[00:00:00] Ellington Brown: Welcome to SpeakUP! International with Rita Burke and Elton Brown! This afternoon, we have Ms. Sonuga, who happens to be an international poet, she's a playwright, and she travels the world using her voice. She is going to recite a original poem, and the title is Bones, Bones. Ms. Sonuga, the virtual floor is yours!

[00:00:45] Tililop Sonuga: Thank you. Centuries from now, when the archaeologists shake the dust from your bone, let them wonder about this thing called courage. When they rearrange each part of you, hold you piece by piece against the light, Give them something to Marvel at. Let their history book say Here lies a woman who knew that fear is just a growling animal with no teeth.

[00:01:19] Rita Burke: The voice you have just heard, as Elton said earlier, is none other than Tililop Sonuga. Who is the poet, playwright, performer. She's a leading voice in the global literary community. Her poetry concert has sold out audiences in the UK, Canada, South Africa, and Nigeria. Titilope is the author of three collections of poetry.

She has made history as the first poet to perform at the Nigerian presidential inauguration. and was the ninth Poet Laureate in the city of Edmonton, where she currently resides. I present to our listeners today none other than Tililop Sonuga. Welcome to SpeakUP! International.!

[00:02:28] Tililop Sonuga: Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here.

[00:02:31] Ellington Brown: Thank you for your poetry. I think it was a beautiful way to get to know you and to listen to what's going on in that head. of yours, and you have such a rhythmic way of putting together your thoughts, till I found it very alluring to listen to you as you gave that poem titled Bones. You are originally from, you grew up in Lagos?

[00:03:04] Tililop Sonuga: Lagos. 

[00:03:04] Ellington Brown: Lagos and then you moved from Lagos to Canada at age 13. Tell us about that. 

[00:03:14] Tililop Sonuga: I am the last of four girls and I grew up in the city of Lagos. It is a city with its own pulse, its own heartbeat. And so my origin story begins in that context with amongst people for whom storytelling and poetry and is a way of life.

It is the ways that we've passed on our oral traditions through generations. And so that's the context from which I emerged. My family moved. here to Edmonton in Canada when I was 13 years old, a month after my 13th birthday. As all immigrants do in search of greener pastures and more opportunity and more prospects for their children.

And so moving to Canada presented a new set, a new context for me as a young African woman and poetry and literature was the way in which I felt my way through the world and. And try to make sense of my new life. 

[00:04:19] Rita Burke: Sounds to me like a truly wonderful, exciting origin story. Now, in the beginning, I spoke of you as a poet, performer, and playwright.

Talk to us, please, about your choice of careers. Why, how when. 

[00:04:43] Tililop Sonuga: Sure. I guess to pick up from my origin story, when we arrived in Edmonton my sisters and I understood that what was expected of us was to pursue our education quite aggressively and to do that in a way that would make our parents proud. And so I followed in the tradition of my father, who was a civil engineer and actually went on to study civil engineering here at the University of Alberta and graduated and began my career as an engineer in the city, building roads and bridges and was quite content to do that. And then I had already started performing poetry, sharing cafes and and libraries and pubs, and I knew that I loved this art of storytelling, but I didn't know how to explain to my parents that I was trying to make a life out of that.

There just was no context for that. So I went on to study to, continue to practice as an engineer, building roads and bridges, and then eventually. My work as an artist came to a head and I had to make a decision. I was overrun with taking time off work to go teach workshops, to go do a thing. And I just wanted to experiment with the possibility of being an artist full time.

So I took first a leave of absence for a couple of months. And wanted to see what that felt like, came back, worked for a couple more years, and then finally decided. To take the plunge and I left my job a decade ago 2013 over over a decade ago, I guess we're entering year 11 and began a full time career in the arts, exploring playwriting, Poetry on the page, performance poetry, and I guess I haven't looked back since I guess maybe the last thing I didn't add to my bio is that I'm also an engineer, which is also a choice of profession.

