This past weekend I experienced something I never thought I would. When I was (a lot) younger, I vividly remember saying “I don’t believe in the idea of heroes or role models. I don’t have any.” I quickly realised I was a moron, and that my mum was my biggest and potentially only real role model. As I got older, I think I started to look up to people more and more. People I aspired to be like in one way or another.
Now, I’ll preface this with why this guy means so much to me. I think in a very simple way. It’s confusing to explain, but I’ll try. Imagine a beach. Right now. In your mind. What can you see? White sand, clear water, blue skies – not a cloud in sight? Tranquility. Now, if I try and imagine a beach here’s what I see. Black. Darkness. A void. Nothingness. I can’t see anything at all. I could sit here all day trying to picture a scenario, a landscape, anything and I wouldn’t see a thing. This is partly the reason why I have a hard time reading books. I can’t picture the scenes, I can’t imagine the characters. Now, what I can imagine are feelings. If I think of a beach I can imagine feeling relaxed, I can imagine feeling happy. I can mentally go back to a time when I felt those things. Feelings and also words. If you imagine this blackness I can see. It’s kind of like a mental chalkboard. When I’m thinking and trying to work things out, it’s like I’m writing out ideas mentally with a white piece of chalk and I can clearly see the letters. I physically draw the connections between ideas like a mental spider diagram. So, I can’t see in pictures but I can see words and feelings.
When I heard Rudy Francisco’s poetry for the first time it was like the foundations of my brain were rocked to their core. I could see his words clearly, but my chalkboard was no longer two dimensional. My imagination had exploded as if in virtual reality into another dimension, these words were oozing feelings out of their pores and onto a canvas. These metaphors seemed so simple yet so profound. The thing about feelings is that you can’t decide how or when you feel them. Sometimes they just are. As I’m mentally writing these words as I hear them, the feelings they give me are erupting uncontrollably off of the board in clouds of smoke. This subconscious overload of emotion. No words had ever given me this outburst. The connections were obvious, but I’d somehow never considered them a fit. The only thing I can compare this to in reality is the first time I saw a double decker train in Amsterdam. I had seen double decker buses, planes even. But I’d never, not even once, considered a double decker train. I was shell shocked. Dumbfounded. This 3 dimensional mental picture I’d never had before. Incredible. This happened during the first poem I listened to, and then during the next, and the next. Soon enough I’d listened to everything that was online. I went down the rabbit hole, and I haven’t came back out since.
In the last, year? 2 years? I haven’t gone a week without listening to his poems. Watching his performances on Youtube. With every listen those same feelings remain. I still get this 3D mental image that combines words and emotions that I just don’t get anywhere else. He literally opens my mind.
This weekend I saw him perform in person. This magician of my mental state. I saw him. He’s not just this series of performances on Youtube, he’s an actual physical being. Rory and I walked into the Indie Lounge in Birmingham and I spotted him immediately. It’s a strange sensation seeing someone you admire, but have only ever seen online. Meeting footballers is different, I’ve met a bunch. You know they’re real, you see other people watching them, you see people post pictures when they meet them in the street. They’re celebrities, but they’re very much within reach. They’re accessible. Rudy though, I don’t know anyone who’s met him. I’ve never seen him in pictures with other people, I’ve only ever seen him perform on a stage and that’s it. I couldn’t take my eyes off of him, it was surreal. As if by magic a painting had come to life, and was casually ordering drinks at a bar.
The show started, it was magical. Really. I don’t think I blinked, or sat back in my seat until the first break about an hour in. Mesmerizing. I watched 5 or 6 poets perform before Rudy, ALL amazing in their own way. Their work was at a level I can only dream of getting to in the future. Then it was Rudy’s turn. I was maybe 4 rows from the front. Dead centre. It felt as if the whole room had became a tunnel with only 2 people inside. There was only 1 light. The light at the end of the tunnel, directly behind Rudy. I felt alone. Alone yet full. Not full like that impending sense of doom after you eat too many plates at a buffet. Perfectly full, Nan’s Sunday roast full. Curl up on the sofa and doze off to a movie full. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so immediately inspired. I couldn’t tell you how long he performed for. I can’t even tell you how many poems, or what poems. But what I can tell you is that my world stopped. Time wasn’t present anymore. I didn’t think of yesterday, tomorrow, 30 seconds from then. Nothing. I was hooked on his every word and it was fucking brilliant.
I’m not great at expressing happiness or joy in my writing, but I’m trying. I gained a lot from that night. A lot of words are over used and consequently diluted. But that night was truly, truly, breathtaking.
So thanks to everyone who had any vague involvement in making it possible. Thanks to Rudy Francisco, to Jasmine Mans, to allll of the other poets who performed. To Ryanair for dirt cheap flights, to Rory and the fuel efficient Fred.
I’ll never forget that night for as long as I live. I can taste the energy in the room as I sit here in my living room, hundreds of miles away.
Flynn! x
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