Show Notes
Spoken word is a deeply powerful, and often prophetic, art form. It has the power to uncover beauty and tragedy, point out the just and unjust, and help us look inward and outward to see all the ways that God is inviting us to deeper faithfulness.
On this episode of Nuance, Case interviews Shawn Welcome, Orlando’s official Poet Laureate. Shawn reflects on his Guyanese roots and the cultural influences on his work. He explores the craft of spoken word, as well as his work as a spoken word artist, noting the intersections of sociology, performance poetry, and his own faith journey. Shawn emphasizes the impact that art can have to bring about justice and beauty, as well as its ability to reflect the creativity of God.
Resources from the episode:
Shawn’s Websites: https://www.shawnwelcome.com/ and http://www.brandgenius.studio/
Shawn’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/shawn.welcome/
Nuance is a podcast of The Collaborative where we wrestle together about living our Christian faith in the public square. Nuance invites Christians to pursue the cultural and economic renewal by living out faith through work every facet of public life, including work, political engagement, the arts, philanthropy, and more.
Each episode, Dr. Case Thorp hosts conversations with Christian thinkers and leaders at the forefront of some of today’s most pressing issues around living a public faith.
Our hope is that Nuance will equip our viewers with knowledge and wisdom to engage our co-workers, neighbors, and the public square in a way that reflects the beauty and grace of the Gospel.
Learn more about The Collaborative:
Website: https://collaborativeorlando.com/
Get to know Case: https://collaborativeorlando.com/team/
Episode Transcript
Case Thorp
Hello everybody and welcome to this episode of Nuance, where we’re seeking to be faithful in the public square. I’m Case Thorp and so glad to be with you. Please like and subscribe. You know, when you share these episodes on your social media or with a friend, it really helps us out to spread the word and to grow. So if you’ve been listening the last couple episodes, you know it’s a new day for the Collaborative. We’ve taken our focus on faith and work and we’ve kind of expanded the lens, if you will, our impact in the public square and the greater culture. But of course, faith and work is still a key part of that. And today we’re going to talk to a good friend of mine, an artist and kind of dig into how an artist’s work integrates faith and work. So even our show Nuance has been a little nuanced, if you will, we’re doing bi-weekly guests on particular topics appropriate to culture and living our faith.
But also you may notice if you subscribed in your feed, we’re doing a thing called Nuance Formed for Faithfulness. These are 10-minute episodes dropped each week that help us form our hearts and form them well for the work God has for us. And it follows with the Christian liturgical calendar. So, check those out. Well, I am thrilled to have Shawn Welcome here today. Shawn, welcome.
Shawn Welcome
I’m grateful to be here, Dr. Case Thorp, appreciate the platform.
Case Thorp
Well, I have been such a big fan and respect your work so very deeply. The few times we’ve gotten to work together have been a joy. And so when you agreed to be on today, it was good to hear. Now I want everybody to know a bit more about you, so let me, can I brag on you?
Shawn Welcome
Sure, yeah.
Case Thorp
Let me brag on you so folks can appreciate Shawn Welcome. So he is a proud Afro-Guyanese American. Now that’s a cool term. I want to dig into a little bit that more. But he uses his gift of words to inspire, entertain, and encourage and educate. So he is an expert in a form of art called the spoken word. And I just appreciate and have grown to appreciate really showing that medium because of you. Now you’re still the poet laureate, right here for the city of Orlando.
Shawn Welcome
Yes, sir. Yes, sir.
Case Thorp
That’s so cool. I didn’t know that we had a poet laureate. I knew we had one for the country, but that’s really cool.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, you know states if they decide to adopt one they can, cities likewise can create a process by which they select their poet laureate and in 2017 the mayor of Orlando decided that Orlando should have a poet laureate. And so I’m the second one who was installed in 2021. So it’s a fairly new position and understandable why people may not even know we have a poet laureate, but hopefully through my, like the way I move, that changes and people come to understand there’s people representing poetry and storytelling and literary arts on behalf of our region. And so each one of us will be different and we’ll have one a few years at a time. And I think it’s just better for the city.
Case Thorp
That’s really cool. So cool. Well, Shawn has done even more than that. And this is partly the reason he is our poet laureate. He founded and presently hosts the longest-running weekly open mic in central Florida called Diverse World. He is the president of Next Level Speakers Academy, which I want to hear more about. Y’all, he has done all kinds of stuff. NBA commercials for the Magic, written and performed at the Orlando Philharmonic, One Pulse Foundation, University of Central Florida, Valencia, Full Sail University, Dr. Phillips Center, Bethune-Cookman University, and so much more. Shawn has a BA in English Literature, and hello, that makes so much sense. And you’re still working on a master’s, right, in sociology at UCF?
