Spoken Word Artist Salient Voice Doesn't Believe In Boxing Herself In

Even with God-given gifts, moments of comparison can distract the gifted. For Sarah Oglio, whose stage name is Salient Voice, she had to remember that her voice mattered just as much as those she compared herself to. 

Growing up in a Christian household often creates the first community that many know into adulthood. Church was a welcome routine on Sundays, allowing Salient Voice to interact with people of different generations and walks of life. Though she enjoyed the community, there were wounds caused within her church community that took time to heal from. For Salient Voice, her pain opened her up to a greater depth and vulnerability in her artistry. 

Resolute Magazine had the chance to chat with Salient Voice before How Sweet The Sound UK, getting to know a bit about her not boxing herself in as an artist, how pain transformed her gift, and how her faith and craft intersect with one another.

How did you become involved in the art of spoken word poetry?

Salient Voice: I’ve not always been consistent with poetry. When I first started writing and performing, I was 16. Before then, I knew about poetry from school. Learning about poems and poets, not necessarily doing it for myself. When I performed at 16, that was an opportunity that came for me because I was involved in a theatre play that included spoken word as well. When I reached my late teens, that’s when I started to be more involved with poetry. Especially, like, writing Christian poetry. When I started to develop my writing skills, it started at church. They encouraged that a lot and used me for events or any performances happening with the youth group or various groups within the church. Then I stopped. And, I picked it up again during lockdown. Now, I’ve been consistent with it.

Why did you stop?

SV: I stopped because I felt like my voice wasn’t important. I remember to date, I just doubted my ability and comparison as well didn’t help. And, I used the excuse, “Well, I’ve always been the poet for my church…”. Outwardly, it was like, “She’s giving others an opportunity.” Inwardly, there were roots. I was doubting myself. I was comparing myself. Because I did that a lot, I just faded into the background, and then I just stopped writing. And lockdown came, and I picked it up again. 

You said you felt your voice wasn’t important. Was there an event that happened that made you feel that way?

SV: I don’t think anything significant happened. It was linked to comparison. I would compare, let’s say, someone else [who’s] a poet in the church– the way that they wrote. I would be like, “Oh I don’t write like that. Does that mean mine isn’t good?” You entertain it once, twice, three times, and it just forms a root inside and it was bearing fruit where I would stop myself from putting myself forward or writing. I would think, “It doesn’t sound like this” or “I’m not articulating myself the way they are, so maybe I’m doing it wrong.” Not knowing that everyone’s unique, everyone’s different. 

Who are influences for you in your craft?

SV: In terms of my poetry, I’ve had influences from Sarah Kaye. Her storytelling used to fascinate me. How she could just grab an audience as soon as steps into a room or just starts. She had a heavy influence on me when I was starting. And now, it’s mainly the people around me. Whether it’s their stories or my personal stories. I have poets that I look up to that have been writing a lot longer than I have. Music, as well does inspire my poetry. Whether that’s the gospel, or the latest recreation I’ve made was by an artist called Bridge music, called “Vulnerable”. I remember listening to their music and it speaking to my heart. I recreated it with a male singer as well.

I don’t like to put myself into a box. I don’t draw my influence from one person. It’s kind of what I hear and what I read as well in the Bible tends to influence me in my writing. Something that a few poets have said to me is that I may not always mention God in my pieces, naming God or Jesus, but they can sense that higher being in my pieces. Like, my pieces will start really sad or self-reflecting and by the time you get to the end, there’s that hope. It’s uplifting rather than keeping you in that low state. 

How did you develop your voice as a spoken-word poet?

SV: It all happened during lockdown, to be honest. I was in a very low state at the time. Like I said, I’ve not always done poetry and that’s not because I never had any interest in it. It’s because my biggest interest was in basketball. I loved basketball way more than poetry at the time. At the same time when I stopped writing and performing at church, I stopped playing basketball. That carried on until I finished uni and lockdown, and I was experiencing a lot of loss. I don’t mean, like, through death; loss of friendships, and things that I used to hold dear.

I was reflecting on myself and thinking, “God, I don’t really have anything that I can call my own.” I didn’t have basketball anymore. Basketball was like my baby. At the time I didn’t know what I wanted to do career-wise. I just thought, “God, I don’t know what I want to do.” 

I took a lashes course and thought “I’ll try lashes. Maybe I’ll like it.” When I would practice on my own I would get frustrated. Then I thought, “Why did I spend so much money on this course?”

I was at a point where I was like, “What am I doing? Where am I going?” I kept writing. I just felt in my spirit God saying, “This is your purpose, this is what you’re supposed to do.” I wasn’t just writing in my room, I was also attending live poetry open mics. At the time, you weren’t allowed to meet up so it was all online, and I remember I followed two particular poets in the London poetry scene. I would follow them and even perform. When I pushed myself to do that, I was like, Yes, I don’t play basketball anymore, but I felt in my spirit that God wants to use this part of me as well. 

Going into the new year, I remember God being like “I’ve called you to be creative. Do this.” And since then, I haven’t looked back. Yes, I have my waves when it’s high and low, but I’m not putting my pen down. 

How does your faith interact with your craft?

SV: It naturally does. I don’t force it. It naturally happens. As much as I’ve had my own experience with faith like I stopped going to church for two years, I’ve had my fair share of pain and hurt. But coming back to church, coming back to God, it just happens naturally.

Because Proverbs 3:5-6 has been sewn into my life, I was born into a Christian family, it’s my identity. And, of course, the devil tries to take that away from your identity. 

There are deeper levels that God could have in your craft, but I feel like, naturally, it just happens. There are times where I’m writing a piece [and] it’s not talking about the church, it’s not talking about God, but someway, somehow I’m referencing him. I’m referencing the Father… toward the end of the piece. It happens naturally, I don’t have to force it. 

You said you’ve had your fair share of pain and hurt. Was that related to the church or just life?

