 Voices of the underground, coming on the rebound Lisa, Jane, Gina, Catherine, Yasmin, Naomi Voices of the underground, coming on the rebound, yeah We got the voices Off has not anything to show Morphe The beauty of the morning, silent bear You know that poem was actually written by William Wordsworth He was walking along London's Westminster Bridge He was inspired by the view of the city Like Wordsworth, we too are walking across a bridge A long a bridge into the city centre You know, in this classic poem, he describes the tranquility of the city at dawn And presently to where we are on this timeless street in Castries We are walking over the threshold Into the episode of Poetry Live, Voices of the Underground Reading this poem, I could hear the music of Chopin like a waltz Shall we? Yes, you can But perhaps we should be dancing to the St. Lucian Polka You know what? We need to take a break When we return, the name of the streets Voices of the underground, coming on the rebound New Select's Rodney Bay office is now open But we are still available to serve you remotely Call or send a WhatsApp message to 285-6796-285-7859 285-3593 or 285-3329 Or send an email to customersupport at lucelect.com for assistance Call 457-4433 to get filled balances Use our free online service at myaccount.lucelect.com for detailed account information And online bill payments through your bank Customers may also take advantage of Chopin's online or walk-in service Lucelect encourages you to practice social distancing Stay home, stay safe Souvenirs at Island Gallery Shops, local cuisine at Oasis Food Court Come upstairs, walk the strip for the best services at your fingertips Caribbean rum shack, perfumery and more At the JQ Rodney Bay Mall, we've got it all Shopping design with you in mind Welcome back By now you should have guessed the name of the street It is one of the busiest streets in pastries Where pedestrians dare you to stop while they cross the street And if you still haven't figured out the name of the street We've got some cue cards Pictoro cue cards Okay, I'll be nice for this one Figure it out It's Bridge Street Bridge Street or Roupon is one of the main access ways Across the river into the city of castries Yeah, and that hump bridge next to the fire station was actually built in 1904 You realize there's more than one bridge connecting the river banks Into the city of castries Speaking about river banks, do you remember that game in the river on the bank? In the river On the bank In the river On the bank On the bank On the bank It's time for tragedy and triumph I'll featured poet Lisa Dublin I'm still catching my breath from in the river on the bank She has uplifting messages in her basement chronicles Which is reminiscent of Maya Angelou whose poetry and quotes are famous And inspirational to all She is an American poet best known for her memoir I know why the caged bird sings We now have Maya Angelou Maya Angelou, Margaret Johnson was born on April 4th 1928 in St. Louis, Missouri She was a well accomplished African American author, poet, teacher and playwright Her childhood was undeniably rough and this manifested later in her art From a very early age, Angelou was stripped of a stable childhood When her parents divorced and she and her brother Bailey moved to Stamps, Arkansas They were raised by her grandmother and attended public school Sadly, extreme trauma happened to Maya When she was raped by her mother's boyfriend on a visit to Missouri She then had to testify against him at eight years old After which, some of her uncles killed him with a beating She felt immense guilt and responsibility for his death because of her testimony And refused to speak for the next five years She graduated high school at 17 and three weeks later gave birth to her son Clyde Angelou's career kicked off when she won a scholarship to study dance and acting at the California Labor School Then in the early 1950s, at a time when interracial relationships were still very much shunned She married a Greek sailor named Tosh Angelou But this only lasts a few years She started her career acting in plays both on and off Broadway including touring Europe with Porgy and Bess Soon after, Angelou moved to New York. She joined the Harlem Writers Guild In 1960, she and fellow writer John Oliver Killins co-coordinated a performance of Cabaret for Freedom Which she co-wrote as a benefit for the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and Civil Rights Movement after meeting Dr. King She then becomes the SCLC's Northern Coordinator She continues the fight for equality against the apartheid system in Africa She produces, composes, writes screenplays and releases the first of seven autobiographies We know why the Cage Bird sings 1970 Angelou's next five autobiographies are Gather Together in My Name 1974 Singing and Swinging And Getting Merry Like Christmas 1976 The Heart of a Woman 1981 And All God's Children Need Travel and Shoes 1986 These books span over the globe and an incredible length of time including stories of her childhood hardships over the years The trials of being a single teenage mom and the development of her creative career Her poetry is