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, there’s a pause button on that. It’s one of those unfinished things looming over my head. Halfway through my thesis, I really put my foot on the gas with my speaking career. And so that is an unfinished thing that at some point I’ll hop back in and finish, hopefully.
Case Thorp
Okay. You know the Lord’s time. And married to Jana. And dude, you have five children. Like, why? Wow. I’m just tired saying five children.
Shawn Welcome
Yes, sir. Yeah, we juggle a lot here, but you know, we do our best.
Case Thorp
What are their age ranges?
Shawn Welcome
26, 23, 10, 8, and 2.
Case Thorp
Dude, you have a 26-year-old? You look 26.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, my wife was a teen mom. She had two very early. Those kids became my kids when we got married. And then we had three more together. So we have a blended family and that’s all of us.
Case Thorp
Okay. That’s really cool. Well, so our listeners don’t mistake my heart, children are a blessing, they’re wonderful. They just take a lot. I know, the family is awesome, but yeah, I’ve got my three and that’s enough. Okay. So Afro-Guyanese American, I don’t think this is a God thing, but just a few weeks ago, I’m stumbling around on YouTube and see, I love these little YouTube 20-minute videos on parts of the world I’m just not familiar with. And I watched this whole thing on Guyana and its history and it’s economy and that sort of thing, but tell us a little bit more about that in your roots.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, so, Guyana is the only English-speaking country in South America. Both of my parents are from Guyana, born and raised, and immigrated to the U.S. in the late seventies, early eighties, and I was born early eighties. And, yeah, growing up in Brooklyn, that’s where I was born. For the first few years, seven, eight years of my life, I would visit Guyana in the summers. When I moved to Orlando at about the age of 10, there was a little gap where I was in Jacksonville for a year and a half. But when I moved to Orlando at 10, I would visit New York in the summers. But consistently, like in my households, it was always Guyanese culture in terms of the food, the music, the…I don’t know, we have our own thing, but you could liken it to just Caribbean culture in general. So yeah, there’s just certain songs we listen to, and certain foods we make at Christmas called Pepper Pot. We have a tradition of baking bread to go with the Pepper Pot, so I bake bread and stuff, too. Yeah.
Case Thorp
Oh, okay. Well, and certainly the seedbed for your work today and those rhythms and the words.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, I mean, I don’t know if I would liken that to Guyanese culture as much as just African-American storytelling, that kind of vibe, which, you know, you have the trajectory from oral storytelling to the Harlem Renaissance to hip hop culture to spoken word, where the emphasis is a lot on tonality, right? And painting these pictures to tell these stories and to kind of use words as a way of communicating effectively but, you know, orally.
Case Thorp
Well, on that note, give us a sense of what is spoken word.
Shawn Welcome
So my definition, my loose definition, spoken word poetry is poetry spoken out loud. So the way I think we conceptualize poetry by and large is through reading it, right? It’s on the page, people will have structured verses or even if it’s free verse meaning there is no structure to it. It’s just creative words telling a story expressing your inner world, your outer world, your perspective on life on the page and it’s read. Spoken word poetry, conversely, if that’s the right word is taking that work that’s on page and performing it out loud. You’re speaking those words, right? So we would just call that spoken word poetry and there’s a whole genre, it’s almost like a separate genre of arts where there’s the blending of poetry and theater together to communicate whatever it is you’re trying to communicate.
Case Thorp
So it’s not necessarily with rhythm, with emphasis. So if I’m just at a Barnes and Noble literature night and stand up and read Emily Dickinson out loud, would that still qualify as spoken word?
Shawn Welcome
I think so, yeah, I would say so because it has left the page. And so anytime it leaves the page to me, it’s spoken word. There are some works that have more poetic elements than others, right, like some people would just write content down and say it and it sounds like you’re blogging out loud, but it’s not necessarily poetry per se. So there’s like varying degrees of spoken word poetry, some that are more prose that’s just said out loud, which I guess could be considered spoken word poetry or spoken word. But to me, the poetic elements, the creative language combined with saying it out loud is really, to me, the essence of spoken word poetry.
Case Thorp
Okay, that’s what I’m understanding it to be. At the end, friends, we’re going to have Shawn do a longer piece, but Shawn, could you just give a little ditty right now so if somebody’s not familiar with spoken word, they could get a sense.