SV: Church. It was church hurt. But, we praise God for growing strength to strength and letting that go.

Would you say that navigating that helped you in your poetry or helped how you approach and tell your stories in poetry now?

SV: Yeah. Poetry definitely helped me to express a lot of pain and hurt. It helped me to find peace with it, I would say, and to somehow understand it and express it. I would see little fragments of it in pieces… It’s helped me to understand certain things and give it to God in a way. 

You have Philippians 1:6 listed in your IG bio. What is the significance of that scripture for you?

SV: That verse means a lot to me because it’s a reminder that it doesn’t matter what stage I’m at, God is going to complete the work that He started. 

There are times when I know I’m not perfect, I know I’m a sinner. So [thinking] have I been abandoned by God. Have I hurt God so much that He’s just not going to use or He’s not going to be able to fulfill His perfect will in my life? So, that verse is a reminder for me that God will be sure to complete the work that He has started in me. 

How did you become involved in How Sweet The Sound?

SV: I was scrolling through Instagram and I came across a competition. Initially, I was like, “I’m just gonna slide past it.” Because it said gospel music competition, and I was like, “I’m not a musician. I can’t sing.” But, I clicked on the link and read a bit more, and saw that they had a space for spoken word artists and I applied for it and kind of just left it, to be honest. 

With where you are on your journey, did you ever expect the world to open up to you the way it has?

SV: To be honest, no. I didn’t think this would be happening right now. Even when I think about it, I’m like “Wow.” 

Like I said at the beginning, you asked me how I heard about How Sweet The Sound. I applied for it, [and] I left it. It wasn’t in the back of my mind. I applied for it and left it.

And, I remember attending two different events at the Royal Albert Hall. One was of a poet and singer, and the second time I went [there was an event] where poets spoke about their faith openly. I remembered one poet who mentioned the name of Jesus. In the world we live in, not a lot of people do that. I remember sitting there and I was like, “God, I want to be able to do the same thing. To proclaim your name in front of many people.” And, of course, no kidding, I think three days later, I got the email saying “Congratulations!” I thought it wasn’t real. 

Poetry has opened a lot of doors that I wouldn’t necessarily say that I would be in if I wasn’t doing poetry.

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Writer Bio:

Shonette Reed is the editor of Resolute Magazine.

Track-by-Track: Tiffany Daniels-Hudson

In her latest project since her 2018 EP Above All Else, Tiffany Daniels-Hudson is back and pushing herself in her artistry. With her new album, Forever, Tiffany challenges the way Christians view the return of Christ, stretches herself beyond her CCM style, and tackles the topics of anxiety and depression.

Resolute Magazine: Since your last album, what have you been up to?

Tiffany Daniels-Hudson: Yes. So, I literally just released in January. I have just transitioned from my church as the worship director. So, my husband and I have been seeking out what our next steps are. But, I’ve been, you know, promoting things on playlists and things like that. 

RM: What playlists? Are you using Spotify or using TIDAL?

TDH: It’s available on all digital outlets. Kind of the thing now is to submit your music to playlists on Spotify and Apple Music just so you can reach a wider audience. So I submitted some before and even after. There’s tons of playlists that my music is available on on Spotify. 

RM: So, what does that submission process look like? I know people will create playlists and share them. But, for a submission process, what does that look like?

TDH: There are playlisters, [which] they call themselves, and they make Spotify playlists. You know, sometimes it could be like an acoustic playlist or a new gospel song playlist or something like that. There’s this website called “Submit Hub” where you can upload your music and then they have these different playlisters that have profiles, and they tell you about what kind of music they’re interested in–what kind of music will be available on their playlists–and some of their playlists have, like, several followers. So, it could be hundreds or thousands of followers from different countries or states. Then, you submit your music and they’ll approve it if they like it. 

And, so, I got approved for a lot of different playlists. Erica Campbell shared my music which was amazing. I was, like, shocked. I woke up one morning, and she does a like support kingdom artists post– I think she does it monthly. And, I think it was the day after the release, she had me on the post. And I was like, “Oh my gosh!” like, “This is amazing!” cause I’m an indie artist in Chicago. I don’t have a huge following. So, I think she found it on a website. I’ve done a lot more promo around this project. And, so, I was able to message her and say “Thank you” and she responded. It was a huge blessing.

That’s amazing.

Yeah.

RM: So, for this album, I know in the past we’ve done a track-by-track, and sticking to that but wanting to get into more of the process around the album. What is the theme of this album?

TDH: So, the album is called Forever. It’s an EP of 6 songs. The concept behind it is that one, God never changes. [God is] always here, [God is] omnipresent. He’s available. Also, the promise and the hope that once this life is over, as believers, we get to be with [God] forever and [God] is forever. The songs on it really focus around eternity, and also some life experiences that I’ve had as well.

My great-grandmother passed away this year. So, there’s a song on their inspired by that process. 

That’s pretty much the heart of it.

RM: Do you have any pre-writing or pre-recording rituals to get you focused?

TDH: This project, I actually got a grant from the Illinois Arts Council. I submitted for a grant sometime last year and I had kind of an idea of what I wanted to do, then, months later I found out that I received the grant. So it was like, “Okay, now I need to really write songs.” Like, get the album out. 

I feel like every single album is different for me cause this is my fourth project. For this one, I thought of different types of songs that I would want to have on there, and throughout the process, I was inspired by different things. So, I kind of really wanted to have songs that reflected my sound as an artist and also my creativity, but then songs that had specific themes. 

I feel like the process was a little all over the place. I don’t necessarily have a ritual. I’ll sit down and think. I sometimes start on the keyboard and come up with a chord progression that I want to work around. Or I’ll be sitting in the car and get a melody. It’s so different every time. 

RM: You brought up your sound and making sure that came through. How would you describe your sound?

