded
as parents but what a success look like
for the new age African artists those of
us who set boldly to our parents to
inform them of the not so traditional
yet creative careers that we would like
to pursue if you ask me I believe that
success lies in the declaration of our
purpose right mom I want to be a
but success also lies in the pursuit in
the everyday of our defiance even for
those African Millennials who do decide
to pursue the traditional career paths
but simply because they want to and not
because they were told they had to I’m
currently enrolled in the Masters in
fine arts program at the new school in
New York City this journey has been
tough filled with so many ups and downs
so many editing and revision as in
writing and different uses of adjectives
to describe how I got here today but
pursuing an MFA in poetry was exercising
my right of commitment into a passage of
writing which is more than just the
passage which is more than just a
passion it is a duty this Duty reminds
me of a trip that I took to Ghana in
2011 when my grandmother was still alive
I had so many ideas and misconceptions
of what I thought the country would look
like but I mean this was immediately
dispelled and shattered as soon as I
arrived the interest further piqued in
2016 in 2017 when I returned also but
this time after my grandmother was gone
the country seemed so incomplete without
her and yet everything about Ghana still
sucked me in maybe more so now than it
may be more so now that she was gone
than it did when she was alive even
still I never felt fully Ghanian in
Ghana people told me that I spoke tea
with an American accent and that the way
that I thought about the world was just
well different before the popular Black
Panther movie and the Wakanda forever
theme growing up in America had its
hurdles – found in the constant
mispronouncing of my last name and never
feeling fully American but also never
feeling fully African either throughout
all of these experiences while I still
understood who I was poetry did not I
would venture to say
that poetry exists entirely outside of
my identity as an African and as well as
an American and serves as an identity
for me all on its own these multiple
identities then have forced me to
question this if my concept of home is
distorted if I exist somewhere in the
in-between space as in between space of
Africa and America what then is my
responsibility as an artist to ghanians
on the continent as well as to other
hyphenated Americans
what role does an artist play in this
world that has been constructed for me
and most importantly is my
responsibility so the work into the
craft or to the people what I am saying
is artists with the dual identity carry
a greater weight especially the writers
and poets of our generation I mean
artists are already sort of forced to
bear the responsibility of documenting
the history of the society in the world
we live in but when when a dual identity
is attached to that responsibility were
forced to question what the world looks
like for us further further questioning
where our work should exist in the world
growing up I never really had many
African women performance poets that
inspired me mainly because much of what
I saw it was in the law field of course
but now the list is far too many to
count
I now realize that I’m a part of a
larger group of American based African
poets who together we bear the
responsibility of moving the culture
Ford whatever that culture may look like
for us based on our personal experiences
just as my grandmother had believed in
my first utterance of spoken word I now
realized that so to will many little
African girls who want to be poets
believe in the craft simply and possibly
because they heard me recite a poem
that’s a huge responsibility I know I
always talk a lot about feeling
in-between and existing in some sort of
limbo space of one identity and the
other but maybe
I don’t have to feel divided all the
time maybe I can firmly and confidently
embrace both identities maybe today even
if only today I can be African and
American an artist I hope you see the
familiar anew in the last poem that I
will be reciting reciting entitled
current about my recent experiences in
Ghana somewhere in a cry I step out of
an airplane and begin to fall a current
as thick as my grandmother’s voice woke
me last night and told me to come and so
I followed the colour of the sky I
arriving stumble through the sign that
read foreign nationals touched a glass
that separates me from the man dressed
in camouflage I show him my blue
passport ask if he remembers me because
my mother says I come from here
she says this is where I belong that
this place holds my grandmother’s name
and I have her face and so I came when
she called
even though I cannot touch her soft
hands no sound she would call me her
voice swallowing an ocean to arrive at
my name she is here though she is not
only her village stands and then I think
countries can be given second chances –
after all I have come here to belong I
have come here for everything they said
this place is to me in this country this
country will know my name my name is
Cynthia amoA a Ghanian Americans spoken
word poet and I thank you all for the
opportunity to be here today to
celebrate life as we don’t know it and
to celebrate the new age African artists
thank you also
[Applause] [Music]
we lie in bed gazing up at the bedroom
ceiling she calls sky I carefully point
afar and say bun in Chee before speaking
its English counterpart my grandmother
looks at me shortly
she mimics the shape I make with my
tongue puffs the sound I make with my
mouth her watery eyes determined and she
says while to mean wall we have been
here many times before this bed our
classroom the wall another word today I
point to inanimate objects only the ones
with tree pairings I am familiar with
and migrate and teach my grandmother how
to speak English she says oh so try me
ruffle and this is how it began me
pointing her pronouncing sometimes I
find an object that I don’t know the
tree word for an infrastructure thing
for its bones in hopes of finding
something close sometimes we watch wheel
of fortune and guess the words before I
knew it she began teaching me tree two
and this is what we were for one another
a synonym and sharing her small frame