[00:06:30] Rita Burke: That sounds to me like A model success story from engineer to artist to performer to poet, absolutely divine! I suspect that's what most people dream about, but very often they never get there and you've been able to get there. Congratulations! 

[00:06:55] Tililop Sonuga: Thank you.!

[00:06:56] Rita Burke: Now, your bio talks about being a global literary communities. Could you expand on that for us, please? 

[00:07:06] Tililop Sonuga: Absolutely. So after I left my engineering job here in Edmonton I took a trip back home to Nigeria because I wanted to experience. life on the continent as an adult woman. I was very interested in the literary community in my home country. I had visited a few times and I knew there was a pulse.

There were writers and poets and visual artists and musicians who were Enriching the continent in ways that I wanted to be a part of. And so I moved back home to Nigeria and started finding my legs in that literary community. And of course that extended to other parts of the continent.

And my travels took me to South Africa, to Cape town, Johannesburg to Kenya. And I started to realize that there was a whole globe of people with stories to tell in their own unique context. And my story as an artist is not complete without, touching on all of those influences and all those places that I've been.

So when I say that I'm a part of global literary communities, communities outside of Canada.

[00:08:18] Ellington Brown: But can you tell us how your Nigerian / Canadian identity influenced your work? 

[00:08:26] Tililop Sonuga: Sure. I think a lot of my early poems were about identity. And I think that happens when you move here as a teenage person who is trying to grapple with what it means to be African, but also Canadian and finding your place in the middle of all of that. And so my earlier writing is a reflection of that search also as you're growing into a woman now from a teenager. So there were a lot of layers of becoming that were happening for me in that time.

I think I'm still quite heavily influenced by my Nigerian identity, my roots, my being, those stories that, that, that context is core to who I am. But it is undeniable that I've now spent more of my life here in Canada than I did in Nigeria, and so I'm influenced in that way. But one of the, one of the, one of the things I think my family, my parents did was ensure that we had a very deep understanding that even though we call This place home.

There is a deeper understanding what home means and to never forget that it's that sort of sanko mentality, which I'm sure we'll get into in a second. But, this idea of always looking back to where you came from. And so I think I identify quite strongly as a Nigerian, a Yoruba woman specifically.

And then I move forward from that place. 

[00:09:57] Rita Burke: It's interesting that you talk about your identity, and I know that as people from the diaspora, we should have no choice but to identify as such. We need to ground ourselves, as you talked about, Sankofa, and we will get to that as we move along. But I'm really curious to know more about your spoken word album that's called Assist.

Talk to us about that. 

[00:10:30] Tililop Sonuga: Sure. I know when you hear the word sis, it means many different things to many different people. But I think in the African context, even in the Caribbean context, when you say sis, that means, sister, friend, family. It's a term of endearment that That is unique to black women.

It's the way that we refer to ourselves. And when you call someone your sis, that means something very meaningful. And so this album is a celebration of sisterhood as its own particular love story. I say often that we have whole Hollywood movies dedicated to romantic love. We have albums and songs and crooners who talk about heartbreak and that.

But I wanted to create an album that felt like. its own kind of celebration of another type of love that is completely platonic, but still as meaningful and long lasting. In fact, sometimes longer lasting than romantic relationships. I have friends who have known me before marriage, before children friends who have really gone on this journey of life with me.

And my hope is that they will continue to into our twilight years. And this album is about that. relationship, how complex it can be when friendships end or go through a period of hardship, how you come out on the other side. It talks even about sisterhood by blood and how that friendship is not guaranteed either.

That's its own working thing that you feed. And so I wanted the album to not just be a celebration, but also a really nuanced look about what it means to maintain friendships. Over years and also even over geographic distance, which is true for me, many of my friends live in Nigeria and they're not in the room with me most of the time.

And so how do you keep those relationships alive? How do you pour into those people and not completely eliminate the importance of that kind of love in search of, romantic love? Sisterhood is its own, I think, sacred and beautiful place. 