TDH: I would say that my sound is a good blend of CCM (Contemporary Christian Music), Pop, and Gospel. I’m not a runner by any means, but I am a powerful vocalist and I also appreciate ambient pads and sounds like that. I grew up in a COGIC church, Pentecostal, so I love gospel. 

It’s kind of a blend of all of those things. 

The church that I attended for the past 16 years was really diverse. And, growing up my dad introduced me to a lot of artists [like] Chris Tomlin and Paul Beloche. But then I was also listening to Kirk Franklin and Mary Mary. And then in high school, I went through this phase of “Oh, I love the Jonas Brothers and The Backstreet Boys.” 

I feel like all of that is intertwined in my music. There’s gospel songs on there, there’s a pop song. And then you got your more acoustic worship-like songs on there too. 

Photo taken by JMae Photography.

RM: If there was a song that was difficult to write, which one was it?

TDH: It’s actually the first track on the album. It’s called “Jesus Reigns.” And I had all the other songs done and written. The last one was the most difficult because I had come up with a chord progression that I really wanted to incorporate and I wrote a song right before that was actually called “Forever” and it was gonna be the title track, but I wasn’t happy with it. 

It was a slow song, it was kind of a ballad, and I felt like the album really needed an upbeat-high energy song. So, I spent days just tryna come up with ideas. My husband came in the house and he’s like “This sounds like house music.” It was just a mess! And, so, I was just tryna figure it out and eventually started lyrics to it and it just started coming out. 

We had a studio session scheduled with the background singers on this song, and I wasn’t happy with the bridge. Usually, the way I work is I’ll either play piano or have a friend play guitar, and I’ll record a rough demo and send it to the producer to come up with the music for it. So, this one I had the track, I had the music, I had come up with the melody and everything, and the day before rehearsal I wanted to change the bridge. It was so long. It had so many words [and] it didn’t really fit. And, so, I was sitting up at night like, “Okay, what am I going to do? How am I going to change this?” And, eventually, the words came. It fit with the music that the producer sent me and, like, I was so happy with the change. 

“Jesus Reigns” was the hardest song to write, but it’s also the song that has the most streams. So, I was like, “Thank you, God!” Cause this was, like, really difficult. And I really love it now that it’s all finished.

RM: On the flip side, which song was the one where everything just seemed to come together for it?

TDH: Yeah, so, this EP has 6 songs on it and I released 2 of the songs in 2021. I re-released them as part of the full project. The easiest song to write, I think there’s maybe 2, but I’m going to say the song, “Here.”

I was at a worship night. And most times, normally, I would be singing at the worship night with a group of friends. This particular night I was sitting in the audience, and my friend Gabe there’s a time through the night where he pauses the set and says, like, we’re going to have a time of journaling or prayer. And he plays electric guitar so he would like loop a certain chord progression, or a certain melody. While that was playing, I began to write the chorus of the song. So, after that, I went home and the verses just kind of naturally came out. It was really simple, and really easy, and I felt like it all came together very quickly and it wasn’t a struggle to write at all. 

Wow, that’s amazing.

Yeah.

RM: How would you say that you’ve grown since? Not since this album came out, but the previous one before this?

TDH: Definitely a lot more confidence. I think that this album… so, kind of two things happened. One, I became a worship director at a pretty big church and I think that challenged me in a lot of ways. In leadership. In confidence. In musical ability. In addition to that, I think that the older you get and the more you do stuff, the more sure of yourself you are. 

I struggled with insecurity for a long time. Especially, as a child. I dealt with bullying and stuff. But music had always been my thing where I felt like “This is my thing.” So, I feel like this album I was able to just… I know myself as a singer. I know myself as a writer. God is just so clear about just being authentically me. But, two, the process of creating an album is so much. You have to work with musicians and producers, and the people that are gonna mix and engineer. 

So, this album, because I had done things in the past I knew exactly what I wanted. And I had complete creative control over things. Whereas some of the other albums that I worked on I didn’t have as much control or I was a little more timid about what I wanted. So, this one I was like, “I’m going to work with this person,” and “I’m going to work with that person,” and “This is the sound I wanna hear.” And, so, I think it definitely, when you listen to it in comparison to other projects that I’ve put out, you can hear the difference in confidence and in certainty, and who I am and what kind of sound I’m going for. But, also, the journey of it. From beginning to end, it takes you on this journey of eternity. 

RM: That’s awesome. What skills have you since learned that helped you to get to this album? 

TDH: (contemplating) I think I’ve learned placement in music. So, what’s a good part to sing really high or to really push things out the way you want them? I’ve learned how to listen more intently to mixes and things that I wanna hear. 

I think I’ve just… this album I’ve been able to really figure out who is my team of people that I think I wanna work with. I’m still figuring out things in terms of, like, live what my band is gonna look like. But, I think in terms of like producers and mixing engineers– these are the people that I really enjoy working with and these are the people that get me. And realizing that when you’re building even a track, there’s so many elements to it and you just kind of know what you want. So, my thing is a lot of my music is more CCM, but I know I want a gospel drummer on almost every song because it brings a different element to things. Or, not every song has to have background vocals where you have 3 singers. You can have 2 songs where you have that and then the other songs I can do my own vocals. 

Learning how to build songs from the bottom up and learning what the needs are for each kind of song. I think I just got creative and had a lot of fun with stuff this time.

Photo taken by JMae Photography

RM: What do you hope the audience gets from this album?

TDH: I hope that people listening to it, one, can just be inspired that life is hard, we go through stuff. Sometimes it’s like, “Man, is there all there is to it?” But, the fact that we get to spend our eternity with God and it’s gonna be constant rejoicing. There’s gonna be no pain. There’s gonna be no sorrow. There’s gonna be this eternal hope that we just have. 