Shawn Welcome
Okay, this poem is called Reasons Why, and it’s reasons why I like living in Orlando. So it’s a short piece about our hometown.
When we say or you see, “My City Beautiful…”
Have you ever asked why?
Because visitors might say palm trees have voices of their own…
Speak for themselves amidst a cotton candy day sky… And a rainbow lit night sky. Is it also true for you who reside?
Betwixt the magical water rides.
In the cool shadow of the Orlando Eye, Caribbean roots plant well in this soil.
They say “My City Beautiful,” but why?
Because date night at the Robinson. Cocktail vibes.
Goff’s ice-cream still survives… Jeremiah’s, I got to have…
Because Lechonera and Mi Banderas and Reyes on Orange Ave.
At Mamak, I like to meet…
Or maybe it’s me. I like to eat
Roti shops to Seafood Station or Sister Honey’s for a treat.
We welcome the retirees from the North and from the West…
Celebrate arts in the street from Immerse to Fusion Fest…
Because the world comes to us… We don’t seek validity…
Orlando’s way to cool to complain about humidity…
Wet n’ Wild, we’ll never forget ya’
Slide down Bomb Bay, they loosed ya’
We don’t forget
We honor the past while still embracin’ the future
Because innovation is in our veins…
Because Magic…
Because Lions…
Because growth comes with the sound of the SunRail over the iron!
An electrifying city!
Resilience could be a tagline…
Because the long lines to give…
Because our pulse never flatlined!
Because beauty’s beyond visual…
When you feel it, you can’t deny…
So when we say or you see “My City Beautiful…”
Just remember the reasons why.
Case Thorp
Dude. Wow. Like I’ve got Jesus-measles like goosebumps, dude. Beautiful.
Shawn Welcome.
So that’s a sampler, I guess. Thank you.
Case Thorp
I mean, okay, listeners, viewers, pull back, go rewind this moment and listen to that again. I mean, there’s so much visual imagery there of cultural things that we’re used to hitting for Orlando residents, but then the overlay of the economy and the people and the food and the culture. Well, thank you. Oh, that was great. So tell us a little bit about your journey in life and how this artistic expression just became now your full-time living.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, so I was, as mentioned earlier, born in Brooklyn, New York. I moved down to Jacksonville for a year when I was about eight years old and then down further to Orlando at about the age of 10. Grew up mostly in Orlando. It was a new place at the time, but obviously just acclimated. The summers I would spend with my dad in New York, my senior year of high school, however, I moved back up to Brooklyn to complete my final year of high school. And it was in that environment that I was in a hyper-creative environment. A lot of my classmates and people on my basketball team were all like doing raps and, you know, rapping in cyphers. And, you know, it was kind of like this, just the cultural thing that you did, or people did, and, you know, it formed crowds and the whole nine.
But me being the new kid again, having no network up there, because most of my network was kind of formed in, my social network was formed in Orlando, I was kind of like a blank slate and very impressionable. And, you know, new environment, new school, new friends, like, you know, almost like hit, control, alt, delete in my mind.
And it was a good time for new information to come in for me. And so being in that environment, I asked myself a simple question, like, can I do this? Like what I was seeing, you know, and these were kids my age. This is right and perform like I was watching my friends do. Right? And so I wrote like a little rap thing and showed it to one of my friends and was like, yeah, it’s my first time trying this out. What do you think? And he thought I was joking. He thought I was playing along. He was like, oh, you’ve been writing for, you’ve been doing this. So I took that as a sign of confidence. And yeah. And I thought it was good. I don’t remember it now, but I thought it was good. And that whole senior year of high school, I just wrote lyrics and brought them back to these settings, right?
Where people were performing and sharing and stuff like that. And so that’s all I did, play ball, write, perform, try to graduate high school, you know? And eventually did, and I brought, after graduating, ended up moving back down to Orlando and started sharing my new talent that I discovered, my senior year of high school with my friends on campus.
And African American Cultural Society or A Squared CS was a program at Valencia College. And they had an open mic type of showcase thing. And one of my buddies, he was actually just in town yesterday. He’s like, Shawn, you need to go up there, man. Do your thing, man. Share your raps or your lyrics or whatever. And so I went up, that was the first time I performed in a formal setting, like microphone, audience.