[00:12:31] Ellington Brown: The wonderful thing about having these conversations is the word enlightenment.

Now, I know for a fact that my mom had a sister that, she loved all, all of her sisters and brothers, but there was just one, and they were very close. And my mom called her sister, he did not call her. I never heard her call her by a real name. And everyone knew when she said sister, they knew exactly who she was.

She was talking about it. And so from just talking to you, I realized, oh, this was, like an African. Origin a thing where the word sister had a different or an added definition to it, as opposed to what people normally think of the word sister. So you talked about your, the, your work and I want to know what is your writing.

[00:13:36] Tililop Sonuga: It changes with the seasons. I wish I could answer and say that I, wake up at dawn and watch the sunrise and drink my tea and get to writing. But. I've had to evolve my writing practice to match my life. I'm a mother of two young children, and so I'm quite in the thick of it now with raising babies and getting their lives together.

I tell people that I write as moving meditation. I write in the in between. I find spaces where I can find 5 minutes, 10 minutes, 20 minutes, 30 if I'm lucky, to put an idea on the page, and then I find another moment later on to finish it. What I am lucky to have is time in the early afternoon in this time period where the kids are off at school and I have my time at the writing desk.

I'm grateful for that. But that's new, even a couple of years ago I didn't have the luxury of that because there was always a baby on my lap. And so I guess my, the short answer is that my writing practice is evolving. Currently it's one in which I move. And write. Writing is a part of the motion of my life.

And when I do find moments of peace and quiet, I take that hour, those, that two hours very seriously. And I just try to get the work done as quickly as I can. 

[00:14:53] Rita Burke: I like your authenticity. I like your honesty. You're telling us like it is. You grab those special moments to write when you can. And I suspect that you enjoy those special moments.

when you can. You have written three plays. You've written three plays. I want to know about those plays, and I'm sure audience would want to know about those plays you've written. And let me tell you something else. You were an engineer, and I'm not sure that you could ever stop being an engineer, but right now you're immersed in your writing and in your performing.

And I'm in the process of writing a Children's book number four, and the woman is a farmer, but she used to be an engineer before. Isn't that interesting? 

[00:15:46] Tililop Sonuga: That's beautiful. 

[00:15:46] Rita Burke: Yes, she's currently a farmer in the book. But she used to be an engineer. I intentionally did that. But tell me about your plays, please.

Tell our audience about your plays. 

[00:15:57] Tililop Sonuga: I think you'll find a lot of engineers have secret lives as artists and creators. And this is, I know this to be true. I know many engineers who are also painters, who also, do all kinds of things. And so that's not as surprising to me. I think, yes, that makes absolute sense.

My plays. So I've written a musical called Ada the Country. Which staged in Nigeria, mostly on and it's a. A play that centers the experiences of Nigerian women from many different generations and the issues that are urgent and important to them. And it's heightened by the fact that it's a musical.

For that one writing the lyrics and having a musician come in and craft that into music. It's produced and directed by a friend of mine, Lala Akindoju, who is quite a force in the Nollywood industry. And so that play was my first attempt at, putting something on the stage and seeing what it felt like for the words that I had written to come out of other people's mouths and see what that feels like.

The Six is another play that I wrote and quite recently I tried my hand at the classical music, the opera theatrical world with a rewrite of Igor Stravinsky's Le Histoire du Soldat, which means The Soldier's Tale. I was commissioned to rewrite his libretto, keeping the original classical music intact, but writing a new story.

And alongside writing poetry, I've always been a poet who says yes to any experience that allows me to feel a little afraid, but also brave. And so every time I'm called upon to do work that feels brave, Like something I've never done before, I often will say yes just to see, and that's where playwriting entered my work.

I, I was ready to give it a try and hope to continue to do it. 

[00:17:46] Ellington Brown: Where do you find inspiration for your poems and plays and all of the other things that you do? 