I hope that they can get that out of each song. That, like, you might be struggling now in life. You might be going through stuff, you might be having a difficult time. This is not all there is to it and there’s a hope for you. I hope that people can enjoy the sound of each song and the journey that it takes them on–from start to finish. And I hope that it will continue to reach a diverse crowd cause part of my calling that I feel that God has given me is to be a bridge to multiple races of people and people from all different backgrounds. So, I hope that both Christians and non-Christians can listen to it and be inspired. 

RM: Let’s go through each track. 

TDH: The first song is called “Jesus Reigns.” We talked about the background of that a little. It’s meant to be this opening song that’s just majestic. It has power vocals behind it. 

I watched a documentary. It’s a Hillsong documentary. The one they put out about their album, it’s called Awake My Soul. One thing that their worship leader, Brooke, said on there was that they needed a song that clearly presented the gospel to people. That’s something that they thought about when they were creating a project– we need a song that talks about the gospel. 

And, so, that’s what “Jesus Reigns” is on this album. The words “Come and listen to the story I’ll tell of how he saved my soul from the gates of Hell.” “Jesus Reigns” is the song that if you’re an unbeliever, you know who Jesus is. You’re able to hear what the message is. And if you’re a believer, it reminds you of your story of redemption.

RM: Okay.

TDH: That’s number one. Number two… Oh my gosh, I need to look up (laughing)...

(laughing)

The order of my album. I should be ashamed (laughing)

(laughing) It’s all good. It’s all good.

TDH: Alright. Number two is a song called “Get Ready.” Anytime I hear a song about the coming of Christ. It’s always, like, super deep and super sad. You know (singing) “People get ready!”

(laughing)

TDH: And I just, you know, this is too much! The coming of Christ is a celebration and we should be excited about it. “Get Ready” is a pop song. And the chorus is “Get ready! Get ready! Oh, He is coming for us.” 

I just wanted to create a fun song about the coming of Christ that people could bob their heads to in the car and get excited about it. It’s an anthem that people could really sing. Because I just always felt like songs based around Revelation or songs based around the coming of Christ were really intense.

Yeah.

TDH: And it’s just, like, this is too much. Let’s get excited about it. So “Get Ready” is meant to be an encouraging song that you can get excited about.

RM: And, then, “He Is Lord?”

TDH: This is a song that’s based off of my great-grandmother’s passing. She passed away this summer and it was hard. That was the first time that I kind of saw the process of death. Literally, the day before she was talking. I talked to her and sang to her, but she was slowly declining. And that next day that I saw her is when she started checking out. She couldn’t talk and her eyes were closing. She wasn’t too responsive. And it was really hard to watch that. I just started thinking about, “Man, I wonder what she could be thinking right now. I wonder, like, is she seeing Jesus right now? Is she gonna see him as soon as she passes away?” And I just began to think about, like: We live this life. We’re here for so long. We have our families. We have our friends. We go through different [things]. And, when it’s time for us to leave– that’s it.

It was hard to watch her slowly pass, but… she didn’t have to be in pain anymore. That’s one thing, my grandmother had a lot of health ailments and things. And she would always talk about the pain that she was experiencing… she doesn’t have to experience that now. 

So that song was inspired by “Soon and very soon, we will see the King.” It was inspired by the process of seeing her slowly leave the Earth. I began to read about life after death and what happens from a Christian perspective. I also thought about, I wanted a song that paid homage to our heritage as African Americans.

That song is probably my favorite on the album. My friend Jeremiah Miller is on that one. He sings the first verse and we duet it. 

RM: For “Here?”

TDH: “Here” is the one that I mentioned earlier that my friend, Gabe Lopez, was coming up with the riff on the guitar. It’s just kind of meant to be like a prayer song, or a song that God is speaking to us. Saying “When you’re lonely, that’s what I’m here for. Doubting, that’s wht I’m here for.”

In every season of your life, He’s available to you. It’s an acoustic song and actually Gabe, he’s on the guitar, his artist name is A Suddden Branch for Safety, and he’s featured on this song as well. 

RM: What about “Enough?”

TDH: “Enough” was a song about… [it came from] a season in my life where I was struggling with feeling satisfied just with God alone. Trying to satisfy myself with, you know, buying stuff. Or, trying to satisfy myself with spending time doing whatever. And it was just like, “No, like, God is actually enough for you.”

Sometimes I think as Christians we go to church, we sing these songs, but in the moment we might not actually believe what we’re singing. We might have to sing the song until we believe the words of it. “Enough” was that song for me. God you are enough for me. I need to sing this until I actually believe that you are enough…

And I did a music video for that one where I’m in this empty room and I’m writing things on post-it notes of, like, distractions. Some of those things were personal for me. Some of those things were things that I think others are distracted by. And at the end of the video, I’m taking things off the wall and the only thing you see remaining is God.

It’s the concept that we don’t have to rely on other things to satisfy us. God is enough.

RM: The final song, “Okay?”

TDH: “Okay” is about my struggle with anxiety and depression. I had a show in July. I opened up for a couple of artists. It had kind of been a long time since I had a performance outside of church. I was feeling really nervous about it because one of the musicians came late and we hadn’t practiced, and we were supposed to have had all this time. It was just supposed to be this small set, an acoustic kind of thing, so I wasn’t too worried about it, but I was really nervous. And it was kind of a different setting for me.I actually do better–the more people there are in a room, I feel more confident. The less people, like if it’s an intimate setting, I’m actually more nervous. So, it was a little more intimate and I did my songs, and it went fine. 

It wasn’t bad at all, but we’re our worst critics. So, in my mind I was just having all these thoughts. And I was like “You know, what am I doing? Am I an artist? Am I a worship leader? How do you combine the two?”

I was going through all this stuff. And I had my table, I set up my table with my merch, and some people donated to me that day. This one couple, I hadn’t met them before, and they gave $200 toward my project. And I was so thankful, but I remember leaving that night just feeling insecure as an artist and feeling like “What am I doing? What’s going on?”