You know, whatever. And when I was finished, people responded well to it, right? And so I started looking for other open mic nights around town and started to get connected with a community of people who did that same thing and became exposed to different styles of writing, different ways to tell stories, different literary devices that people would use to express themselves. And it was the combination of connecting with those friends and, um, exposure to national poetry slam, which is a national poetry performance competition that really opened my mind up to what was possible. And I just kind of nurtured the gift over time and, you know, the rest of the history.
Case Thorp
Yes. Now you talked about in high school, you discovered and developed this gift in the midst of your friend set. What about the classroom? Were there any teachers that helped you develop this?
Shawn Welcome
No, I don’t think spoken word is even taught in schools like that. You know, it’s more form and very Eurocentric in terms of like stylistically, you know, so it just, everything that I learned came from like inspiration from hip hop culture and kind of like in between the cracks of school, you know? But it has the same like literary value nonetheless, right? I teach spoken word poetry workshops presently, and I have a way of kind of introducing that in a more, I guess, structured kind of style. But that’s not a knock against English teachers. I’m just answering the question in terms of where I learned what I do from.
Case Thorp
Right.
Shawn Welcome
It was a bunch of no-name 16- and 17-year-olds.
Case Thorp
But you did decide English literature for undergraduate study. Was that because you knew this was your future?
Shawn Welcome
I did. So I was working at four high schools at the time running a program called, I was a counselor for a program called POPs, Professional Opportunities Program for Students. And this is kind of like a mentorship-type program where you introduce certain life skills to those students. I had them dress up every other Wednesday with their shirts and it is kind of, anyway.
At one of those schools, I received such a strong rapport. I’d gotten such a strong rapport with the students that I was working with that the faculty and administrators and teachers noticed and was like, Shawn, you should teach here. Forget the nonprofit, you should teach here. And I was like, I don’t have a degree. What are you going to do with that? You going hire me as a teacher without no bachelor’s? And they were like, if you go back to school, we will hire you as a teacher. And so that was the inspiration for me going back to school wanting to have some sort of stability in my life and my growing family and stuff like that. So I went back to school and I was like, I don’t want to go to school that has nothing to do with what I’m interested in. So they at that time, University of Central Florida had English as a major with a creative writing track.. And so I was like, okay, well that fits. Right. This is 2013. I enroll.
I get accepted, I start taking classes, and I did not like the creative writing courses for me, because I have already been writing creatively. I’m a non-fiction creative writer. And while I appreciated it, it felt like overkill for me, right? And I found that I did much better and learned more out of my English literature courses. So halfway through my college journey, I switched tracks to English literature because it had elements of history. You’re comparing authors and giving like a new perspective. I don’t know, for me, it just fed me more and I also passed them each year. And so I was like, English literature is where it’s at and they made me read and write my eyeballs out, but you know, I did it and I had some sort of grounding. And I’m not teaching full-time, but that was the original reason for going for it.
Case Thorp
Sure. But then as a rabbit trail, like then why masters of sociology? That’s interesting.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, so I’d always been in the space, in the intersection of arts and culture, right? When I started hosting Dandelion Community Cafe, it was at that venue, Diverse Word, which you mentioned earlier, which I actually no longer host anymore. I need to update my bio. Another artist runs that. I did do it for the first 17 years. So, but when I started that in 2006, it was just to get around other poets and create a room of diversity around creative expression. And it was just to kind of build it, you know, my own community around poetry there. What I noticed is that people were starting to really build these strong social bonds as a result of focusing on poetry, right?
So while I’m hosting and stuff like that, I’m recognizing that other things socially are happening, right? So I think that was the first layer in my or one of the layers in my interest in sociology later but I think I’ve always been interested in people and groups and how they work together and theories around why people work together and why they don’t and that sort of thing
My work with Polis Institute, when I worked for Phil Hissom who started that organization, was really meant by and large if I could summarize it meant to minimize the negative impacts of community development and so as a practitioner in that space, but while also performing and hosting a space, sociology has always been sort of like in the backdrop, but I’ve never done any actual studies to understand the impacts of performance poetry environments to social impact indicators, right? What do these environments have to do with crime reduction or education or people getting smarter? Are they? Graduating high school more, does the region matter, all of that stuff? I think there is a gap in knowledge in terms of what poetry actually does socially and so between that and also which is a longer story. I won’t get into now meeting my biological father for the first time in 2016 and learning about his involvement in sociology.
I think that helped me understand how I was hardwired, like why I was doing all this community type work, but also being an artist and having an impact that way made me want to pursue my master’s in sociology and just see how I can even make a bigger impact with my art form.