[00:17:55] Tililop Sonuga: I think the world, if you observe it slowly and closely, is full of stories. And so I find inspiration in the everyday. One of the things that I pride myself in doing, even in the work that I write, is keeping it quite low to the ground.

By that I mean, I want my poems, my plays, my writing to feel conversational. I don't want it to feel like something that's out of reach for people. I don't make attempts to make the language intentionally dense or complicated. I say what I want to say, how I want to say it, of course. And an attempt to say it in elevated language and say it beautifully, but to say it clearly.

And so I'm listening for everyday conversations in kitchens and on the streets and watching people around me. And I think it can feel when you want to write something grand, that you need to travel the entire globe to go find these majestic stories. But I will offer that if you look even just In your daily life, there's so much to draw from.

There's so many people. I have my mother, my father, that's between the two of them. That's a whole world of stories that they could tell. And sometimes when I sit with them and ask them questions about their growing up, their childhood, that's volumes, that's volumes. of stories that live inside a physical archive to pull from.

So my inspiration comes from everyday life, everyday people just going about the business of living. 

[00:19:27] Rita Burke: You've talked about majestic stories. And I'll have you know That I was center stage, sitting right under the stage when I saw Sankofa the Soldier's Story. Talk about magic. I was drawn right in! And if at all possible, I want you to talk to us about that story, and your writing that story, and maybe throw a couple of lines from that story in, if at all possible. 

[00:19:57] Tililop Sonuga: Okay, I'll see if I can remember, but I was commissioned over a year ago. To as it was presented to me to do a rewrite, a reimagining of Igor Stravinsky's Soldier's Tale.

At that time, I had never heard of Igor Stravinsky. I didn't know anything about his Soldier's Tale. And I said, yes, anyway, because that is what I do. And then I went about the business of learning more about Igor Stravinsky and learning more about his original Soldier's Tale, immersing myself in this classical music, of which I was not unfamiliar.

My father loved classical music and made sure that we were exposed. We played piano as kids and we went to concerts, so I had a context. But Igor Stravinsky's music, even in this classical world, is quite Subversive, like it was different for the time. It's, it changes time signature in between. It's, it goes from one tune to another tune.

It's really complex work. And so I struggled at first after I had said yes to doing this work to find an entryway to this music that, is in its own world. But in my searching, I thought, okay, a soldier's tale, a soldier's tale. What is a soldier's tale that is urgent and important now? And it led me to the story of the number two construction battalion or the number two black battalion, which was an all black battalion that served in the first world war and had to really fight for their rights to serve.

And after much racism and roadblocks for them, they finally settled on being a construction battalion, so no weapons for them and no fighting, mostly because, the British were worried about their colonies disappearing, if black men learn how to use weapons and fights, then that would be an issue.

And so I found their story and dove right in. I found war journals and diaries, and I just became really immersed in this world. And so I picked through it and thought, I will write a story about a fictional soldier. Cause I think to write a biographical story is a different thing. And I didn't want to do a disservice to the real life soldiers, but I created this fictional soldier which allowed me to take more creative liberty with the story I was telling, but still to draw on these true contexts, these things that actually happen.

And I just started about the work of writing this story brick by brick. It was really intense and difficult work. It took a year of going back and forth to write. But I think at the end of it, I was quite proud of what I was able to accomplish. And it felt really magical to also sit in that same room with you.

And, I think I was right behind you and watch other, people who are masters at their craft, speaking these words that I've written at the same desk that I'm sitting at right now. It just it's such a wild thought to me. 

[00:22:42] Ellington Brown: Do you find yourself getting emotionally involved as you are pouring your thoughts onto a quote unquote paper?

Do you ever find yourself getting to a point where you're so emotionally involved where maybe you have to maybe back off in order to allow yourself that space so that when you come back to writing it, you're still able to be objective? 