So, I went to my best friend’s house… I just talked to her about how I was feeling. I talked to her and she was like “Hey Tiff, I think you should write about how you’re feeling.” And that night I went home and I wrote most of “Okay.” 

It’s a totally different vibe for me. My husband is an R&B artist, so that’s his thing. I sat at the piano and began writing this slow song that’s super honest and the first line is “Sometimes I wonder what they think of me. I begin to question who I’m meant to be. Am I called to this life of artistry? Or am I called just to be your masterpiece?” And it ends with just the words “It’s gonna be okay. It is gonna be okay.” on repeat. 

The song is a singer-songwriter kind of vibe. It has some R&B influence on it. It’s really ambient and mostly just piano. And I was inspired by my husband with some of the harmonies and things like that. But, it’s just an honest song. And the first time I got the master back, I played it for one of my co-workers and she just started crying on the spot. She was like, “Tiffany, I think that this could be a song for people who are Christian and people who aren’t because a lot of people are struggling with stuff.” And, so, I feel like that song got put on a playlist for a radio station and it’s a non-Christian station. I was super excited about that because I wanted my music not just to reach Christians. A lot of people struggle with anxiety and depression. 

I still listen when I’m going through something. Just as an encouragement for me.

Photo taken by JMae Photography

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Photos by JMae Photography

Writer Bio:

Shonette Reed is the founder and editor of Resolute Magazine. The South Central LA native enjoys cooking, exploring, and reading a good book when she's not working.

Q-and-A: Vash Wilson

Calvin is a 23-year-old college student finding his way in the world for the first time and navigating what it means for him to have a voice. In the middle of it all, he finds himself with powers that have a consequence every time he uses them.

In Curse, Vash Wilson has created a world in which readers can sit back and reflect on how they would approach their choices, if they would, and what it means to live in a world full of both choices and consequences.

Resolute Magazine: For those who haven’t heard of Curse yet, and those who haven’t read it, what is Curse about?

Vash Wilson: Curse is about this run-of-the-mill college student, Calvin, and one day he has these powers awakened inside of him and it’s through a traumatic experience. And he’s told once he gets these powers “You can use them, but there’s a caveat. There’s a catch: Every time you use these powers, a little bit of your life expectancy is depleted. But, not only is it depleted, you do not know how much life you have left.” 

So, Calvin has to wrestle with the choice of using his powers not only just for his own selfish gain, but also for those around him. Because he does run into some scenarios where the people that he loves, they need saving. 

It’s a tale of choice. You can put yourself in Calvin’s shoes and try to get a feel for how you yourself would make these choices. If you would make the choice. You know? Because with the catch of the life depleting, would you make a choice? It’s one of those morally gray types of deals. That’s what we’re tackling in the book Curse.

RM: You’ve written this book. It was released on February 6th and you’ve been sharing BTS about the book on social media. But, also, you’re self-published. To start, why did you name the book Curse?

Vash Wilson: I named it Curse because I look to look at how the story is and how the character and how the twist on the whole power thing is. I was trying to figure out “What could I name it that’s straight to the point?” Something that’s creative, but also that’s straight to the point, that’s not like “What could this mean?” or “What could that mean?” Like, when I tell you the description of it, you know, it jumps at you like “Okay. So it’s a curse.” It’s not like… it’s cool, yeah, because you have powers and everything but it’s consequences. You know what I mean? 

Mmhmm.

And, I wanted to separate myself from, like, the normal genre of, you know, superhero-type things. Because with those you’ve got like an Avengers type of event and the city is left in ruins and they go home and eat pizza. You know what I’m saying?

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

There’s no real responsibility on them for using their powers and whatnot. But, for this, it’s flipped. It’s “No, you got responsibility. But not only for everything around you, but for your life in general too.”

RM: So, in the book, what are some themes that will pop up for the reader?

VW: Um, I feel like an important one is choice. I feel as though a lot of times we don’t move on things. We decide to sit in the middle or on the sidelines, even in the story of our own lives. Because we don’t want to take that chance at failing. We don’t want to disappoint anybody. But, I feel as though you have to not be on the sidelines. You have to make a decision. At the end of the day, every choice you do or don’t make has a consequence. 

I think just playing around with them, is something that everybody could connect to. Especially with the main character because the main character’s in college. And even if you haven’t [gone] to college, you’ve been at that age where you’re tryna figure stuff out. You’re tryna see what works. Maybe your whole childhood people were saying “Hey, go to college. Get a degree. Get married. Have kids.” Like that whole American Dream type of deal. What a lot of people don’t really tell you is that it don’t work out that way. At least not as easy as it seems to work out that way. And, that might not even be what you want. 

That’s all going back to, like, the theme of choice. You’ve got a choice to make. And Calvin, the main character, he has a choice to make since he has these powers now. Whether he wants them to have an impact on his life to where he could use them to better his family, his friends, or his community, or he just doesn’t want to use them.

RM: With this book, you talk about consequences. What are some of the consequences that Calvin, the main character, finds himself having to face?

VW: He has a few consequences. The ones I can talk about without really spoiling anything, like I said in the beginning, he has these powers–a little bit of his life expectancy is depleted every time he uses them. So a consequence is, “Okay. If I saved this woman from getting robbed on the streets, from getting mugged, cool. But, how much did that just cost me?” 

Then it becomes a thing of morals. Because you can have some good standing ideas and good intentions of doing the right thing, but then you have to ask yourself “Okay. What happens if I do get married down the line? If I do have kids. Did I just take off a year that I would be having to spend with my kids?” You know?

Then, there are also consequences of how is he going to explain this to people. Because I set up the world of Curse, it’s not like the regular superhero world where people are aware there are people with powers, you know? So, just him having to deal with “Who can I tell? Who can I not tell? How much am I willing to go through before I’m able to tell somebody?” Having that inner fight within himself because all of these things are happening at the same time and it’s a little bit traumatic. Especially, how he gets his powers. So, for him, it’s a solo fight for a while. He has to figure out, like, do I want to jeopardize the safety of everybody around me including myself by letting them know what’s going on with me?