Case Thorp
Well, it makes perfect sense to me in terms of English literature, giving you such a broad view of how expression happens, the culture, the language of sorts, but then the sociological impact. Cause you love that intersection of arts and culture. I mean, we’re big in that too. That’s why we’re doing this. Tell me your faith journey along this track.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, so when I moved out of New York and lived with my aunt in, oh gosh, I forget the year, but I was eight maybe so ’91, something like that. My aunt introduced me to the Gospels. She was heavy into church. We lived in a poorer area economically and whatnot and so for safety purposes I think it was like church, homeschool, church, homeschool like there was no in between and so she actually ran a daycare out of her home too, so there was always educational materials in the space where I lived. This is why my mom was looking for a house in Orlando and I would eventually move it and live with her. So, I was in church like 24/7, just inescapable. And so at the age of eight years old, as much as I understood it, I gave my life to Jesus and really adopted the philosophies of, you know, the teachings of Christ and understood about, you know, life after death and, you know, there was a strong push around being righteous and at my young age, I desired that. I wanted to be on the right track and all of that.
Now, some of that walk became complicated when I moved to Orlando because I had to deal with white supremacy and racism as like the only black, one of the few black kids in my elementary school. And some of the people that were picking on me were being informed by some of their parents you know to me that kind of thing. So I kind of had to wrestle with like if I say something if I curse or I punch back or whatever it is, like am I sinning? You know, like there was this kind of inner conflict. No kind of believing that like Jesus was a pacifist, you know, like you don’t know that kind of thing and so I had to reconcile these realities growing up. And obviously as I personally matured and started to get even more perspective around what I was experiencing and understanding more of the history of the United States, understanding our African-American leaders here that have tried to make things better for black people in the US, I began to kind of understand and get more of a well-rounded perspective and understand how to manage my existence here.
Case Thorp
Yeah. And your church today is what?
Shawn Welcome
Deeper fellowship, deeper fellowship, right? You’re on Orange Avenue is what I call my home church.
Case Thorp
Give a shout out to the pastor there.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, Pastor William McDowell, Deeper Fellowship.
Case Thorp
So share with us then how your faith does lead into your spoken word art.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, I think I had phases. And this will make sense when I understand the kind of stages of my writing. When I first started, it was really just to impress my friends, right? To show them like, oh, I can do this. Like, I’m cool too, right? So it was just a lot of word flipping and not a, I’m not saying it wasn’t thought to it, but it was like for the oohs and the ahs, you know? It wasn’t necessarily as substantive as it later became, right?
Case Thorp
Hmm. I think a lot of people could identify with that. I think a lot of people could identify with, you know, why do I do what I do for a living? Well, in some ways I’m trying to get A’s or impress parents or impress others. Find myself.
Shawn Welcome
Right, right, right. So initially it was that and it was like, you know you get a brand new car and you’re like speeding all over the place and doing you know, the donuts and stuff like that, so that was kind of like, you know, how do I drive this thing? Then it transitioned into saying things more substantively. So, you know late high school/early college I’m kind of learning about conflicts in the Middle East and these different kind of social issues that started to bleed into my writing that, you know, because I think my heart at heart, I love sharing things that I’ve learned with people, right? It’s kind of like just the educator in me. And so I would use poetry as a medium to share things that I learned, right? So it went from just trying to like impress people to sharing like new things that I learned kind of about the world, but still using lines to kind of like communicate that.
And then that kind of naturally bled into me wanting people to know what I stood for spiritually theologically, right? So, you know, especially around 2008. This is around the time I got married and I joined my wife’s church at the time in Kissimmee and we were you know 24-7 not to be for seven, but I was soaking up a lot of the word around that time and really involved with the church. You can tell in my writing and my performance how what I was exposed to informed what I was saying. So there was a season I would say between 2008 maybe to 2012-ish a lot of my writing was around my faith. And then I almost kind of not emptied myself of that but I almost felt like I said all I needed to say, and beyond that I started to start to tell other people’s stories you know other people’s hardships and other people’s overcoming journeys, and I got really into like the storytelling aspect of spoken word.
Case Thorp
And this is telling the stories of biblical characters or other people of faith you had encountered?
Shawn Welcome
Other people in general, not biblically associated. I’m just saying like other people’s stories. So there was a young lady who was sex trafficked for seven years and got out, right? I thought her story was important enough to spend time crafting a spoken word poem to share. And I’ve done that to help raise money for a nonprofit in town called Samaritan Village who has anti-human trafficking efforts.