[00:23:09] Tililop Sonuga: Yeah, I think with any kind of writing there's an emotional investment, whether you like it or not.

I think, Even if you're writing something that has nothing to do with you, you come at it with your own lived experience, your own context, your own ideas, your own biases, even. And you are trying to wrestle with that on the page. And with this particular story, the more I learned about the battalion, the more I learned about the atrocities that they had faced, the more I cared about these men.

I cared about their stories. I cared about doing it justice. It was a real honor for me for the family members to attend and validate that the story that I had told felt like it did. It honored their memories, and so I was thinking about that a lot while I was on the page. Yes, this is fictional, but these are real people that existed.

And in that way, I would have to write a little bit and leave a little bit and come back. And I think even beyond the emotional investment, I think in writing, sometimes you need fresh eyes. You need to step away and sleep. People often ask me what is my greatest writing advice?

Sometimes you need to take a nap and the problem solving happens in that place. If you've been staring at the page for too long, sometimes just going to rest. I've solved a lot of problems. That I was having or a lot of, confusion that I was having on the page by just taking a little nap and somewhere in that you come back with fresh eyes, a little bit more separated from the page.

And then you can find your way through again. So yes, I think taking those breaks in between helps you emotionally regulate, but also to find a new entryway into work that is as complex and meaningful as it is. 

[00:24:49] Rita Burke: That was meaningful. I feel certain that the audience in that theater that Saturday when I saw the play, Soldier Story, it drew us out and it poured into us as well.

I know you said it took you about a year to write, but did you know much about it prior to being asked to do that play? 

[00:25:16] Tililop Sonuga: Not at all. I didn't know much about Igor Stravinsky or his work, but I also didn't really know about the Black Battalion, which is, I think, a testament to the ways in which history, Black history is buried in Canada, to speak quite frankly.

I was surprised, and I remember that day, I think I just Googled Black Canadian soldier or something like that, because I knew that I wanted to tell a story that felt urgence to me as a black woman, right? And I think it, maybe it was like page two or three of the Google page. I saw, I think maybe an article or something, and that began my fall into the rabbit hole.

But this was not a history that was taught to me at school. I just was not aware. Shamefully and I think in creating this work I became more aware. And my hope is that as the work continues to be staged and move through the world, more people will acknowledge that this history existed and place these men and their sacrifice in a place of honor that it deserves.

[00:26:14] Ellington Brown: One of the things that is sticking out for me is when you talk about Blackness. And I'm just wondering, how do you approach your writing when there's a combination of Blackness and womanhood in your poetry? 

[00:26:32] Tililop Sonuga: That's a great question. Thank you. 

I think there are many intersections for any of us. in the world. Like I'm operating at many levels. I'm operating as a black woman to certain people who encounter me, but I'm also operating as a Nigerian woman, which is a very specific kind of blackness. I'm operating as a Yoruba woman, which is a very specific kind of Nigerian ness even with it.

So I guess the point I'm trying to make is that we all exist within these complex layers of being human. And I don't, at any given time, isolate any of those identities. I am as a woman as much as I am African as much as I am black as much as I am a mother as much as I am a daughter and a sister and a wife and all the things and so of course I know that when I go down, go into the page to write something I'm coming with all of that for better for worse.

And sometimes. All of that doesn't allow me to see certain things clearly, and other times it allows me to see things more clearly than anyone else. And I guess my work in writing and editing aggressively is, how do I strip? The work that I'm trying to write down to its purest bones without interfering with it, with all of these identities that I carry, but also how do I enrich that work with all of these identities I carry?

So it's a careful balance of recognizing that I bring so much of my history and my life into my work, but not so heavily that I'm not able to create from a place that feels light and joyful in the end. 

[00:28:10] Ellington Brown: Wow! You must take a lot of naps.

[00:28:13] Tililop Sonuga: I do take a lot of naps, yeah, when I can. 

