Passing the Mic: Black and Indigenous Youth Futurities with Jayda Marley
The future of Black youth, Indigenous youth, and youth of colour is of the utmost importance to Jayda Marley (The Poet Mj) in her work as a poet, performing artist and arts educator.
Growing up as a young child in the Jane and Finch community in Toronto, Jayda Marley used the arts as an outlet to express herself. In elementary school, she learned that her mother wrote poetry, and after reading some of her mother’s poetry, she was inspired to write her own. With the encouragement of her mother and teachers, Jayda Marley, who was an avid writer and reader, became part of the spoken word scene in Toronto and competed for some time.
That was until she realized that it was not the space for her anymore.
For Jayda Marley, who speaks of radical influences like Angela Davis, James Baldwin and Malcolm X, poetry itself has the power to be radical, and it is even more radical in the hands of the youth. Ultimately, her message about youth, liberation and our future takes centre stage. “It is really radical that [the youth] speak up about the messages that they have,” said Jayda Marley.
“Nobody was with you in that notebook when you were writing; nobody was with you in that room when you wrote this poem or telling you how to say it or when to say it. There's no teacher telling you if it's right or wrong, and so I think it is really radical that you get on stage.”
We discussed Jayda Marley’s upbringing, her visions for the future, her love for the youth, her experiences as an Afro-Indigenous woman and artist in both Black and Indigenous spaces, and what community means to her as a poet, teacher and artist.
Photo: Roya DelSol
IDARESIT THOMPSON: I’ve been told that poets do not want to be asked about their writing all their time but about their thoughts. So, what have you been thinking about lately?
JAYDA MARLEY: I've been thinking about how we can create our own future. In the sense that sometimes I feel really bound by society's views on what I should do in life. And sometimes I really think to myself, “is there a way we can make a future that doesn't include this and that does include art? Being able to really do what we want to do?” So, really, I think what’s been heavy on my mind is the future.
IT: What sort of future are you thinking of?
JM: I wrote a poem last Black History Month called “A Ticket to the Revolution.” It was about how, across the diaspora, we've all been affected by anti-Black racism. I feel a lot of the time that people who are artists don't often talk about what's in store for us. We always, always, always go back to what's happened to us, which is so important, obviously. But, sometimes, when you want to be a voice and a model for the youth, it's really important that you give them hope and a sense of future.
So I think the future really is just about rebuilding what we want for ourselves and taking our own paths. It's not about taking the path that the white man wrote for us, or what our teachers say we have to take, or the road that they say we can't take.
It's really just about what we want to do. It's really just about freedom. Like real, real freedom. Not this vague sense of freedom and this little sense of safety. No. It's real, real freedom.
You deserve to choose your own path, and you deserve to choose what you want to do, where you want to go and how you want to live.
Photo: Roya DelSol
“You deserve to choose your own path, and you deserve to choose what you want to do, where you want to go and how you want to live. ”
IT: How did you get started as a poet?
JM: I grew up in the Jane and Finch community, so I saw a lot of the things that people did to prosper and rise above, but I never really knew what I wanted to do. When I was around 13 or 14, these girls from Unity Charity came to my school and performed. I had never seen performance poetry before. I didn't know you could do that. So I studied and watched performances and performed my first poem at school. I started competing when I was 16 and competed for a while. I received a championship, and after that, I decided I wanted to stop competing and just focus on the art and on teaching because I realized that it was such a great outlet for me and a lot of other people from communities like the one I grew up in.
I've seen it do many great things for a lot of troubled youth, for a lot of youth who feel lost, broken or hopeless.
I hope to continue doing it forever.
Photo: Roya DelSol
IT: You’ve mentioned before that you are Afro-Indigenous. How has your identity impacted what you choose to write about, or does it even impact what you choose to write about?
JM: I try to focus a lot on intersectionality in my poetry. I discuss my identity and how the parts of me intertwine with each other and how I relate to other people in my own communities in that way. I try to speak and shed light on anti-Blackness, how it feels to be different, and how it feels to not look the part of certain identities. But I really just focus on intersectionality, Indigeneity and Afro-futurism and how those communities both can come together in the future. I think that it's really important that those two communities create a strong knit bond in order to create a future that we are actually a part of.
IT: Has your identity impacted the way you navigate community, especially within art circles?
JM: Sometimes it feels, especially in Indigenous communities, like a points game. You get this many points for knowing this, and you get that many points for being here or knowing more routes to your community. But, over the years, I have found a lot of community and have found an enormous group of Afro-Indigenous women who are going through the same experiences.
There's a lot of us all over the place, from Nova Scotia to BC. We’re everywhere. Growing up, I didn't understand that. But once I started to really be in the community and meet people, I realized that I'm not as different as I thought I was. For me, it was just navigating and being okay with myself. It wasn't ever really about making other people accept me because I really don't care about that. You go by your own experiences, you speak on the things that you know––and the things that you don't know, you leave space for the people who do know.
I think it's important to know that not all of us are the same. And it's important to know that there's no look to anything.
“But I really just focus on intersectionality, Indigeneity and Afro-futurism and how those communities both can come together in the future. I think that it’s really important that those two communities create a strong knit bond in order to create a future that we are actually a part of.”
Photo: Roya DelSol
IT: Are there any people with whom you are in community? Any other poets who have informed the way you write or what you choose to write about?
JM: I'm going to keep it so, so, so real. There has not been a space that I've been in that hasn't held me back in the sense of my voice. I think that it's really important that we understand that many Black people have different views and different political stances.
I think that a lot of the spaces that I was in when I was younger . . . have nothing to do with me, and they have nothing to do with what I think and how I think. I think that a lot of these spaces are afraid to be radical, and I think they're actually afraid of the word radical.
I met my first mentor––her name was Mahlikah––when I was younger. She's an Afro-Indigenous poet. She was so badass, so radical. No one could tell her anything about her writing and what she had to say. And yet, people still wanted to listen to her. And so I think that she is definitely one of the people who motivated me and told me that all the stuff that I was seeing in front of me, all these competitions didn’t have to be the future for me––even if I wanted to continue to make money from my art.
So, there were definitely a few people along the way who guided me.
But I think that a lot of the spaces that I was in were definitely holding me back. Because I think that a lot of the funding that we get in the city comes from a certain type of person and that a lot of art spaces are afraid to combat the ways [these people] think.
Photo: Roya DelSol
IT: Any parting words about who Jayda Marley (The Poet Mj) is?
JM: Wow, that's a big question. I believe so much in the voice that we all have and the voice that we are able to give to others without even knowing it.
There's a quote that I heard so long ago, and I always think about it. It says, “don't be a voice for the voiceless; just pass the mic.”
For me, growing up, I didn't have any mentors who passed the mic to me when I wanted to say something. It was always someone speaking on my behalf. I think that as artists and as creators, once we learn how to manoeuvre with our craft, it's really important that we pass it on.
We need to teach the youth that everything they have to say is important and anything that they're going through is real.
This interview has been edited and condensed.