held many stories many words and yet
here I was pointing my mind is a careful
dictionary a reasoning in English though
I am not from this language she tells me
some days I am a choosing of words
thoughts in Reverse my grandmother’s
hands tremble now I hurried to scan my
mind for its tree worm and arrived at
nothing before she is gone does this
mean I have no language which is to say
I have no song does this mean my
grandmother knew the things I did not
say
so there was a woman who once lived
named Margaret a crea every a Entei whom
I was named after and who still lives on
through my poems Margaret was my
grandmother what you’ve just heard is a
poem I wrote entitled from my
grandmother when words fail my
grandmother or Nana is I would
affectionately call her passed away in
April 2014 god rest her soul at the
young age of 78
she was from a small village named op
Adama in the back white district of
Kumasi Ghana which he lived in laughed
and gave birth to my mother in all six
of my mother’s siblings who Nana was has
informed my work in more ways than I can
understand there are many women in my
family who owe our strength and vigor
Tanana and I am humbled to be one of
them before passing away in April 2014
my grandmother lives with my family and
I on Ohio for years it was in this
setting that I actually first met my
grandmother and it was in this setting
where I also first met myself before
coming to America Nana did not speak
English
and she spoke very little before she
left I imagined the language sounded
chaotic for her like a like a jumbling
of sounds in a rolling of words it was
this chaos then that persuaded not to
ask if I could teach her English what
I’m saying is my grandmother was the
first person to believe in my spoken
word in its precision in fluidity grass
threw fragments of natural conversation
in a moment my speaking of English
Africa had convinced my grandmother that
she too could speak English just by
hearing me speak it she was the first
person I taught anything to the one with
whom I exchanged languages with I came
to America at the age of two and so
naturally the only way I retained my
native tongue was through conversations
with my grandmother now I have to
differentiate I couldn’t have done this
with my mother perhaps whenever my
mother spoke to me in tree always
responded in English that’s because she
but for my grandmother she had no idea
how to communicate in English it was a
different kind of confrontation I was
forced then to learn and speak my native
tongue just so I could communicate with
her this call and response of English to
treat Rita English had solidified and
informed so many other dichotomies in my
life now we all have many roles and
identities that we interchange daily for
me that might look like what it means to
african-american as well as a woman but
for what seemed like the entirety of my
life experience I’ve been forced to
confront most importantly my dual
identity of being African as well as
American the experience also of being
African within America these identities
decide not so much Who I am
but where I’m from and where I belong
where I fit in the world on the one hand
I’m American on the other I’m also very
very African to clarify my experience is
different from many right I mean it’s
not to be confused with the many
experiences again of what I deem the New
Age African artist this includes but is
not limited to the African creative that
remains on the continent the African
creative that was born on the continent
of a race of Rod and the African
creative that was born and raised abroad
I fall somewhere in between the two
latter examples where the lines blur is
is I was born on the continent but
didn’t stay long enough to be raised
there this is where much of my poetic
work stems from an exploration of the
themes of the the value of culture and a
dedication to self-identity the stories
of my family further inform my work and
impacts my writing style the stories my
grandmother would share with me often
served as a validation of the themes of
the oratorical tradition that my people
have in our life an instance in the way
in which our words dance in our beliefs
of storytelling so while I discussed how
identity sort of influences and informs
my work it’s also important for me to
discuss how identity has convinced me
that the role that I play as a poet is
purposed I always loved the stories my
grandmother would share with me bad
always struggled to find my own voice
until I stumbled upon performance poetry
poetry fascinated me with its bending
and redefining of the rules of modern
language with the striking resemblance
to African storytelling and it forced me
to speak up to finally give voice to my
narrative and so in an effort to give
voice to my narrative I present to you
all the next poem entitled to the
process and if I write the things I
speak what truth will rise from my bones
and if I believe that writing is
breathing and if I sing the words I
breathe and if they take flight off the
page and carry to my heart into yours
and if I pace my living room floors
isn’t it the sound of mantra on my
tongue isn’t it still the rhythm the
conjuring and COO and language isn’t the
language the act of singing alive rising
the dust and if they said to speak less
and listen more do I not speak my truth
only when I hear it aren’t what my
ancestors gave me a ritual the loud the
gift and the listening of speaking like
the monsters we are afraid of and what
is the process of writing of breathing
isn’t it all knowing when to go forth my
daybreak with all this might in my chest
no matter how you try to silence me I
will say my fears mouth wide open mom I
want to be a poet this is the phrase I
uttered to my mother at the tender age
of 22 after America had deemed me
independent and had deemed me an adult
right fresh out of college finding
myself in finding my voice if this was
the way America saw me surely my mother
– however I was still very afraid when I
approached my very African mother and
told her mom I want to be a poet I
almost whispered it like it was a
forbidden thing which is to say mom this
is what I want to do with my life
mom this is what I believe I’ve been
purposed for mom I want to dispel the
notion of the starving artist and still
show up in the world this one mom I want
to be a poet to give you all some