[00:28:16] Rita Burke: As you were talking about those intersections and how your life and identities intersect, I thought of the world, the word enrichment, and I guess you have no choice.

But to get joy out of those intersections and they enrich your life. There's no question about that. And so we're talking today with Tililop Sonuga, who is a performer, a poet, And a playwright. And on SpeakUP! International, we speak to people we call community builders. And through their stories, we expect our audience to be educated, informed, and inspired.

And I know that you're doing that for us today, Tililop. Talk to us about, talk to us, for me, about the person who makes Be involved in getting you to the place where you are today, the person who most influenced your life.

[00:29:26] Tililop Sonuga: They say it takes a village. So I think who I am today is a measure of two things. One, I believe quite strongly that I am the end result of all of my grandmother's prayers, my mother's prayers, and women who came before. And so on the one hand, God is responsible for who, what, where I am.

In many instances, when I sit down to write something on the page, it really does feel like there's a divine hand. And so I would be remiss not to mention that my creative practice is not separate from my spiritual beliefs. It's not separate from my prayer. Life poetry to me is prayer. That's a way of worship and meditation.

So I consider that to be responsible for where I am in my career, but like I said to start, I am a product of a village that raised me and that includes my mother and her mother includes my father and his insistence on curiosity as a measure of a person. My dad loved when we asked questions! We used to compete to ask him the most clever questions and ask it in a way that would get him excited.

So he would spend a longer time answering the question. So curiosity was a huge part of my childhood. We were not restricted. We weren't children that were told to, stay in your place and keep quiet. In fact, the more precocious and curious you were, the more celebrated you were in my household.

And so I think that curiosity is something I carry in my work. I think every person I have ever encountered, my husband, my children even though they are three and six, I learned so much from their, the way that they move through the world. And I have so much to learn from them about who I am.

Motherhood has been about being more curious about my own childhood so that I can offer my children something, and so I guess I'm not, I can't say one person. I think I'm just, I do really feel braced and carried. By everyone who has touched my life in some way. Some people I may never even know.

People who speak my name in rooms that I'm not in. Who say something on my behalf when I'm not there that brings about the next opportunity. And I'm grateful for all of it, truly. I think, I feel like a really privileged person to have been loved so generously by so many people. 

[00:31:54] Ellington Brown: What poet? 

[00:31:55] Tililop Sonuga: Yes.

[00:31:56] Ellington Brown: And writers. Do you enjoy reading? Ooh. 

[00:32:03] Tililop Sonuga: There, there are many. So I grew up in Nigeria. And so of our time, they were the Chinua Achebe's and Wole Soyinka's and Buchi Emecheta and Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Those are poets or writers, even though I think even prose writers, there's just poetry in all of it, are writers that we celebrate and love. But I also studied Maya Angelou and Toni Morrison. I had the opportunity of meeting Maya Angelou here in Edmonton after winning a poetry contest and meeting her faith in person. Even also meeting Sonia Sanchez in my travels as a writer. And I look to poets and writers, but I also look to music.

I love the music of Shadi Adu and Lauren Hill more contemporary work, but I think sometimes when I listen to a song, I can hear the poetry in it, and that influences me as well. I think I'm just drawn to storytellers, whatever their medium is. I'm drawn to their work and always curious about how that work can influence me.

[00:33:08] Rita Burke: As you read your poem, Bones, I felt the spirituality coming out. It's very interesting. As you read at the beginning of the top of this show, Bones, I could feel it in my spirit. 

[00:33:23] Tililop Sonuga: Oh, wow! 

[00:33:24] Rita Burke: The spirituality coming out. So thank you for that. Our guests Give to us and pour into us. I believe every time we introduce someone, it enriches my life and I need to say that to you.

[00:33:38] Tililop Sonuga: Thank you!

[00:33:39] Rita Burke: I want to know what it felt like to do a poem at that Nigerian presidential inauguration. What did it feel like? Tell us about that.