RM: As far as world-building, you set up a superhero story in Chicago. I know you’re from Chicago. Did that influence that? Or was it more “Yeah, I’m from Chicago, but I haven’t read many stories where superheroes exist here?”

VW: Reading books as a kid, even reading comics and watching cartoons, there were a lot of cities where they were made up or if they were real–they weren’t Chicago. Mostly New York, LA, and Philadelphia–the bigger cities. The more popular cities at the time. And, I always wanted Chicago to be at the forefront of something.

So, like, Batman films–the last decade they were filmed in Chicago. That’s cool. I get that. But as far as me reading and actually being able to get a feel of Chicago and some of the settings and just being able to see that, I thought that that was important for me. To not only see my city reflected in a certain light but also to see the characters and how they navigate in the city of Chicago.

RM: For the main character, you said we have the choice of sitting on the sidelines or just getting to it. Is there a time when Calvin notices he’s sitting on the sidelines of his own life and made the choice not to continue to do so?

VW: It goes back to what I was saying about consequences. There’s a certain place in the book where he looks at the consequences of his actions. Because… this isn’t like your average superhero-type story. There’s no super-armor. There’s no Iron Man like, you know things like that. It’s real. There’s no Disney-type of movie. The consequences are real. They are dire. People can die, you know, in the blink of an eye. And I think Calvin gets into these situations where he looks at the gravity of everything.

It’s one thing to sit there and say, “Okay, I’ll help out some. I’ll use my gifts sparingly.” It’s a whole ‘nother thing when you’re looking down the barrel of a gun and you have to really have that conversation in your head that’s like, “What am I doing? This isn’t some video game where I can respond 5 minutes later. This isn’t some made-up world. This is real life. I could die by just tryna play a superhero. By just tryna save people.” 

It goes back to what I was saying before is there really a bad answer to the question of “Is it a good thing for him to use his powers or not?” You know? It wrestles with that. 

RM: For Calvin and his powers, you talk about a lot of that risk of cost. Every time he uses his powers, his life expectancy drops. How did you reach that for this character? 

VW: For him… So, I’m a poet. I like to utilize everything that I have in a certain project and this project just so happened to be a novel. I looked at him and his power, which isn’t something random that I just gave him. It’s specific because I wanted the character to be relatable. I wanted the character to be likable, obviously, but I wanted the character to be relatable. 

I guess I could give it away it’s not that much of a spoiler. He has the power of, basically, persuasion… That’s his gifting on a basic level. So, I wanted that to go hand-in-hand with the fact that he is a college student still tryna figure it out. He never necessarily had a voice of his own and now he does. The problem is: He has the consequences of it. So, now, [Calvin] trying to navigate the fact that he has a voice in everything, now it’s a cost. It’s a bigger cost than he could have possibly imagined. 

I came up with that whole thing for [Calvin] because I wanted him to be really relatable, but I also wanted people to see growth within him. By the time you get to the end of the book, you see a completely different person than you did at the start of the book. Somebody who’s not as timid or letting the wind blow and take him as he sees fit.

RM: In being a poet, did you notice if those skills lend themselves in writing this novel?

VW: Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Starting at the basis of everything, I came out with my first poetry book in 2018. That set the groundwork for literally everything that’s going on today with the novel because I had to learn how to write the novel. I had to learn how to structure it. I had to learn how to go about self-publishing–all of those things. 

I didn’t start from ground zero with Curse. Because I had that experience built on from my poetry book. Not only that, but from me writing poetry for years, I have a voice. As a writer, you try to find your voice and things like that. That’s something that I already had. It was easy for me to transfer that to the novel. The only thing that was really challenging is now it has to be something that everybody can get a hold to and understand. With poetry, it’s “I can write this and it can be abstract and I know the theme. I know why I wrote it. How I wrote it. And this is what I got from it.” But somebody else can go and they can take something completely different from it, which is fine because that’s how the poem relates to them. And there’s a connection between both of us. I can’t do that with a novel. 

It has to make sense to everybody. I can’t just put something in there that’s like “Oh, man, that’s clever. That’s artistic. That challenges them to think.” Because then you’re reading and it’s like “This don’t make no sense. Why would he do that? Why would she do that? Why would they say that?” 

Me being a poet definitely lent itself in writing this book and making it easier. So, I didn’t have to start at ground zero with everything. 

RM: Getting into world-building… It’s always interesting to me, whether it’s a book about someone who has powers or someone whose moving to a new city, it’s interesting for me to see how that world is built. How did you do your research and the planning for building this world that Calvin is in?

VW: It’s something that I realized a few years prior because I was in the process of writing a novel before I kind of sort of shelved that and started writing my poetry book. So, I took a couple of writing classes and what I learned was that your world has to have rules. You can’t just make a world and do whatever you want with it. Even something as off the charts as something like Superman, right? He doesn’t have a weakness besides kryptonite, but you can’t just have him do anything. It has to be constraints on him, the world, and everything for it to be a good story. If not, you’re just writing to write. You know? 

The first thing was, with Curse, that whole deal with the powers–that was the starting point. From there, everything else branched out. Because now it’s like these powers, they exist, with this catch. “Does everybody know about it? Or does a certain amount of people know about it?... So, now, how do I go about selecting who gets powers and who doesn’t get powers? Do I even want to explain that? How did the powers originate in the first place?” And it branched out from there.

For me the world-building was fun. Just coming up with different rules and different scenarios for the characters whether they could really like sink or swim.

RM: Having a self-published book, what did that process look like for you?

(laughing)

RM: You’ve been through it before with the poetry book. 

VW: Awwwww, man.

