Poetry

Iron Heartbeat

We must never forget the beginnings of the steelpan and its incredible role in the fight for
Black and Brown humanity, autonomy, culture, and memory in the face of brutal and bloody
oppression. The swelling joy bursting from the bellies and chests of the listeners was once
tainted with fear of violence, overridden by the red-hot will to play anyway; to sing and
dance and be anyway.

-najjablesse, 2024

I wear my love for pan on my sleeve. More accurately, I wear it on my shoulder as an abstract pan played by an abstract panman, complete with a floating heart nearby.

I have been inadvertently searching for a way to combine my deep love for pan with an equally profound love for writing. Enter: ethnomusicology.

This essay is the hat I threw into the ring, the first brick lain in a foundation upon which I intend to build my academic legacy. How lucky am I that I found a way to delve even deeper into my special interests and make a career out of it?

Happy reading. Love.


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