just as passionate and transformative Her activism work over the years and the year before her death Almost symbolically, she publishes her seventh autobiography Mom and Me and Mom Angelou dies at 86 years of age on May 28th, 2014 Her poems have become common in everything from cards to literature classes She is an undeniable example of a strong and powerful woman Who has taken a painful past and reshaped it into art that has touched and transformed the hearts There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you This is a quote from Maya Angelou This lady is so inspirational Yes I agree with you, she has been an inspiration for me my entire life And I was fortunate enough to actually sit in on one of her classes to discuss some of her poetry such as Phenomenal Woman and Still I Rise And I was actually invited to her 80th birthday party You know what, you can describe what the poet does as verbal music The usage of imagery and metaphor to evoke this experience and emotions Let's analyze Feeling Good Written by Anthony Newly and Leslie Brickers for the musical The Raw of Gris Paint The Smell of the Crowd Nina Simone's vocal performance of the song creates an elated emotional state of freedom The use of vivid imagery of nature to portray the depth of feeling Experienced with references made to flora and fauna That are generally free and independent for instance Birds in the sky, fish in the sea, scent of pine The sun and the stars are also used to portray the limitless joy depicted by the song The song speaks to these features of nature as a general feeling of joy The word new is repeated for dawn, day and life to show that this good feeling is ongoing and not short lived End rhymes are also used for instance See, free, treat to maintain the idea that Feeling Good is truly a song of liberation Feeling Good performed by our very own Diana Phillip It's a new day and this whole world is new We'll be right back We got voices, we got voices, yeah It's Rodney Bay office is now open, but we are still available to serve you remotely Call or send a WhatsApp message to 285-6796-285-7859-285-3593 or 285-3329 Or send an email to customer support at lucelac.com for assistance Call 457-4433 to get bill balances Use our free online service at myaccount.lucelac.com for detailed account information And online bill payments through your bank Customers may also take advantage of shoppers online or walk-in service Lucelac encourages you to practice social distancing Stay home, stay safe GEF is both a champion for cultural preservation and development change agents Established in April 2002 by the CDF Act of 2000 As the agency responsible to align the aspirations of cultural and creative individuals Groups, communities, policy makers and civil society Through the implementation of the national cultural policy of St Lucia We envision a strong united and proud St Lucia community Empowered by culture and creativity For more information on how you can partner with CDF on some of our projects and efforts Go to CDFStLucia.org Or contact Cultural Development Foundation, Barnard Hill-Castries PO Box CP5405 Call us at 457-9021 Or send us a fax at 459-0615 Email us at info at CDFStLucia.org Cameras are rolling, head up, we're back on air Yeah, I know, I was just listening to one of Lisa Dublin's basement chronicles Mastery takes time You can get to where you want I know Lisa's definitely a motivator Let's have an insight into her life An interview with Lisa Dublin Ordinary women with extraordinary talent Describe your creative process What spaces, places and things inspire you? I don't think I really have a creative process to say I think I'm thinking a lot all the time about everything My mind is pretty active And it is from just thinking What I'm at the kitchen sink or cooking or cleaning up Or running in particular Any of these activities yield so much raw material for me to then go off and write about So I think my creative process is just living And I'm very intuitive and very sensitive So things hit me differently I find a lot of people And that is where I get inspiration I get things to write about To speak about In terms of spaces, places and things that inspire me I think the people I love inspire me a whole lot I am everybody around me They're little pieces of the people that I love In how I speak, in how I move In the things that are particular to me I pick up a lot from the people whom I love And that has changed my life And I think made me just very big on development and personal development So they inspire me They pop up as characters in my poetry, in my prose writing, etc You find the people that I love if you know me well enough And if they know themselves A day in the life of Lisa Dublin What is your life really like being the wife, mother Working professional and a vlogger of the Basement Chronicles Are you finding equilibrium to quote a phrase from one of your poems to all the girls? Life is very hectic I think I speak for all women when I say that You know, it's very difficult to find that balance But you have to keep on trying That's what I've come to realise So yeah, all of these things We have three boys We're very busy