Free Minds for Like Minds [Archived]

[This blog post was archived in November. Some of the following images are blurry but still cute. Multiple photographers. Click on the images to enlarge.]

There is a monthly poetry night at The Dalston Lounge (Dalston Kingland, London) called Free Mind and this is the second time that I've come down. When I performed a few months ago I had a great time and met interesting people with some very interesting occupations, which is one of the many things I love about mingling and networking. Such as when you meet people from various walks of life who can teach you something, I love that.

Last time I recall debuting a new poem at the time but unsure of which one, along with performing readings of two of my old personal favourite throwback poems for the sake of nostalgia. Those poems being My Testimony and Memorise My Lines. Felt good to revive those and to express certain sentiments that some audience members could relate to.

This time being Black History Month (BHM), I really wanted to debut another topical poem however, the poem is so damn long and unedited (as is much of my new writing in recent years), that I simply could not be asked to cram it into my 5-10mins set that would have felt rushed. I expressed this with the audience about being saddened to not have what I was originally going to perform, be ready or polished enough to share. More so that my energy wasn't there to at least give an extract of it despite their encouragement- much to their disappointment (their disappointment from initial excitement of potentially hearing my new material, which felt sweet in its own way). 

As I don't like to disappoint and want to always be able to leave my audience with something to enjoy, I still dropped a few gems for them to hear, think and talk about. Thus similarly to last time, I performed another throwback (Innocence), plus a crowd favourite that was on my mind due to recent experiences (Make Delicious) and a Black empowerment poem of mine titled Passionate Beings. All went down well, and made up for the absence of my new sh*t. The original BHM one was too precious to have been half-arsed, so I'm glad that I decisively didn't cheapen it or disrespect the knowledge and honour of it with a rushed performance, just for the sake of sharing. 

My specially selected substitute poems left the audience with the right amount of joy, food for thought, silence and audience interaction that was intended. Luckily for me, a few people recorded parts of my performance and generously shared their recordings with me which can later be seen on my Instagram.

There were much more people at this event than the previous one and it was noticeably more international than before, since a Poet from Los Angeles (another Lauren aka Coldest Wyntor) came with her group and they were lovely. A foreign accent is nothing new on any day around here but theirs added some extra flavour.

A sweet audience member approached me to tell me how much my poems inspired her as a new Poet and how much she enjoyed my performance, despite not being able to hear the BHM one that she was looking forward to. I met some friends of a 'new to the mic' Poet, whom some of which was coming to a poetry event for the first time and were thoroughly enjoying themselves which is always nice to see. I also bumped into another fellow Poet who I recently connected with from her show last month (Teju Chosen). 

Everyone was just beautifully social. There was a perfect mix of shared interests, smiles, hugs, vocal talent, listening ears and respect.

 

Teju, Wyntor and I ended up hanging out at the bar afterwards having a fun engagement of creative minds and opinions. It's always a pleasure to connect with like-minded positive souls. The Owner, Joshua who is the best and sweetest Host, kept the vibes going with his great DJ'ing (like he was reading our minds with his music). 

I think that one of the American ladies was celebrating their birthday (or birthday week). It was just fun, great vibes all round with the perfect temperature of London's delayed heatwave that many of us are grateful for in this autumn season. There was some food eaten, drinks flowing, drinks offered, laughs had, ideas exchanged, pictures taken, memories and contacts made. Nice one!

I sported one of my proudest haircuts as my own barber, which was well complimented. For a change it was photographed by someone other than myself (or at least with my permission lol) to capture it well from a better angle, so here you go. I often forget about my hair patterns until someone points it out to me in curiosity, shock or admiration, thus it was nice for it to be artistically noticed. I'll give you (whoever is reading this blog) a free poetry book if you can guess or near enough guess, what my unique whimsical design is in the comment section! 

More pics can be seen on my Instagram page.

Love Lauren

Audible to be Accessible (Audio link)

Last week I performed at a North-London spoken word event called 'Verses' mainly for the sake of getting a new poem out that I've been dying to share. I have had an abundance of new poems go from pen to paper or finger to computer in recent months and I'm loving it. This one is basically a letter of complaint slash bitter love letter to one of my former favourite brands where snacks and guilty pleasures are concerned. I wrote it with conviction, sincerity and humour knowing that many other fans of the brand especially long-time fans, would relate. It made the crowd happy with laughter and I got my point across, even more so I intentionally tweeted it to the company in hope that they pay attention to customer feedback regardless of the form in which it is expressed.

