An interview by Alicia Cole.
Angela Brown was born in Meridian, Mississippi on January 5, 1969. Angela works as an assistant for the Department of Hospitality Management at the College of Southern Nevada. She found her voice through writing poetry. She found her purpose in writing as a cultural activist advocating love and peace through her lines of poetry. Angela was inducted into Who’s Who in Literature. She was given the title of Inspiring Youth Award. She was involved with the Pulitzer Remix and literary mentor project. She earned a Bachelor of Science degree from UNLV. She earned a Master of Arts degree in Creative Writing from Berkeley. She produced a spoken word album titled, Blended. Blurb published her new poem anthology e-book titled, Sun Flowers. It does not matter how great a distance it took to get to the finish line, what matters is your determination to get there and how much effort you spent to make it possible.
Black Fox Literary Magazine: When did you start writing poetry?
Angela Brown: I started writing poems ten years ago. I started writing when I thought I had something I wanted to say. I wanted to define my purpose in writing. I wanted to share with others about my cultural identity. I started writing poems about my life experiences. I was born after the Civil Rights Era ended, in the seventies. I wanted to share my culture growing up poor in the ghetto. I wanted to reflect stories through poems about my cultural exposure I had to the church and my community. I wanted to write poems which reflect on my childhood. It was then I got my calling from God. God gave me the gift to write poetry. I use my talent by sharing my poems with others.
BFLM: What does poetry mean to you?
AB: Poetry is a form of expression. It is a form of expressing ideas from life experiences. I jot down my ideas from learning experiences and write about it. To me a poem is writing about love, happiness, pain and doubt. I write poems from the heart. I write poems from the heart of the ghetto. I write street poetry. Writing poems is something I am passionate about. I am passionate about my culture. My purpose in writing poems is to tell the story of my culture so others will understand me.
BFLM: How does poetry help you communicate your black experience?
AB: My experience is in the black church, and in the black community. I learned to express myself taking poetry workshops. The themes of my poems are from the media and the news reports about my culture. When I write a poem I want to reflect on ideas so others will question the validity of what is taking place or going on. I reach inside myself to describe that voice in me to develop the character or theme I write about in the poem. From this I learned how personal experience shaped the way I think. When I write a poem, I am reaching out for the voice inside. I become the voice behind the character I am writing about. In my poems I write gravely on culture at a spiritual level. I like to sample from other artist, singers, poets work to sample their technique on how they question morality. When I write a poem, I am reaching out for the voice inside of me. I become the voice behind the character. In my poems I write gravely on spirituality. I sample from other artist, singers, poets work and use it as a theme. I begin to question morality of the theme.
BFLM: Do you think you have a different understanding of poetry being black?
AB: My outlook on life has shaped my experience how I reflect on life. My personal experience is how I reflect on life. Being black is an image of expression. Being black is an attitude. I feel that writing a poem is about expression and building relationships others can relate to. I hope my poems connect to other people. Being black is an image of how I am perceived. My form of writing comes from the voice within. Writing is my passion. Being black is an image of expression of my culture. Being black is an attitude of expression.
BFLM: In one of your new poems, your words are taken from Alicia Keys. How does music shape your poetry?
AB: When I hear Alicia Keys sings it reminds me of my cultural identity. I like her music because her voice sounds soulful. When I format the lines of the poem using the lyrical poem I think of fond memories. Alicia Keys songs reminds me of my childhood. Alicia’s songs remind me of my first love. Alicia reminds me of my culture. I reflect on those themes when I write my poems. I feel that writing a poem is about writing words others can relate to. I feel my craft of writing mimics her soulful sound that in my words of a poem have become more spiritual. In my poem Fame, I am writing a Cantu poem. A Cantu poem is where I take one line of a collection of songs and place it into a poem. The poem is structured into a poem format and will contain rhyme and meter. My poem “Fame” is sampled from Alicia Keys songs. I like this piece because the words are inspirational and the lines connect to the word flow.
BFLM: Who are your favorite poets?
AB: I like Tupac Shakur poems because he speaks from the imprint of his heart about the environment he lived in. Tupac mentioned in his poem “Cry,” that you can have all the money and fame and feel alone. Tupac was famous and had a lot of wealth and if he had a girlfriend and a family to share this with his life would have been more complete.
I like Gwendolyn Brooks because she talks about family love. She says in her poem that having a happy family is paying the rent, feeding your wife and satisfying your husband. You can come from a poor environment and not have everything in life you wanted but all you need to be happy is to have love in your life. Gwendolyn tells her audience that all you need is love in your life to be happy. I grew up poor and I did not have much but I was happy.
I like Nikki Giovanni’s poem “Knoxville Tennessee.” Nikki states that being happy is having fond memories of your childhood. In Nikki’s poem she talks about fond memories of a church picnic. There was good food and music. She was able to spend time with her grandmother walking barefoot on the mountains. Love and being in good company made her happy.
Through each poet these images demonstrate to the reader that happiness comes from being loved.
BFLM: If you could recommend three artists (writer, singers, painters, etc.) to help others understand the black experience who would they be and why?
AB: I feel inspired by Langston Hughes jazz poems when I follow his lyrical meter in how it flows with the words or the meaning behind the poem, I feel his wisdom and knowledge comes from his passion for his cultural identity.
I enjoy reading Maya Angelou’s poems, I like to read how she handles her struggle. Maya was an activist, writer, singer, poet, performer and dancer. She is very adamant about how she stands on politics. One poem I like in particular is the poem, “Still I Rise.” Maya read this poem at the presidential inauguration.
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
But still, like dust, I rise.Out of the huts of history’s shame
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise
Maya knows the value of education is the key to becoming successful in life.
I also like listening to songs written by rap artist Biggie Smalls because of his different approach to writing poetry. Biggie Smalls knows how to balance lines with rhyme schemes throughout the music piece that lyrically flow with the music between bars throughout the rap song. Biggie Smalls is a talented poet and rapper.