with basketball, with school You know, all sorts of things But my husband is pretty good with the kids So that I think gives me He's just a great guy So that gives me peace of mind And it gives me the space to produce a lot I think finding the time and the space to do all of these things Requires, you know, a lot of discipline Sacrifice my sleep time sometimes But that's okay Because the results I think are worth it Was there a period in your life when You felt unhinged Like the drive and passion that fuels your creativity Was disappearing I think for a while there Before left delusion I lost my faith Things happened in our lives And I figured, if God cared This would not be happening Like seriously and literally And I just remember saying, okay I have to be a nobody Like if I were somebody and if God cared These kinds of mishaps and failures Would not be happening And I just didn't care for a while I just became a casual drinker, cusser, whatever I just didn't care because I didn't know how to reconcile Having bad times in my life With a God who said that he'd take care of me And truth be told, I wasn't writing in that time Like I was just like, whatever Just living life however it came Because I thought like if God didn't care about me Why should I care about me anyway And from that experience A year later or so after we had moved here I began to write the poem, I am not Job That's where it came from, that kind of experience Like wrestling with God Like if you are God, why are these things happening And truth be told I only got like the last verses of that poem Just through this lockdown Just this year Since your move to Canada What has been your experience Coming from a Caribbean context In terms of writing and culture? I think the biggest shock When I got here was that I was considered a minority For me coming from a homogenous society In St. Lucia where everybody looked like me Basically And because of that He saw people like me In positions of authority In leadership positions Doing big things Back in St. Lucia I was in the media I was lecturing I was in business I enjoyed a certain amount of success Within the society And then I come here In terms of the term minority What does that even mean I understand that statistically Black people are in the minority They're not as many of us as there are White people or other races But I think there are also other connotations Of minority that I do not Subscribe to That you're supposed to be at the bottom of the ladder That you're not supposed to be All that you can be In a society such as this I reject that I don't have the blueprint of Doing life like that Because of where I'm from And so I think it creates A very interesting coordinate To be able to negotiate the society Knowing where you came from And what have you learned about life I love that question Because I've learned A whole lot about life I've learned that If you put in the work You get the results Along the way You get connected to different people And I've learned Not to question it But just to work it Run with it Try to figure it out and make it work But there are some connections That we can't really explain I've learned That even if you have to speak your truth There's a way to do it There's a way to be gracious And gentle and get the message across I've learned To be humble Because you just don't know Where life will lead you And you know you will Meet people around you So I've learned to just be humble And roll with the punches sometimes You know what I got it from Melissa She's a great innovator And she earned two masters degrees And also balancing that With being a mom She's got a solid foundation She's rooted in spirituality She's rooted in her Christian faith One of the things that she said to me was Her faith has given her wings to fly You know that in itself Is truly motivational And now The performance of Lisa Dublin Asking everything that can be shaken Is broken along backbone Or strengthened along fault lines Darkness producing so much light Refracted in a hundred places And in people's half faces Eyes revealing what the mouth Finally can no longer hide Six feet apart Is a new six feet under Death to hustle, death to grind Death to busy death to noise I am breathing the breath Of my own sin I am breathing the sound of my own spin I am breathing the sting of my own hate I am breathing the sting of my own pride I taste me Behind the mask Hello, do not ask me how I'm doing I have stopped trying Resigned to a reckless resetting Behind the mask Take me as I have become This time for the rest of our lives This reset is a mindset shift To normalize the normal The burial of the victims And the conjuring of browning dreams Everyday actions turned into petitions For life, six feet apart to make you see You've been ghosting yourself Breathing your own breath To confirm your mess I taste my terror Without the companion crowd I hear the scream of my hidden name I feel the cold wind Of my endgame I touch a sticky darkness Behind the mask Hello Do not ask me how I'm doing I am becoming nothing And everything behind this mask Eyes watching, ears screaming Don't touch, don't breathe, don't approach Don't cleave, go