Case Thorp
Yeah. Oh, we love them. We love them.
Shawn Welcome
There’s a Darrell, the story of Darrell Davis who has spent much of his life converting former Ku Klux Klan members out of their white supremacist ideology through conversation and this sort of thing. There’s just amazing sort of the Negro Motorist Green Book was a little booklet that was published in the 1930s.
Case Thorp
Wow.
Shawn Welcome
And it had listings of all of the safe places that African Americans can go to if they were traveling through the Jim Crow South, right? And it helped black folks navigate to avoid being harassed. And so there’s a million inspirational type of stories out there and I became interested in that. And for me, it really was a way for people to hear things that were biblically aligned.
Case Thorp
Yeah, right.
Shawn Welcome
Right, that can still reach the world in a way that they could understand and not necessarily like tune you out, so to speak. So, and I have the more explicitly poems connected to my faith as well, but I try to, I try to do more than just talk about Jesus, you know?
Case Thorp
Sure, right. Okay. I want others to hear what I’ve just heard you say, the way in which your faith and connection to your work is an evolving, growing thing. And I mean, I hear these stages of where you said you just work and impress others to a next stage of sharing my learning about the world, sharing it so others can engage to a next stage of I want others to know what I stand for, what matters to me. So for listeners, I just want you to make that parallel. How are you wherever you may serve and work, helping others to know sort of what you stand for. Then you said you had a season of being soaked in the word and it just comes out naturally. And I can imagine water cooler conversations or business meetings or deals and your principles are stated and seem to come out, then you’re telling other people’s stories of suffering and redemption. Telling other people’s stories and then helping the world understand biblical principles and biblical alignment. Dude, that’s, I really, that encourages me to think about my faith and work integration and it grows and evolves and gets more mature.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, absolutely. God’s just a big God, you know? And I think he just uses people in different ways to accomplish what he wants to accomplish in the earth. And I just try to do my best to align with whatever that is and do my best to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit’s leading and prompting for me, you know, creative ideas.
And at the end of the day, people don’t care about what you say. They care about who you are. How do you treat people at the end of the day? Because people pay more attention to that than anything else. And even as a spoken word artist, I say a lot of things. But what I value more is, what was your experience with me?
Case Thorp
That’s, you know, that’s one thing for a bank executive or a plumber or a stay-at-home parent to say, but for you as a spoken word artist, like, that’s a pretty bold statement.
Shawn Welcome
I mean, it’s true, you know, it doesn’t matter, I’m on these big stages and, you know, standing ovations and the whole night, like, it doesn’t matter, but at the end of the day, there’s all these, like, side pocket conversations about how much of a jerk I am. It’s like, or, you know, or my wife, you know, saying, oh, he’s great out in the streets, but at home, he’s a freaking terror, you know. I never want that… or my kids, you know? So like that stuff matters more to me than the public presence of who I am.
Case Thorp
Mm. Well, I’ve never heard that. I’ve never heard that. Can you share an example of where you just saw Godly fruitfulness from your work?
Shawn Welcome
So the first story that came to mind when you said that was, oh my gosh, and there’s been some wild stories. I forget the year, but it would have had to have been after 2010 and before 2015, somewhere in that range. I went to speak at a church. I performed and afterwards there was a couple that came to me and said that they’d gotten my CD. I published a CD in 2010 called Stone Soup: Poetry is Church for Some; it’s on Apple music. I don’t broadcast as much but the wife of the husband or the husband I don’t know which one of them…but they said that they had heard my CD and was surprised to see me here at this church live and had to share with me that after listening to the CD, they had given their life to the Lord. And we’re like, we never thought we’d be able to meet you and all this kind of stuff. I was just like, wow, I had never, I’d never, I wouldn’t have known that.
So that was kind of encouraging, like, cause you don’t always see fruit or don’t know what the fruit will look like. Right. It may not be that it could be something else, but just, it was encouraging for me to know that there are seeds that I’m sort of like planting out there and fruit is happening, whether I know about it or not. There was another case where this guy bumps into me at a Publix and said that he had bought a car. And the car had my CD in the CD player and when he heard it he was like all of this guy’s following this guy so he ends up getting a job with Phil who you know at Discovery Church, I think he’s at now and he’s the guy that bought the car with the CD in it that had my voice on it. He’s telling Phil about me, effectively. He’s like, oh that’s Shawn and he shows him pictures of me or whatever and the guy ends up running into me at Publix and tells me this whole story about how he bought a car and it had like an old CD in it or something. But, and he was encouraged by it, is the fruit because he was an artist as well and didn’t know like what he would do with his talent and this sort of thing. And hearing that and then meeting me was really meaningful.
