Editor's Note
Introduction
Current Index
Free Your Mind
The Future
Wake Up
Editorials
Alliance
Bizarre
The Staff
Photos
Community
Blog
Rebecca Dupas VERBATIM: “It Is What It Is”
Part I
By: Ccep J. Dew
dews_ccep@yahoo.com
Grandma’s
backyard… lying in a hammock… swinging between two trees… feeling the cool
breeze flutter across my eyelashes… sipping a sweet, but not too sweet glass of
lemon iced tea… Yup, that’s what Louisiana-native Rebecca Dupas makes me feel...
Comfort… at ease… at home.
I remember my first trip to Warm Wednesdays, the weekly open mic event that
she co-hosted. When the first performer finished, Rebecca asked if she could do
a poem for him called… Well, the title slipped her mind for a moment and her
reaction to the lapse caused an uproar in the audience. From my seat, I looked
up at this woman who seemed so complicated, yet simple and I was in awe of her.
And even though “The Takeover” was a blunt piece about modern-day Slavery and
how people don’t realize they’re being taken advantage of, she delivered it with
such grace. It’s still my favorite poem by her.
That’s what Rebecca Dupas is: grace, pride, classiness, and a role model for
women—young and old alike.
I’m honored to have grown to know her as well as I do and was beyond pleased
to interview her. Rebecca’s words are uplifting and true and she is the reason
why I strive to be a lady in everything that I do. I hope that by reading this
she understands that and also that you find the hope, humility, and dignity that
I did.
Rebecca Dupas on being “Rebecca Dupas”:
“When
I first started [performing spoken word] I was unfamiliar with the concept of
people really calling themselves something else and I wasn’t even that
comfortable as a performer to give myself something more creative or catchy than
my name. And when I went [to my f
irst open mic] I signed up as ‘Rebecca’ and it
kind of stuck… Even now that I have the opportunity [to choose an alias] I like
the simplicity of it. I like how my name sounds when I’m called to the stage…”
“Rebecca Dupas is educator, poet, host, daughter, sister, auntie, friend…
That is how I would describe myself. I think that education is my calling. I
think that that’s what I was born to do and all of the positions that I’ve
taken, it seems, in my life—and it’s only been twenty-six years or so—but all of
them have dealt with trying to share some type of knowledge or some type of idea
or concept with an audience. I’ve always wanted to be a teacher and sometimes I
see my role of poet and teacher as the same. You go into a situation with a
message and your passion is to share it and hopefully convince someone else to
be passionate about or even entertained by that message….”
On childhood experiences:
“My childhood was innocent for a while. For a long time I didn’t know about
the hardships that my immediate family faced. I was oblivious to a lot of
negative energy until the age of six. And really for me that’s when I say the
whole ‘childhood’ ended for me because it was the loss of innocence at the age
of six. Up until the age of six life was good. Things were well. I lived in the
South with my mother and my father and then at the age of six that’s when I
moved to the state of Maryland… It was feelings of being separated from family.
It was feelings of loneliness because I was in strange place and I had to make
new friends. I was dealing with being away from my family, being away from my
father, and trying to fit into a new place because I was definitely a country
girl in Maryland which we call ‘the city’… It was a struggle for my mother as
well to adjust because we left everything, we sold everything that we owned, and
we started over. So, really that’s where the influence for most of my poetry
came: the whole idea of needing to adjust and seeing my mother struggle. Once I
got old enough I learned that life wasn’t as sweet as I thought it was. That
period that I describe as ‘innocence’, it really wasn’t as simple as I thought
it was because then I learned really the true situation with my mother and my
father. Things just become a little bit more real to me and it was those issues
that ended up in my poetry. Some of the first poems that I wrote when I was in
the seventh grade dealt with family and loyalty and friendship and belonging and
all of those things that sort of mirrored the experiences that I didn’t even
know I was going through…”
“Rebecca Dupas is an educator, poet, host, daughter, sister, auntie,
friend… That is how I would describe myself.”
On writing inspiration:
“I’m
one of those people where when I’m passionate about something whether I’m
passionate about it because I love it or passionate because I detest it I have
to get it out. I kept a journal since I was in middle school. The ideas, the
thoughts that I had, I always
needed to write them down. But, of course journals
are too personal to share. So, when I started writing poetry there was always
this urge to let somebody read it or to read it to somebody when I was confident
enough to actually share it. The whole understanding that a lot of times folks
share the same experience, that’s really what drives me to share because I know
that at least one person is going to relate to this. At least one person is
going to listen. But, also I’m just inspired by the scene because when I go out
to open mics I’m thrilled watching other performers get up there and take these
personal situations or these things that they’ve witnessed and write about them
in a way that the average person wouldn’t think about. And just seeing that
motivates me and challenges me to take my thoughts and each time come up with
something that’s better than the previous poem that I’ve written…”
On sharing poetry:
“I noticed the interest that people had in my poetry book when I was in middle school and my early years in high school and people would ask me to read it. I never thought that it was extremely special because it took me a while to get comfortable, but I thought about it like, ‘Wow. Obviously there’s something that that like.’”