[00:33:52] Tililop Sonuga: It was the first time that I had ever done! And so it was an honor on many levels, an honor to have been called upon to do something that they were trying out for the first time in most, American inaugurations that they'll have a poet, but in Nigeria, inaugurations had happened without that kind of celebration or that moment of honor for a poet.

And so it felt incredibly special, but then also there was something really interesting happening in Nigeria at the time. Nigeria saw. In that inauguration, high voter turnouts, young people who are voting for the first time, there was a lot of hope on the ground in the country and people who stood in lines.

And I remember then watching videos of people standing in line for hours, people who had brought their grandmothers in their wheelchairs to wait to vote. And Nigeria, which, you know, if you know the history of the country. has experienced a lot of turmoil over the years, but that year in particular felt like something new.

It felt like people had real, genuine hope for the country, which in many ways was dashed in the years that followed, but I still remember that singular moment when people just felt like this could be it. This could be the moment that everything changes. And I had a lot of that context in writing this poem.

I wanted it to feel not like I was performing a poem to presidents and political figures because they don't need any more of my poetry, but who needed my poetry? I thought at the time were the people who had stood in line for days, wanting to cast their first vote. I wanted to write a poem that felt reflective of them and their joy and hope.

And so that moment was special to me. In that way, I was in the venue was Eagle Square, which is this huge stadium and the stadium was massive and world leaders from across the world came to witness this moment. But also I was aware that it was being televised and so there's people at home both home on the ground, but also home in the diaspora who are watching this moment happen and it was.

It's to date one of the greatest honors of my career and one that I think of quite fondly. I try to remain in the moment of that hope and hold it separate from the context of what came in the years after the same old disappointment, and, but we had for a second, we had that day. And so it feels special in that way.

[00:36:28] Ellington Brown: It sounds very much like what we are going through right now. When you step back just a little bit and actually it's almost like a rerun where we could see it, we could feel it, we could taste it and it was again taken away from us. So let's say you write a poem and then all of a sudden out of nowhere you hear this music in the background and all of a sudden you can actually lay the music right on top of the poem. What happens that allows you to become that connected to the universe to determine whether or not it's going to be just a poem or spoken word?

[00:37:17] Tililop Sonuga: Hi, praise that I'm connected to the universe. I hope I tried to be I guess the most honest answer is that I don't know a lot of the time I start with a blank page as we all do as writers and creators of anything and the terror of that blank page and the hope that today is not going to be the day that I'm found out to be a fraud who cannot actually write, you always think that next time might be the last time, right?

So I started in that same way. So in the beginning, I'm mostly preoccupied with being able to write anything at all. I'm not really necessarily thinking yet about what it becomes, but I think along the way, The work and part of why even in, living an artist's life is not it's not an easy choice because sometimes you really are quite unsure about what comes next.

But what I trust is the work and the work's ability to make its own way. I always say my job is to first create it. And then like a child, it will go into the world and go find. It's way it'll find its legs. And so I create and then I feel work itself starts to communicate what comes next.

And I move in the direction of what feels exciting and fun and sometimes a little bit terrifying. And so some poems remain as poems on the page and that feels okay, settle. Sometimes there's a nudging that, oh, maybe, what would happen if we tried a little a little guitar here, or what would happen if we developed this poem into maybe a one woman play longer form thing, and I think I have to get to a point in the creation process where the work starts to communicate.

With me, in a way, and say, okay, there's more, or leave it alone for a few years and come back later, or maybe this one was just for fun, and nobody else needs to see this one. I think it tells you, in a way.

[00:39:13] Rita Burke: You talked about your parents, you talked about friends, you talked about sisters, quote unquote. What would you say is the best piece of advice you've ever been given?

[00:39:25] Tililop Sonuga: Whoa. These are really beautiful questions. I have to say that first while I think about my answer. Because I've had sincerely the privilege of sitting at the feet of so many wise people who have taken the time to tell me anything at all.