RM: And I know that formatting and stuff is different between poetry and a novel… I know it can be a nightmare.

VW: Yeah.

RM: So, how’d it go, Fred?

VW: It… it was a pain in the butt to really do. Because even though I had already published a poetry book, it’s like I mentioned before, it’s not that big of an undertaking. I could write a poetry book in less than a year if I wanted to. Just sit down and hammer it out. The main thing is, it’s an expression of me. And I’m just hoping that it connects with people so people can read it and be like, “Oh, this is good poetry! I got this from it” or whatever. And that’s what it is. That’s simple. I know it may not sound simple, but it’s simple. It’s easy. 

The novel on the other hand was different. I had to understand world-building. I had to go and look up what type of font and the spacing thing for a general fiction book. I had to research how long a novel is typical. How many words? This is all before me even really started to write it. Then, I had to go and do a little bit of research on self-publishing or publishing. And when I finally got to writing, it’s writing that thing out one time–one complete time–and then going back and changing things and doing drafts.

Yup.

The fact of the matter is I can’t really enjoy the book because I have seen it so many times. So many times over the course of the like last year and a half. It’s, like, I’m sick of looking at it. It’s like when you are cooking for people and it’s time for you to eat, I don’t want to eat my own cooking. It’s one of those things. I’m proud of it. I love it. But, I can’t consume it like everybody else can.

I had to go and do the formatting. I had to go and get an editor. Not cheap, by the way.

Nope. Not at all.

And it’s cool because the editor is, like, one of my good friends. So I was happy to like pay her her money. Didn’t ask for like a friend discount or nothing like that, paid her her money. So, that was cool but it was kind of one of those heart-sinking things of like “Oh. Okay. This is… this is a lot. I’m not even finished with it yet.” 

I had done my drafts. But it’s different when you do your drafts and then you send it to an editor and they do their editing, and you gotta look at it and see what needs to be changed and altered. And you gotta figure it out. That’s a whole other set of drafts you got to do. Then, you gotta start looking into marketing. So, I really didn’t start marketing the book until 2 weeks [before release]. Which was a rookie mistake.

There was a lot of learning. A lot of re-reading, re-writing. I didn’t even mention the website. The website took me about 2 and a half days of trying to get it how I liked it. How I wanted it. I had to go and do a little photoshoot. I’m not–back when I was younger I used to be conceited, so, like if Instagram would have came out like 2009-2010, that would’ve been my app. Now, I’m an old grumpy man, no. I don’t wanna be taking pictures like that. It’s like, I get it. I understand it. Especially with me making reels and making skits like that–I’m having fun now, but at first it was like pulling teeth. Like me pulling my own teeth to do it. Those having fun with it, kudos to them because it’s a lot of work. 

But, I’d do it all over again. It’s been a heck of an experience. I’m more comfortable on camera now. Just even going on Facebook Live and Instagram Live, that wasn’t something that I normally did. But, I challenged myself to go and do it as a form of promo and marketing. 

It goes back to what I always say, in order to get comfortable you gotta get uncomfortable first. And there was a lot of uncomfortable things that I had to deal with in the writing process. And that’s just dealing with the writing process. I had a rough year last year.

Yeah.

My mom passed away last year. Four more relatives proceeded within the span of 6-7 months. On top of me writing this book. So, it was a lot. It was a lot. But it showed me what I was made of. What I am made of. To be able to push through and get this thing done. You know? Outside of dealing with all the loss of life last year, as far as the writing portion is concerned, I’d do it all over again.

RM: Final question: What made you want to write a novel?

VW: The initial one would be that when I was younger, that’s what I wanted to do. I wanted to be an astronaut before I realized that involved a lot of math. I already hated math, but they told me it involves a lot of math, and I was like “Whelp. That’s something that I’m not gonna get into.” So, my next big thing was writing because that’s something that I always loved. I always read these books, especially when I was younger– did they have Bluford Series books out there? 

They may have. I don’t remember.

Because it was a bunch of Black authors like writing scenarios and things like that really targeted Black children or Black teenagers at that time as far as like family drama. You know, brother and sister in a gang. Somebody moves and they get into a rough high school or something and they gotta transition. All of those sorts of things. 

Yeah. It sounds familiar.

Yeah. So, I read a bunch of those. I had a teacher that was really into challenging us to read. So, I read things like Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry.

That was a good one.

It was. I read things like Monster.

Another good one. 

Like, Scorpion. I read The Alchemist. So there was a lot of books that I read. The problem that I ran into was that I didn’t read anything that I really liked with the characters and people that looked like me. Because reading Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, Monster, and Scorpion and things like that they were cool, those were great books, but the scenarios and things that they characters were dealing with were like “This is a lot. I see this a lot.” It’s almost kind of sad in a way because it was a lot. A lot of trauma and pain and I was like “Why can’t I read about a Black guy who kills a dragon or something?”

Exactly.

You know?! And I was like “Where can I find that book?” So, that’s what really motivated me. But, the more recent answer was I was in men’s fellowship, and some of the guys were talking–I was listening. And then the whole initial idea of Curse hit me. Like, have you ever just sat there and you were just minding your business and you just had like a grand idea just come out of nowhere. Like that’s what it was for me. So, I got the whole premise of having powers and life depletes and everything and I’m like “Okay.” And it was from God. It had to have been because I wasn’t thinking about it at all. So, I give all the credit to Him. But once I got that, I took the ball and I just started running with it. 

I always wanted to write a novel, I just never knew necessarily what to write about.

And I think that was May 5, 2021. So, once I got that idea I went off with it. And that’s how we got here today with Curse. It was an idea that was fresh to me and interesting. And I knew what type of characters I wanted. I wanted a predominantly Black cast of characters. I wanted it to be something that yeah they gon’ have their issues, but it was gonna be uplifting. You know what I’m saying? Not any trauma-inducing things like that… I know I wanted to do something different. That really drove me to write Curse.

