Journalistic Poetry.
Robin - Air Element
You tell me it started out of nowhere
Your background they just couldn’t place
You were neither here, nor there
A part of your history erased
The kids would say, what was it again Egypt? Something North African
Yes, would come the whisper, ‘my grandfather was from Sudan’
You tell me you have a large family there
But here it feels like you’re the only one
You tell me how sometimes you miss that warmth
And I imagine an eagle in the sky reaching for the sun
Swept up high, soaring solitary and silent
While drumming inside is a tribal riot
A rhythmical GPS system
Your forefathers gather on your skin
There’s no keeping them quiet
They burst through your fingers at the age of four
You tell me you kept banging on surfaces
So your parents let you explore
And sent you to a musical conservatory
Where you learned classical technique
But you say it’s hard to force creativity
The thinking mind doesn’t always get you to a beat
I imagine it takes the use of a different instrument
Clearing cloudy thoughts is usually what leads to it
You tell me you like to look out at nature and listen to music
Attuning to the flowing notes like the wind
As it blows, inspiration flows and you are cued in
To the ensemble within, a flying flock in formation
Jazz or the blues carried from generation to generation
Black is not a colour
It’s always been a vibration
“Like Dutch dominion over water, you pace the beat to create tempo
And like Arabic script, you embellish melody for flow”
I ask you about your experiences with whiteness
You tell me how you thought they weren’t being ‘racist’
But trying to be funny by pointing out difference
At first, you laughed along
But over time and time again you got angry
Because neither laughing nor speaking up meant that you belonged
And no matter how calm you were, your skin colour sounded an alarm
You mention how this made you understand how it feels
To be left out and revealed
To be unknown, and to be set on a journey to seek your own
When you‘re in a society where chances are circulated among clones
Of a single type
You mention how being between black and white
Has given you perspective and double privileges
With melanin, you can blend in in many different villages
And a Dutch name and passport easily gets you there
With both powers at play, favour is in the air
You tell me when you call your cousin in Sudan
And ask how he’s been, he says - ‘Always flowing, like the Nile’
It strikes me that flowing is also a way to be and doesn’t exclude anything
Especially if your identity exists in between
The opposite is a European approach to time
Where a moment encompassing everything is considered undefined
Structured timekeeping holds the line
I imagine these are the makings of a natural drummer
Like Dutch dominion over water, you pace the beat to create tempo
And like Arabic script, you embellish melody for flow
You tell me how when you play, musicians hear African tones
Deciphered heritage expressed and assembled
You read the signs and make the cymbals tremble
Swept up high the eagle hears the song of the sun
It says music speaks soul to soul
And recognises everyone as a part of the whole
Robin runs Robin van Rhijn Drum School at the Treehouse community and is of Dutch and Sudanese ethnicity
“Black is not a colour
It’s always been a vibration”
Xx
