I was discussing with someone randomly the irony and sadness of the fact that Phyllis Hyman had an album entitled “Prime of My Life” and unfortunately committed suicide in said prime. If you are not familiar with Phyllis Hyman or her music, click here to get a brief synopsis. After that get familiar with a voice that I dare you to try to describe. My poem below is inspired by her life and struggles, because a lot of it is parallel to some things I have gone through in the past.
I often find poetry hanging out in the songs of my favorite artists. I’d like to pull out some lyrics that are pure poetry to me in what I call, “Poetic Melodies.” Lalah Hathaway is the daughter of my favorite artist of all time: Donny Hathaway. The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree so today’s Poetic Melodies is featuring the beautiful, talented Lalah Hathaway. Enjoy:
It was like a lifetime passed right through my fingers
So long ago so much that I didn’t know
Kind of like a light shined down and showed me howHow to move on that was then and this is now
All around me, everywhere
Seems like nothing but despair
Confusion, disillusion
Hanging in the air
Global melancholy smears
a stain across the sky
Somewhere right now someone’s crying
And I just don’t know why
It’s just the naked truth (Truly alive when I’m with you)
It’s just the naked truth (You’ve changed all I thought I knew)
Yet you were living proof (It was given, the times you spent)
As we climb to heights anew (And the naked truth)
Why cant these memories just be erased
Why must i yearn for your kiss
The first moment we’re not face to face
Reminds me how much your missed
Where do we go
Well, I am feeling all musical and what not this week, so I will do a Poetic Melodies post all week. Well, it is my blog and stuff. *shrug* Today’s featured artist is The Foreign Exchange. Enjoy, get up on it!
Waiting for the daylight
Cause then she’ll keep me
In the safety of her arms
She never leaves me
And when the sun rises, she watches over me
He tells me all his secrets
He thinks nobody knows
We lay together in daylight
I love him so
And when the sun rises, he watches over me
These lines here are so simple, but poetry can be simple… don’t you agree?
Good people, good loving
Good music in my life, it makes me happy
Good people, good loving
Good music in my life, it makes me happy
So happy
When she lays down at night
I wonder what she sees
When she thinks of paradise
Maybe she’ll dream of me
So every night I pray
That when she goes to sleep
and she dreams of a love
Maybe she’ll dream of me
All this time I had it wrong,
But now I truly see
The road you’re choosing.
See the writings on the wall
Tells me I’m losing you
And there’s nothing for me to do
Cause our greatest fears came true.
I finally got a clearer view
I don’t wanna be a soldier anymore!
Because the war never ends
And no one ever wins
I don’t understand why we should fight for love?
Either it ain’t or it is!
It either ain’t or it is!
Are you a Foreign Exchange fan? If so, what is your favorite Foreign Exchange song?
This edition of Poetic Melodies is featuring my favorite group of all time, WuTang Clan. I love them because like me, they are nthing to f*ck with… Enjoy!
Merciless like a terrorist hard to capture
The flow, changes like a chameleon
Plays like a friend, and stabs you like a dagger
This technique attacks the immune system
Disguised like a lie paralyzin the victim
You scream, as it enters your bloodstream
Erupts your brain from the pain these thoughts contain
The court played me short, now I face incarceration
Pacin — going up state’s my destination
Handcuffed in back of a bus, forty of us
Life as a shorty shouldn’t be so ruff
But as the world turns I learned life is hell
Living in the world no different from a cell
Yo, in the housing, thousands seen early graves
Victims of wordly ways, memories stays engraved
All my live brothers, is locked down with high numbers
The young hunger, blind to these lies, they die younger
In this New World the Order slaughter men, women, and children
Ten feet gates surround the building keep us sealed in
The projects, lifeless like a vietnam vet
Constant war, sever threats of enemy conquest
Crooked cops comb my building complex that’s in the rumble
Streets are like a jungle, can’t let my cypher crumble
Inside my lab, I’m going mad
Took two drags off the blunts, and started breaking down the flag
The blue is for the Crips, the red is for the Bloods
The whites for the cops, and the stars come from the clubs
or the slugs that ignites, through the night, by the dawn
Early light, why is sons fighting for the stripe
I bomb atomically, Socrates’ philosophies
and hypothesis can’t define how I be droppin these
mockeries, lyrically perform armed robbery
Flee with the lottery, possibly they spotted me
Battle-scarred shogun, explosion when my pen hits
tremendous, ultra-violet shine blind forensics
I inspect you, through the future see millenium
Light is provided through sparks of energy
from the mind that travels in rhyme form
Givin sight to the blind
The dumb are mostly intrigued by the drum
Death only one can save self from
This relentless attack of the track spares none
poetry.
is.
donny hatahway.
his voice is.
just.
every.
thing.
and…
even if I never knew his story…
I would know his story.
poetry is.
phyllis hyman.
unstoppable.
but stoppable.
even if I never knew her story…
i would know her story.
because:
i know pain intimately
and it never disguises its voice
doesn’t hide beneath chords
or behind riffs.
pain is consistent.
and if it it ain’t broke.
you know the rest.
but i still try to fix it.
with poetry.
and…
poetry is.
yeah it just is.
but…
mired in death.
in life…
in turmoil.
in peace.
in confusion.
in clarity.
in hope.
in giving up.
in beauty.
in ugliness.
in love.
in indifference.
in me.
in doubt.
in belief.
in irrationality.
in reality.
in this fallacy
in this truth
inside.
it just.
is.
every.
thing.
every. thing.
even when my everything is nothing
no. thing.
is transformed into importance
even when my song for you
still leaves me living all alone
when no one loves me in no space
when i feel there is no time
for anyone to hear my song.
but i am just thankful
that i can sing it.
and my refusal to be lonely
is greeted by poems
who agree that they don’t need to live on.
but insist.
that I do.
because poetry just is.
but me,
i.
am.
every. thing.