Now although this performance was filmed by the organisers, on this occasion I wanted to record my myself for a specific purpose. In recent years I have seen a dramatic increase of disabled people of various disabilities and of all ages, however I've noticed an increase in young (up to 30yrs old) disabled people, well in London anyway. Blind people stand out to me a great deal and tend to gravitate towards me in general especially at train stations for some reason.

Anyway, I have come to be in awe of how some blind people make the best of their lives despite lacking sight. Knowing of Ray Charles and seeing Stevie Wonder achieve so and do so much, regardless of not being able to see the piano they were actually playing on always blew my mind. Only a month ago I learned about the astounding career Opera Singer Andrea Bocelli who lost his sight at age 12. Even Blind Fury who I saw on BET's 106 & Park freestyle rap battle (which was one of the best segments of that show by the way), blew me away at how he completely held his own.

I actually began writing a poem about a visually impaired young woman I saw walking with her rollerball white cane, semi-confidently on a hazardous, pot-holed, scaffold infested busy high street. Every pedestrian and driver stared at her in shock as did I, although I was thinking less of judgement and more of her safety. In comparison to watching the men on TV, I'd say that watching and observing this lady in person left the greatest impression on me with regard to empathy.

I have become more mindful with the acknowledgement that other than road crossings, free parking, certain door entries, discounts, some public toilets and some technologies; still many daily life things do not consider the blind, deaf or physically disabled (e.g. Wheelchairs). In recent years I have simply grown a large appreciation and a whole lot of respect for people living with disabilities, blindness in particular and have started to be more considerate of their needs in regards to my own business activities.

With that said I know that there is always braille however, reading poetry or seeing a spoken word performance in all its glory is not going to be fully received by blind people. Yet that does not mean they they can't be entertained by it in another form i.e. Audibly. So I want to reach out to blind audiences more by voice recording my performances for them. This will also give me good reason to be more active with my Soundcloud page that I do not update often. I'd love to have my poetry be more accessible to a wider audience this way or similar. I much prefer to do voice recordings as opposed to video ones anyway for both the ease and comfort, although this audience was my sole motivation, as it is for me to do audible versions of future books and the recent idea to upload readings of my food blog posts.

Verses was a fun night that fully made up for the crap night I had earlier in the week at a show that invited me down just to waste my time. It was all positive vibes, good poetry and friendly people. My stage experience was funny for me not even due to the content of what I was saying, it was due to a dog running up to me in the middle of my performance, my dry eyes watering like crazy ironically effecting my vision and my hay fever provoking that further.

To say I was multi-tasking and keeping my cool was an understatement. Watery eyes and interrupting animals aside, I pushed through my performance being the pro that I am. I'm just pre-warning you for some moments on the recording that may throw you off. Take a listen, share with any blind poetry lovers and enjoy!


@LK_ReelDeevah

On Cloud 'Diva'

Long-time no blog, well in regard to this blog anyway.

For my audience that follows my blog as opposed to my Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn pages, I am letting you know that I finally have a Soundcloud page! Yep, I've jumped on that bandwagon and it's well overdue I agree as Spoken Word is where a lot of my work is at. However, it was not a priority as it just adds to the workload in my preoccupied opinion. I was also concerned that having a collection of my audio online (for free no less) may prevent listeners from being encouraged to see and hear me perform in person (which is NOT THE ONE) and I was worried about having certain recorded poems on my Soundcloud that I'd like to reserve for the audio CD of my current poetry book as well as my upcoming book. These are all valid reasons- not an excuse, either way my case is rested and I catered for my audience with another profile for some accessible media.

Bear in mind that there is only one recording uploaded so far BUT it does include 3-5 of my poems throughout the hour's recording taken from my appearance on Poet's Anonymous this year. In a way it is like having 5 uploaded tracks I'd like to think. When I have more, I will give more, all within due time (there is so much going on creatively at the moment). Take a listen, follow and enjoy in the meantime ;-)

FYI; that picture of me that I edited into the logo to complement this blog post nicely, is one of my favourite pics ever by the way. It was from one of my previous birthdays when I went to Paris and Morocco in the same week. Definitely a vanity moment that was if I do say so myself, my cream outfit was so on point! The matching gloves which I have since lost, those sickkkk boots that I adored and still own ahh....it's no wonder I was given the name 'Diva,' just saying.

As I toot my own horn and create more media for you to go across my profile pages that now include a Soundcloud (smiling), I wish you a fantastic day my lovelies ;-)