context this decision was made in
opposition to the traditional law school
career path that my mother and I had
discussed for years
I mean commonly African parents are
known to require this of their children
in obligation to pursue careers they
believe to be prestigious in medicine
nursing law pharmacy engineering and so
many more but poetry had always been
purposed to my life it was more than
what I wanted to be it was who I was
and yet you all still would understand
my very single mother and her raising
three children an immigrant from Ghana
West Africa who was a teacher back home
but who had worked tirelessly for years
to now become a clinical to now become
certified as a clinical nurse
practitioner she responded mommy you
want to be a watts quite literally
african-american children shouldered the
burden of success of their parents if we
do not succeed they have not succeeded
as parents but what a success look like
for the new age African artists those of
us who set boldly to our parents to
inform them of the not so traditional
yet creative careers that we would like
to pursue if you ask me I believe that
success lies in the declaration of our
purpose right mom I want to be a
but success also lies in the pursuit in
the everyday of our defiance even for
those African Millennials who do decide
to pursue the traditional career paths
but simply because they want to and not
because they were told they had to I’m
currently enrolled in the Masters in
fine arts program at the new school in
New York City this journey has been
tough filled with so many ups and downs
so many editing and revision as in
writing and different uses of adjectives
to describe how I got here today but
pursuing an MFA in poetry was exercising
my right of commitment into a passage of
writing which is more than just the
passage which is more than just a
passion it is a duty this Duty reminds
me of a trip that I took to Ghana in
2011 when my grandmother was still alive
I had so many ideas and misconceptions
of what I thought the country would look
like but I mean this was immediately
dispelled and shattered as soon as I
arrived the interest further piqued in
2016 in 2017 when I returned also but
this time after my grandmother was gone
the country seemed so incomplete without
her and yet everything about Ghana still
sucked me in maybe more so now than it
may be more so now that she was gone
than it did when she was alive even
still I never felt fully Ghanian in
Ghana people told me that I spoke tea
with an American accent and that the way
that I thought about the world was just
well different before the popular Black
Panther movie and the Wakanda forever
theme growing up in America had its
hurdles – found in the constant
mispronouncing of my last name and never
feeling fully American but also never
feeling fully African either throughout
all of these experiences while I still
understood who I was poetry did not I
would venture to say
that poetry exists entirely outside of
my identity as an African and as well as
an American and serves as an identity
for me all on its own these multiple
identities then have forced me to
question this if my concept of home is
distorted if I exist somewhere in the
in-between space as in between space of
Africa and America what then is my
responsibility as an artist to ghanians
on the continent as well as to other
hyphenated Americans
what role does an artist play in this
world that has been constructed for me
and most importantly is my
responsibility so the work into the
craft or to the people what I am saying
is artists with the dual identity carry
a greater weight especially the writers
and poets of our generation I mean
artists are already sort of forced to
bear the responsibility of documenting
the history of the society in the world
we live in but when when a dual identity
is attached to that responsibility were
forced to question what the world looks
like for us further further questioning
where our work should exist in the world
growing up I never really had many
African women performance poets that
inspired me mainly because much of what
I saw it was in the law field of course
but now the list is far too many to
count
I now realize that I’m a part of a
larger group of American based African
poets who together we bear the
responsibility of moving the culture
Ford whatever that culture may look like
for us based on our personal experiences
just as my grandmother had believed in
my first utterance of spoken word I now
realized that so to will many little
African girls who want to be poets
believe in the craft simply and possibly
because they heard me recite a poem
that’s a huge responsibility I know I
always talk a lot about feeling
in-between and existing in some sort of
limbo space of one identity and the
other but maybe
I don’t have to feel divided all the
time maybe I can firmly and confidently
embrace both identities maybe today even
if only today I can be African and
American an artist I hope you see the
familiar anew in the last poem that I
will be reciting reciting entitled
current about my recent experiences in
Ghana somewhere in a cry I step out of
an airplane and begin to fall a current
as thick as my grandmother’s voice woke
me last night and told me to come and so
I followed the colour of the sky I
arriving stumble through the sign that
read foreign nationals touched a glass
that separates me from the man dressed
in camouflage I show him my blue
passport ask if he remembers me because
my mother says I come from here
she says this is where I belong that
this place holds my grandmother’s name
and I have her face and so I came when
she called
even though I cannot touch her soft
hands no sound she would call me her
voice swallowing an ocean to arrive at
my name she is here though she is not
only her village stands and then I think
countries can be given second chances –
after all I have come here to belong I
have come here for everything they said
this place is to me in this country this
country will know my name my name is
Cynthia amoA a Ghanian Americans spoken
word poet and I thank you all for the
opportunity to be here today to
celebrate life as we don’t know it and
to celebrate the new age African artists
thank you also
[Applause] [Music]
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