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Cover Illustration by Shawn Haliburton

Writer Bio:

Shonette Reed is the founder and editor of Resolute Magazine. The South Central LA native enjoys cooking, exploring, and reading a good book when she's not working.

Profile: Kezia The Poet

Young Kezia Snipe waited eagerly with her peers in her home church in Memphis, Tennessee as her Sunday School teacher handed out little memory cards. On them, pictures of popular stories from the bible that they had to remember and later, relay to everyone what was occurring in detail. She credits much of her growth and development to those formative years spent in church that shaped and molded her through singing in the children’s choir, Easter speeches, and youth events. Now in her thirties, Kezia conveys vivid imagery, gut-wrenching emotions and bible-laced themes in the poetic form of spoken word. Her latest work Girls and Elephants makes her writing come alive and echoes what was forged in secret places on stages. In fact, her poetry unfolds the anguish, lament, and labor of a dedicated writer in audible form. 

“I promised myself I’d stop writing about writing, but I never vowed to stop writing about fighting no gloves. I'm Mike Tyson, biting ears off the silence so the darkness isn’t the only one who hears my violence. You want torment? Then stop writing, stop creating, get distracted, mental fracture, ears and hearts and minds and eyes all are canvas but out of balance because anxiety sends shaking creatives packing” – “Kept” from Girls and Elephants by Kezia the Poet

Snipes began writing at 7-years old and the first words she ever wrote rhymed. From there, she became immersed in reading and writing. These memories were something she held dear to her heart and eventually became a part of her life. She often would be seen surrounded by books. In her bathroom, in her bedroom, in whatever space she occupied, books were there. Writing became her comfort and way of expressing her feelings up until middle school when she stopped writing. During her freshman year at Wooddale High School, in her hometown of Memphis, Tennessee, her acting teacher, Louise Bennett approached her and encouraged her to come to a meeting for the speech and drama club after school. From there she joined the club and stayed on through senior year of high school. Becoming a member of the speech and drama club gave her confidence in performing and being on stage, and this led to her falling in love with the arts and especially poetry. 

In her twenties, Snipes became a regular in and on the open mic scene as a spoken word poet. Never letting go of her religious upbringing, she truly began following Jesus after challenging conversations with people in her audiences after stepping off-stage. These encounters were the catalyst for her digging deeper into the Christian faith. One specific conversation with a Pastor of a thousand-member church sticks out in her mind where he said that her poem had the clearest explanation of the gospel he had ever heard, and he struggled to articulate the gospel in his own sermons. 

“I just kind of stood there shocked, I think because it was a glimpse into his humanity, that kind of shook me up because we tend to whether we mean to or not, put pastors on a pedestal, and at the same time we’re robbing them of their humanity when they’re broken and human just like we are. My view of church and how it is and faith and how it exploded in that moment. The notion kind of developed that everybody is trying to make it whether they’re in the pulpit or the pit, we’re all on this journey trying to make it, that was a wakeup call for me and caused an adjustment of my perspective,” Snipes says. 

This experience demonstrated her gifted ability as a poet. Girls and Elephants, an 8-track poetry album is her opus, and each poem focuses on girls and women in different scenarios and situations from mother and daughter struggle relationships to dealing with abuse. The title—Girls and Elephants––came to be after learning how females lead elephants’ packs.

“She is the one who has to be vigilant, she is the one who is hyper-intelligent, she is the one who has this beautiful relationship with the baby elephants, and whenever they’re migrating, she leads them to wherever they’re going to go. To me the message rings out that women were always capable, women always had the intelligence, always had the ability to do what needed to be done. That’s what women do, we do what needs to be done, so girls are the elephants in the room” Snipes says. 

One of the elephants in the room is addressed on the track 1:15am, which began with a phone call from one of Snipes friends at 1:15 in the morning, revealing to Snipes the emotional turmoil she felt over the death of a sexual abuser who was prominent in the church. Then there’s the upbeat “Blessing for the Daughters” that details Snipes shuffling her way through adolescence to adulthood with little to no familial guidance, fighting for her place in the world. 

“This blessing is for the daughters, who did not have the choice to choose. God Bless the daughters, who have a hard time accepting help because throughout her whole life, she could only really rely on herself. This is for the daughters, who could not carve out time to properly grieve the lack of capacity or presence or willingness so little room for reprieve for loss and void were much more consistent companions than her family.” – Excerpt from poem “Blessing for the Daughters”

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Other tracks like the viral poem Narrative, expresses the anguish over black lives lost to police brutality and racist-incited violence. This project is one that Snipes deems Grammy-worthy, and one that she hopes will inspire people from all walks of life. “I always felt like I had to police myself when it came to how I expressed myself. I felt like it had to be in a certain kind of box, it had to be displayed a certain way. I did use some restraint with Girls and Elephants, but I think it came together beautifully. I think the production is wonderful and I think it’s my most well-thought-out project. I think it gives something to everybody, I’m really proud of it and I think it’s some of my best work,” Snipes says. 

In the era of “Me Too,” Issa Rae’s and Black Girl Magic, Snipes describes herself in the poem “Homage” as an inquisitive little black girl with more books than she had friends, who now as an adult is comfortable in her own skin. Unapologetically Black, Christian, female, and a poet who has a way with words. 

Stream Girls and Elephants on Spotify or Apple Music

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Writer Bio:

Aasha Francis is a native Chicagoan from the southside of the city. She holds a bachelor’s degree in broadcast journalism from Columbia College Chicago and writes in her spare time. She serves in ministry alongside her husband in the Englewood neighborhood on the southside of Chicago and is a talented artist, songwriter, and producer. Artistically known as Aasha Marie, she is currently promoting her debut album “While You Were Sleeping” (WYWS) released in 2020.

Keep up with Aasha Marie on IG: aasha_marie or visit her website: www.aashamarie.com