“In high school a friend of mine organized a poetry show my senior year in high
school and we decided we’d put this show together. One of the greatest
influences was how excited my mother was when she found out I was going to be in
this show. My mother wrote poetry and, in fact, there’s only one [poem] that she
actually shared with me, but when she shared it with me I was so impressed. It
took me a while to write my own, but really that poem was always in the back of
my mind. My mother had me practicing in front of the mirror and she was giving
cues on how to say [my poems] and how I should move my body when I say what word
and just seeing how proud she was sort of fueled me. After that show I didn’t
perform again until I got to college and it was some type of coffeehouse. Then,
finally someone took me to an open mic and I just fell in love with the whole
energy, being anxious to get on stage, and then getting on stage and knowing
that the work is accepted. I sort of just fell in love with that whole feeling
of writing something, performing, and then knowing that I’ve done well.”
On writing and performance style:
“I can’t help but to think about the things that people tell me about how
they interpret my writing and performance style. But, I know that my writing
comes from my desire for people to do better and to have more. It’s for the
world to be a better place as clichéd as it sounds. Most of my writing is always
some type of message for the betterment of a situation whether it be a
relationship between two females or female and male. That’s always my desire: to
paint a picture and to show some type of resolution. I tend to focus a lot on
women and I think that comes from watching my mother struggle as a single-parent
and overcoming a lot of obstacles, but yet still dealing with so many pressures
as a Black woman and also as a single-parent. I’m influenced to write about that
and also the relationships that women have and the issues that we deal with that
sort of affect us in the relationship. I think that most of that comes from
observations. I do know that I have a very calm demeanor and my desire is that
the words are going to speak for themselves. That’s what I would hope…"
“…For as long as I can remember I wanted to be just like the teachers in
my life and I can’t imagine myself doing anything else…”
On hosting OneMic.tv:
“I was contacted by Marcus Carey [executive producer, director, and creator
of onemic.tv]… He had seen me perform and he asked me if I would be interested
in doing One Mic and of course I said, ‘Yes!’ An internet show? I was thrilled
that of all the hosts that he could’ve chosen for that wonderful idea that he
asked me. So, I was on board. I was definitely interested in that. I thought
that it would be amazing because we have Def Poetry Jam which gives one kind of
depiction of poetry…but, this concept actually allowed us to interview and talk
to the poet and get to know the person behind the art. I just thought that was
wonderful…”
On
the female hosting dynamic:
“I think that just with my personality I bring a certain energy to a venue.
Many people tell me that I’m’ wise beyond my years’ and I can be very reserved
and I bring a seriousness as well as just a feminine perspective to the
microphone when we deal with issues in our communities, especially when it comes
to relationships and family…”
On the calling to be an educator:
“A long time ago, when I was in elementary school in second grade, I had a
teacher, Ms. Tanya, and I can imagine what she looks like. I remember the
feeling that I experienced in her presence. I can’t even tell you what she did
that was so special, but I remember thinking that I wanted to be just like Ms.
Tanya and I wanted a classroom of my own and I wanted students and I wanted to
teach. That feeling never left. It continued throughout my educational
experience with Ms. Oliver in the fifth grade and Ms. Dew in the tenth grade and
these were all English teachers. So, I finally just had an inclination towards
English because I like to write, but it was something about being in that
position where I could influence and teach and try to better the lives of
others. I just fell in love with it. There was only one moment where I deterred
and I thought that maybe I wanted to be a veterinarian and help the little sick
animals, but for as long as I can remember I wanted to be just like the teachers
in my life and I can’t imagine myself doing anything else…”
“The reason why I say that it’s a calling is because… I just have an
inclination to share information and some people might think that sounds boring,
but it’s what I love to do. I had the opportunity to go to Towson (State
College) which some people call ‘The Teacher’s College’. Since I knew I couldn’t
imagine myself being happy doing anything else I just made sure that I got my
degree and that I ended up in somebody’s classroom somewhere…”
Find out more about Rebecca Dupas and the question that leaves her speechless next month!