Back in those early days when I began my apprenticeship as a

Host: The sun hung low over Kingston’s rooftops, melting into a haze of orange and crimson, like the embers of a long-remembered fire. The air pulsed with the bassline of a distant sound system, its rhythm moving through the streets like a heartbeat refusing to die. On a cracked balcony, overlooking the slow drift of smoke from a nearby food stall, Jack leaned on the rail, a cigarette burning to its last inch between his fingers.

Jeeny sat cross-legged beside a radio, where Linton Kwesi Johnson’s voice spilled from the speakers — a deep, rhythmic poetry, half anger, half revelation. She closed her eyes, mouthing the words.

“Back in those early days when I began my apprenticeship as a poet, I also tried to voice our anger, spirit of defiance and resistance in a Jamaican poetic idiom.”

The verse ended. The street below went on breathing, alive with music, vendors, and laughter.

Jeeny: “That’s what it means, Jack — to make language a form of freedom. To turn anger into art.”

Jack: “Freedom? Or just another way to dress up rage so people don’t get scared of it?”

Host: The evening light painted their faces in uneven gold — her eyes glowing with quiet faith, his shadowed in skepticism.

Jeeny: “You always say that — like beauty is a disguise. It’s not, Jack. It’s translation. Johnson didn’t soften his anger; he made it speakable.”

Jack: “But he still had to use a microphone, didn’t he? He still had to turn defiance into a performance so people would listen. That’s not freedom — that’s survival dressed in rhythm.”

Jeeny: “And what’s wrong with survival? That’s where all art starts — from the need to be heard when nobody wants to listen.”

Host: A car horn blared below; a group of children laughed, running after a ball. The smell of jerk chicken and sea salt mixed in the breeze. The city seemed to hum with the same resistance Johnson once wrote of.

Jack: “You think turning pain into poetry changes anything? The same system still stands. The same streets still burn. Maybe it just makes oppression sound… lyrical.”

Jeeny: “No, Jack. It changes the soul. And that’s where the revolution begins — not with guns, but with words that make people remember they’re still alive.”

Jack: “That’s idealism talking. You can’t stop a policeman’s baton with a poem.”

Jeeny: “Maybe not. But you can stop him from owning your spirit.”

Host: The wind lifted a page from Jeeny’s notebook, scattering handwritten lines across the floor. She reached for them, her fingers trembling slightly. Jack bent to help, and their hands brushed — a spark of unspoken understanding amid their argument.

Jack: “You know, when I was a kid, I used to think anger was the only language anyone would listen to. I fought. I yelled. I broke things. And every time, people finally looked at me — but never for the right reason. They looked because I scared them.”

Jeeny: “And Johnson — he found a way to make people look because they recognized themselves. That’s what poetry does — it translates fury into something the heart can hold.”

Jack: “But that translation… doesn’t it dilute the truth? Make it palatable? Maybe anger isn’t meant to be softened.”

Jeeny: “Who said it’s soft? Poetry is a weapon too, Jack — just sharper in silence. Think about it: Johnson used Jamaican Creole, the language the colonizers called ‘broken.’ He made it whole again. Isn’t that the purest act of rebellion — to make the broken beautiful?”

Host: The radio crackled again, playing the faint beat of “Inglan Is a Bitch.” The bass rolled through the floorboards, vibrating beneath their feet. Jack’s jaw tightened, his eyes flicking toward the street, where a group of young men in hoodies shouted at a police van passing slowly.

Jack: “You see that? Those kids don’t need metaphors. They need justice. They don’t have the luxury to turn their pain into poems.”

Jeeny: “And yet, that’s where justice begins — when someone names the pain. Silence never saved anyone.”

Jack: “But sometimes it’s all that keeps you safe.”

Jeeny: “Safe? Or silent? There’s a difference.”

Host: A pause. The music faded. Somewhere far off, a dog barked. The air hung thick with tension, not of argument but of reflection.

Jack: “Maybe… maybe I just don’t believe words are enough anymore. People write, protest, bleed — and the world still turns, indifferent.”

Jeeny: “The world doesn’t change all at once. But each voice carves a crack. That’s what Johnson did — gave shape to collective anger, made it visible, audible, undeniable. His poems weren’t just art — they were testimony.”

Jack: “Testimony for what?”

Jeeny: “For the dignity of those who were told they had none. For the rhythm of a people’s defiance. You call it survival — I call it soul work.”

Host: The night deepened; the sky bruised purple over the horizon. The first stars blinked awake. Jack’s cigarette glowed, then dimmed. He looked at Jeeny — her eyes reflecting the same fire that burned quietly in Johnson’s words.

Jack: “You really think language can carry that much weight?”

Jeeny: “It already has. Every revolution begins as a sentence, whispered by someone who refuses to shut up.”

Jack: “And every revolution ends when those whispers get lost in noise.”

Jeeny: “Unless the whispers become a chorus.”

Host: The radio buzzed again, and the unmistakable voice of Linton Kwesi Johnson filled the small space — measured, rhythmic, alive with the pulse of memory and fight:

“Dem never love we yet, but we still deh yah, still deh yah, still stand up tall.”

The words seemed to breathe through the balcony, into the city itself. The children’s laughter, the distant sirens, the smell of salt — all part of one long, beating poem of survival.

Jack: “You know, maybe that’s what he meant by a Jamaican poetic idiom — not just the sound, but the stance. The refusal to kneel.”

Jeeny: “Exactly. To speak your truth in the tongue they tried to erase — that’s defiance itself. That’s rebellion wrapped in rhythm.”

Jack: “So you’re saying the poem is the revolution.”

Jeeny: “Yes. Because once people start telling their own stories, no empire can rewrite them.”

Host: The moonlight slid over the balcony’s chipped paint, softening the edges of everything — the buildings, their faces, even the old radio humming in the corner. Jack flicked his cigarette into the street, the small spark falling like a punctuation mark at the end of something understood.

Jack: “Maybe you’re right, Jeeny. Maybe words are the only kind of violence that doesn’t destroy.”

Jeeny: “No — they destroy too. But they destroy silence.”

Host: A long silence followed — the peaceful kind, born not from avoidance but from comprehension. Below them, the city’s heartbeat went on — drums, horns, laughter, and somewhere, a man reciting a poem to the rhythm of his people’s survival.

The wind carried it upward, brushing against their faces — like history exhaling through the night.

Jeeny reached over, turned up the volume, and the balcony filled with the sound of resistance — not loud, not angry, but alive.

Jack smiled faintly.

Jack: “So this is what revolution sounds like.”

Jeeny: “Yes. A heartbeat — in dialect.”

Host: The camera pulled back, rising above the balcony, above the streets where music and memory blurred together. The city glowed like a living poem — imperfect, unyielding, and forever singing in its own tongue.