The Bite Magazine - Spring/Summer 2022 - Issue 31

A ONE-WOMAN SPOKENWORD SHOW Cristina Lloyd gets an insight into poet Tanica Psalmist’s challenges as a female and woman of colour in every facet of life. bitetheatre S pokenword poet Tanica Psalmist performed her One-Woman Spoken Word Show at the multi-award-winning independent Omni- bus Theatre in Clapham, south London, in tribute to International Women’s Day. Rephrasing the word as ‘Woo-man’s Day’, she delivered a fusion of fierce, exotic and vulnerable poetry based on her insights as a female and woman of colour, reciting individual dialogues on varied subjects with expres- sions of tone, sound demonstrations and action. The event occurred in a theatre room, with a chair set against a brick wall. Tanica addressed the audience wearing a long flowing dress with polka dot balloon sleeves. She spoke about women’s desire for motiva- tion and how we sometimes feel agitated, frustrated, appreciated and depreciated. The experiences we go through when we don't feel valued or our bodies are subjected to unwanted attention—our fight to gain control of situations that sometimes seem beyond our reach. In ‘Fetish Fantasy’, the poet, now dressed in a pink ruched dress, talks about men’s fetish, perversion and infatuation. Yet, she describes an erotic fantasy encounter of a man dreaming about her brown skin smothered in strawberries, cherries and whipped cream. These exotic musings have her feeling like intense heat burning on the insides and sweating buckets throughout the night. The dialogue gets more erotic as she narrates their passionate rendez- vous and the sensational shivers running down her spine. She envisions smooth skin sweating in the sheets and the windows evaporating steam as she gasps, “Baby boy, gonna lose my breath”. The fetish fan- tasies race through her mind in a fast and furious style. This mystery man has never experienced ‘fine chocolate pudding’ or ‘moist brownie’ before. Then in the morning, the realisation of an exotic dream hits and the man tells her some things, to which she responds with, “Love me for me, do not dream.” Her following recitation, ‘A Wo-Man’, empathises that women are more than the “superficial of see- ing and touching.” Whether traditional, modern or old-fashioned, we switch it up and our girl pow- er abilities level up. Our hormones mature into a ‘beautiful, mysterious landscape’ yet as we learn from our mistakes to build strength from failures, we forgive even when we are humiliated, mistreat- ed and crushed. However, we are multidimensional, multitalented, multifaceted and graced with multi- purpose. Tanica highlights the emotional traumas that wom- en go through and the things we desire, such as free- dom and equality. We continue to seek the truth de- spite being demolished, stigmatised and criticised. We are bearers of life, becoming mothers, teachers, carers, lovers, fighters, embracers and survivors. Feminine beauty is the socially constructed notion of physical attractiveness. Even when we are told “We are beautiful” by infatuated eyes, we should re- spond with “Yes, as we’ve always been.”