Video of the Week: Saul Williams & the Power of Spoken Words

One of my favorite Poets is the remarkable Saul Williams. His ability to play words in ways that bring new meaning and force unorthodox thoughts through rhyme, cadence and knowledge has played a major role in my understanding of communication. He is a beautiful word-smith and is a fellow believer that poetry as a verbalized performance gives certain pieces a sense of power and beauty that is missing if just read silently from a page. In this weeks clip Saul shows this masterfully. This comes from an older film he did entitled SLAM, and the spoken word poem is, I believe, a section from his Amethyst Rock. The scene is set in the context that Saul’s character has been unfairly arrested and placed in the D.C. prison system and while incarcerated becomes the target of harassment. Another inmate, who also happens to have it out for Saul, is coming up to him with the intention to kill him for some reason I cant remember. All of the sudden, and Saul knowing whats about to go down, he erupts into this spoken word monologue capturing the startled attention of his supposed killer, other inmates, and the in-prison English teacher. He directs his words at his killer but the aim of his poem is to bring the killer into a close relationship with himself showing him the “bigger picture,” if you will, of why it is all these black men are in prison in the first place. Whether you agree with his message or not, one thing is clear; this is a marvelous portrayal of what the power of speech can do and how words and thoughts can change minds and hearts in an instant. No wonder our Lord chose the simple preaching of words to spread His message and Kingdom throughout the world.

About Me, the Author.

I am a 25 year old D.M.V. resident committed to a life of freedom only found in submission to Him. That is, I live in the D.C./Maryland/Virginia metropolitan area and I am first and foremost a Christian committed to a life of humble yet bold servitude in and through and to Jesus Christ.
I am currently enrolled at Capital Bible Seminary working towards a masters degree in Divinity as well as theology and hope to serve my Lord as well as His church to the best of my ability through His grace. I also serve at and love dearly Trinity Community Church in Bowie, MD. http://www.trinitycc.org
I’ve been blessed to have lived in every continent except Australia and Antarctica and so have seen a large portion of Gods beautiful creation both geographically and culturally, but I now live in and wonderfully enjoy the culture of the D.C. area.
These two realms, the grace of God through salvation in Christ and the beauty of Gods ingenious creation through a cities own unique culture and society, have been merged together in my mind to create SoulahGratia. It is a poetic play on the latin phrase Sola Gratia which the Protestant Reformers championed as a call to recognize that salvation, in fact all of life is of grace, come from God alone. The Soul of the Washington D.C. and its surrounding playgrounds merged with the Grace of God in all of life through Christs work on the cross has birthed this blog SoulahGratia.
As my life as well as this blog grows, hopefully I can add to and increase the depth of this autobiographical section. Untill then, enjoy the bloggage!