So, yeah, there’s a few stories out there. I don’t know. Actually, you know what? I’ll share one more, one more. At the open mic night that I hosted, past tense, there was two artists that met there, Robbie and Mimi, they met there and they ended up becoming a couple and wanted to get married at the same spot where they met. So during the opening, at Danny Linek, so during our break, we usually have poets perform and then we take a break. During the break, they got a justice of peace and had a wedding ceremony at the open mic, like literally got married at the open mic. Like, I created this environment, how cool is that? But that was like, oh my gosh, like it was that meaningful, you know?
Case Thorp
Is this at Dandelion Cafe? That’s cool.
Shawn Welcome
And now y’all have, you know, this union. So anyway, I can go on and on.
Case Thorp
We talk a lot here about common grace. It’s as different than special grace. So like you talk about people coming to faith through your work, that’s a special grace movement of God that’s specific to salvation in Christ. But I love also common grace is God’s goodness to all people, whether they’re believers, God’s goodness to society, the public square. And to know, you know, your fruitfulness is also born by raising these issues of racism, raising these issues of, you know, telling the story of the, of human trafficking, raising our own appreciation for the beauty in Orlando, like you did a moment ago. So I want folks to know, I mean, that fruit is just as valuable. I say just as valuable. I mean, it’s so valuable because it blesses people and it helps lift us as a community.
Shawn Welcome
Thank you.
Case Thorp
Shawn, could you describe God for us as you perform?
Shawn Welcome
Such an easy question. I’m being sarcastic. Describe God in one word.
Case Thorp
What, what is he? Well, not just God, but like, what is he seeing and feeling and reacting to as you do your spoken word?
Shawn Welcome
I think that, I don’t think that, I know that God by his very nature is a creator.
He’s a creator and in our nature, I believe that we are creative beings as well because we’re his children. When I exercise creativity in the world, to me, I mean, I have a unique, you know, kind of a special lane here with spoken word poetry, but to me it is an extension of what he values, right? And especially if those words are life-giving, right? I don’t know for sure like what God’s thinking when I’m performing. I hope that he’s pleased, you know, with what I create and what I decide to put out there for the various reasons that I do. But I know God’s a creator.
He’s creative. We have creative elements of us. Some is more amplified than others. But, you know, I have this way of thinking that like, we should really, you know, people in general, especially folks in the faith, should really concentrate on what, like what does God want me to do here? You know, I think we spend a lot of attention on whether I’m gonna make it to heaven or not, right? And kind of like, that’s the sole and primary focus. And I think there’s some error in that type of thinking. I believe that our focus should be how can I bring heaven on earth, right? Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So like, what is heaven? What is what is the perfect sort of setting and how can I, how can I pull some of that and bring it here during the course of my lifetime, right? And if we focus on what was like, whatever our assignment is in the world and let like, I feel like we need to have more of that kind of energy, you know? Um, and we’re, we’re fulfilled in the process. God’s pleased. Right?
Case Thorp
Preach.
Shawn Welcome
And like what will happen will happen like Christ has done it all you know what I mean so I don’t know from an energy and perspective standpoint I think we should focus more on that and so to come back to your question about you know what does God think or what is he feeling-ish when I’m performing spoken word poetry I you know I would I believe that he’s pleased
with that and it’s consistent with the way that I think we should, especially people in the faith, should operate.
Case Thorp
Wow, friends, right there, right there. That’s, that’s the sermon, the heartfelt sharing. So, Shawn, I’m just so grateful that as a deep man of faith, you’re out there in so many different venues and so many different listeners who may not be of faith, but boy, they’re being blessed by blessed. They’re being blessed by fruit. That’s right, baby.
Shawn Welcome
Common grace is what you called it. I love it.
Case Thorp
The collaborative went under the umbrella of First Presbyterian Church. We helped to launch Arts Fellowship Orlando, this six-month fellowship where artists are brought together for discipleship, spiritual formation, and to create wonderful works. And so Shawn came to our performance of these works at the Dr. Phillips Center and there you as a guest artist shared a profound spoken word that I believe you did write that specifically for that event.
Shawn Welcome
I did not write it for that event, but it fit nice and snug.