to work Stay home, go to school, stay home Go to die, stay home Reset, pay down debt Grab, watch again, embrace the tech Zoom your coffee, FaceTime Grandmother's dying Zoom your guts from a darkened basement I can't believe this is happening Even the weddings will soon have a close Hello Doesn't matter how I'm doing I might have stopped dying Though there's no living yet There's no ending yet Only the promise of anything And nothing behind the mask I am certain Job still aches For the cherished tradition of his beloved children While his brand new heirs Resonantly welcome the mulling Of progeny by way of your compensation I am certain Job thereafter Praised you for his new blessings With a veil of fear dressing Each and every moment, wondering When next you would choose to test him With another painful lesson I am certain Job displayed Signs of smoke inhalation after his Recreation, an understandable Byproduct of your fire That raises dreams to ashes To stoke a resurrection And I am not Job I will not be your pawn to be broken Then recombitioned just to show that you are sovereign Indeed, I am not Job I will not die to breathe Be stripped to be equipped You could have saved me from this Are you sure you didn't offend Said my well-meaning friend A modern-day build-out Interrector and mocks empathetic Squeezing a smile synthetic The narrow sieve of his judgment Till you've learned your lesson You won't move on to the blessing A sister prophesied Refusing to show me your eyes That scream the one conclusion From the group revelation where they Prayed over my demise God, answer me If you dare You who designed our futures And know the end from the beginning And everything in between God, answer me You who promised peace In the face of war And said you were all knowing Did you not see this coming Answer me I love you fiercely You I have not abandoned I have heard and I have answered I did not turn my back I love you fiercely I brought you through this fire To flesh out your heart's desire In me there is no error Sometimes I'll let you go through Sometimes I say no to error To lead you to greener pasture Other times your path is clear Sometimes I say yes to pain To give you lasting gain Other times the change is now Sometimes I say yes Sometimes I say wait Sometimes I say go Daughter Face me and tell me if the failure Of yesterday was not replaced by the clarity Of today. Daughter Stand up and face me like the woman Scorn to survive and burden to fly Weaponize the fight, humble to stand tall Full of grace to smile God, I can't say that I understand completely Or I agree with you wholeheartedly But I was burnished through the fire And I'm leaving my heart's desire And I did not die and I did not break And I'm alive and well again God, I know you now Like I didn't before Bullwalk, rampart Redguard, shield Dreadguard, waymaker Everything I will trust you now because If you took me through this You can do anything I thoroughly enjoyed that performance by Lisa She is definitely a performance poet She's so lively I totally agree with you I love the feel of her poetry Yes, we now have the final performance Of Lisa Dublin This is in celebration This is in praise This is in defence of every woman This is you thinking and this is me talking This is us supporting a woman generation This is a woman thing This is a girl thing This is for the mothers And this is for the grandmothers This is for everyone who dares To be woman Well, to tell you the truth Being a woman just ends easy All that stupidness about women balancing home And work and everything in between Is out of balance because It don't have no equilibrium Because you're always leading to one side of life While your mind is tugging you to go In a direction that no woman has gone before And on top of all of that On top of figuring out your place And trying to run your race And fighting for your space On top of all of that Woman giving you more trouble because you're a woman You don't know what I mean Maybe you don't realise Two mother crabs cannot occupy the same universe Is why your colleagues at work Don't already talk to you But that's funny And that don't make much sense Because these women talk into every other mother crab In the same small universal space So you think it must be something you do Why they don't like you And women, yes Women just like you will want to cut you down Just because you like them Trying to define your life And they want to tell you how to dress And why you don't look good to them And they think highly of themselves I tell you to think that their laughter And their opinions on your style And your hair and your shoes mean a thing As if in the little universe You're trying to set up for yourself They mean more than they supposed to So this is for all the girls Who dare to be different Who step out in bright yellow like the blazing sun When all the world is in corporate blue This is for all the girls Who don't care about the status quota And fling another dimension in the face Of what it means to be a woman This is for all the women who they say have Too much style The stockinged women And the made-up women And the women with the fake accents And the