I think it's beautiful! I'd say one of the things, there's lots of advice, and this is not to discount any of the advice, but one of the things that I hold with me when I'm making work that I think I have held with me for the longest time, I had a mentor and a teacher who mentioned to me once after a workshop session to implicate myself.

And at the time it felt strange to consider what does it mean to implicate yourself in your work? And the more I unpacked that, the more I thought about it. What she was asking was for integrity and truth telling in the work that I create. This idea that we are all very imperfect beings. Who are attempting to do something beautiful.

And in doing that, implicating yourself, by that not standing apart from the world and on your soapbox and talking down to the people, but writing from a place in which you are inside of the work, inside of the experience, and implicated in some way in whatever it is that you're writing or creating, I think has served me really well.

I try to write as honestly as I can, no matter how messy or embarrassing it might be. I try to lead with my heart and with the truth, and I think that has served me well. It's a piece of advice I was given many years ago that I think about if I'm writing something and it feels, sometimes very preachy, I have to ask myself, like, where exactly are you in this work?

And how are you implicated? And how can you get a little bit more honest about what you're trying to say? So I would say implicating myself in the work that I create has served me well. Has been a really useful tool.

[00:41:29] Rita Burke: I hear you, I see you, I feel you. 

[00:41:32] Tililop Sonuga: Thank you. 

[00:41:34] Rita Burke: Is there anything that you want to share with our audience before we put closure to this absolutely delightful discussion that we have not asked you?

[00:41:48] Tililop Sonuga: You I will repeat again that I think I've loved the questions I've been asked. I think they were very meaningful and meaty and I'm very thankful. A for the invitation to be here, but also that the conversation felt really enriching to me as well. So thank you for that. I would say that. I would love to meet your listeners out in the world somewhere and I would love for them to engage with my work wherever they find it, but I will also offer to them that we are in the world is in a very unique and difficult and messy place.

And I think more than ever, this is the time for the storytellers and the artists to rise up. And so I will offer that if there are secret poets out there and writers and novelists and playwrights and musicians who have this burning desire to say something, Now is the time to say it. And my hope is that out of the turmoil of the world will emerge a new generation of storytellers that will actually change the tide.

So I also want to hear from your listeners as well. I want to hear their art. 

[00:42:53] Rita Burke: Even the people that used to be engineers, huh? 

[00:42:55] Tililop Sonuga: Exactly. Especially them. Especially them! 

[00:43:00] Ellington Brown: Thank, you so much for giving us the warm and fuzzy feeling this afternoon, having this conversation with you! It has definitely been a pleasure. We got to talk a little bit about your early life and your background, your artistic journey, the creative process. Which I found to be quite interesting themes and styles and in career highlights that happened to you that maybe you thought wasn't even possible, but they did happen.

And so I really want you to know that we want you to come back. Obviously there's going to be more chapters to this book. And so we want to be the first to have a conversation about what you added to your life. Whatever that may be and thank you again from SpeakUP! International. Rita, do you have anything you want to say?

[00:44:06] Rita Burke: As I said earlier, we are so fortunate that our guests very often will fill us with stuff. They make our lives rich, and today was no exception, and so I say thank you. Really appreciate your being on SpeakUP! International, I will reiterate what Elton said. Come back, talk to us about what you're doing, about what's next, and those kinds of things. Really appreciate that. 

[00:44:37] Tililop Sonuga: Thank you so much. It's been truly a pleasure! Thank you! And I will be back! I'll see you soon I'm sure!

[00:44:43] Ellington Brown: Thank you for listening to SpeakUP! International! If you wish to contact Tililop Sonuga. Please be prepared to submit your name, your email address, and the reason why you wish to contact Ms. Tililop Sonuga. at https://titilope.ca/about-titiope-sonuga Ms. Tililop Sonuga uh, has other social media platforms you can use to connect to her that will be listed in the description section on Spotify and other social media platforms. 

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