Case Thorp
Well, it did fit. And so I’ve asked Shawn to close us out if he would share that piece.
Shawn Welcome
Yeah, thank you very much. So the poem is called Last Name, and it kind of talks about my last name and the name of the Lord. So I hope you all enjoy. It goes like this.
Welcome is my last name.
Welcome to Brooklyn, New York, 1989, PS 244, first grade.
Every door at Doormat had my name.
Always felt extra special, but not this day.
See, Classmate Liberty Brown told me I was gonna die.
When I asked her to clarify, she said, “‘Yeah, everybody’s gonna die.'”
Someday, it was the most shocking news I’d received in all of my six years.
Tears, face painted my face the color of confusion.
So like a reporter, I gave Papa the breaking news and he didn’t look surprised.
Apparently, like my last name, this was common information, but sounded like a revolutionary idea at the time.
I wanted to go to my 11-year-old older sister and say, did you know about this? And just like, didn’t tell me. What are we keeping secrets now?
From that high point on, questions snowballed and avalanched into what they called the true and living God.
I suddenly realized that the big bad wolf was alive, exemplified by little red riding hood, but clearly understood once I read it in red writing.
If this don’t make sense, tell me what does. Have you heard of a greater story of love? See more power in what is softly said.
Listen, gentleness is just as supernatural as raising the dead, knitting with needle and thread.
My God made me out of the fabric of his breath from a place of rest as he chooses.
How many rulers does it take to confuse us?
One ruler is one foot step closer to the truth.
12 inches towards the light. Let’s leave it at that. 12 disciples run the right track.
Call me an addict, a fiend for Ben Elohim.
There will be an illuminated white horse in a broken sky saddled by a mighty rider whose blood pumps forgiveness.
We all need transfusions. I wanna be transformed and transfigured so you can’t figure out the difference.
I’m talking about immortality being attached to me as a tractor is to a trailer.
What good are my goods if I’m not going anywhere? Give me another name.
The name that is above all names, top of the food chain, king of the jungle, lion of Judah, don’t depend on your war horse to save you.
This earth age will fade away like pagers.
Long longer exists like the milk man.
I mean, when’s the last time you seen the milk man?
This earth will no longer be relevant in a million years, maybe another 80 for you and I.
Yes, both me and this earth will die. So why should I believe in either of them?
O wretched man that I am, where are the Liberty Browns?
I’m sounding the alarm. His name is above every name, rules above every game, over Jehovah rules and reigns more than a last name.
I want a name that’ll last from everlasting to everlasting, rather be radically wrong in Christ than write my own self-righteous thesis, Jesus.
The most controversial person to parade the planet from his immaculate entrance to his amazing ascension, his name transcends dimensions, it’s not unknown.
Real issue is how bad do we wanna know?
Change my song. Shred our wrongs into confetti so when death is ready, the sound of a savior is saying, welcome home.
Case Thorp
Wow. I’m weeping. Shawn, wow. Friends, go and learn more and enjoy Shawn’s work. Dude, thank you. Thank you so much. You are a blessing. So, tell us where folks can engage more with you, either online or in upcoming events.
Shawn Welcome
My pleasure. Yeah, so if people are interested in having me come out they can go to ShawnWelcome.com And fill out, you know a request form there My email is simple info at Shawn welcome calm One of the things are service offerings that I’ve been pushing a lot lately because
It’s just good for me and for the people asking for is these custom performances that I would draft and there’s a separate website for that called brand genius dot studio. So I’ll give an example or the Orange County Convention Center is having a global pet expo.
Case Thorp
My daughter will be there. I promise you.
Shawn Welcome
Okay, well I wrote a poem about the connection between the human-animal bond and that’s a client that I’ve worked with so different things like that brand genius that studio for custom content creation But I’m easy to find just Google Shawn Welcome and you can find me or reach out to Dr. Case Thorp.
Case Thorp
Yeah. Well, y’all go learn more and engage with this wonderful art and artists. So friends, thank you for joining us today. Please like and share. It really helps us to get the word out and we want others to be blessed by this spoken word for sure. Leave a review wherever you get your podcast. Come see us at collaborativeorlando.com for even more content, podcast, blogs, and you can find us across the social media platforms.
Be sure to tune in to Nuance, Formed for Faithfulness, this 10-minute devotional. I hope that it’s a blessing for your heart because we want to form ourselves well for the public square. I want to thank our sponsor today, the Magruder Foundation. I’m Case Thorp, and we’ll see you next time.