long nails Who make the plain jeans feel less than a dollar Even though they themselves don't even have a scent And this is for all the girls who stand Make the world stand at attention With the swing of their hips And the appeal of their glance This is for those women Who make other girls hold on tightly to their men Not because they want them Or even try to get them But because they shine too brightly Not to be noticed by every single one of them But this is for all the girls Who are loyal to the sisters Who won't betray them with their men Or diss them without reason This is for all the girls who see men as colleagues Not just lovers And who run shoulder to shoulder With the eagles and the tigers But being a woman is sometimes a strange, strange thing All that potential And sometimes no power Because it has no unity in the cup The only time you rent out sisters Is when you have a tragedy for all the world to see They come like ants on a sugar hill They take a tasty morsel of the story To satisfy their hope That you enter as good as people say you are But the moment you back up again The moment you begin to blaze They stalk out, avert their eyes When they see you coming across the road Instead of saying good morning Because they're comparing themselves to you And you coming out on top And they can't handle that And they're hoping and they're praying Something will happen to make you lose your mind And they pray and your man will leave you Or your business will bust or you will be embarrassed But they don't know In the long journey of your life Them things don't happen already Is why and how it's by the grace of God You surviving today They don't know if they can walk in your size 11 shoes But they jealous for them all the same So this is for all the girls who make things happen Who aren't afraid to fall for the rush of the comeback This is for the girls who know the pain of a vision The grind of the challenge and the price of the fight This is for all the girls who'd rather read than do dishes Who'd rather write and create than skin chicken And fry fishes This is for the girls who run hot and sweaty with ideas And whose hair won't stay in place While they chase their ideals This is for all the girls who share themselves with the world Every part of themselves except their very soul This is for all the girls who really find womanhood Into something vast and encompassing all shades of their personhood But to be a woman You have to make a choice in your head first And then get your heart and your body to follow It's what you want that will make you decide How to move is what you want The ring and the husband, the family, your degrees Your career and international affair Is either you make a choice to partner with your man Or to run your whole show yourself And don't leave no place for this compromise stupidness Wear it, fall it, fall When he come, he come And if he come, he come and you don't care But if you want different You have to learn to play the game and toe the line You have to choose which battles to fight And learn when to just sit tight So it's either you're going to be a woman Who could live with her man or a woman unto yourself And when you make that choice You have to stick with it And leave every other option for another life Where it would have no god and no family And no society to remind you So this is for all the girls who straddle pretty skirts And loose pants, sexy heels and ballet flats Flowing tresses and quick one-plats Chic acrylics and laptop digits This is for the girls who struggle with their choice Who want their husband in their bed And their degree above their head This is for the girls who appreciate the men Who make them feel loved and wanted Though they're strong and independent But this is also for the other kinds of girls Who go it alone, who chart their own course And buy their own home This is for all the girls Whose minds can be tamed by any man or woman Who question every norm and break every tradition I think it's wonderful that the director decided To use this poem to all the girls to end the series Definitely Many times I feel in the society People try to pigeonhole us Try to determine what we should and should not do And as we saw in many of the poets Throughout the series You can be a nurse and a poet You could be a professor and a poet There are many sides to us as human beings And we should be allowed to be free to be ourselves Yes, and I want to say to embrace being different Embrace being unique Embrace being you I see you're wearing your Art Reach t-shirt Yeah, Art Reach, which is from the National Arts Festival Yes, the National Arts Festival is actually created By the Cultural Development Foundation And it's virtual now Yes Let's do a recap of the series Let's just do a little limbic poem What say you? Let's do this I'll start Okay, let's begin There was a poetry show That started six episodes ago It ran for a while For more than a mile And now it's time to file Hope you enjoyed the series of all our featured poets Gina Catherine Naomi Solita Jane And Lisa Thank you for being part of Poetry Live Voices of the Underground Poetry Don't Don't Poetry Don't Poetry Poetry Poetry