Christine Neil-Wright, performing poet
BY HIS word, God created the heaven and the earth.
Christine Neil-Wright, who has never been short of words, is using the same process to recreate her own life.
Neil-Wright, employed as a secretary in Kingston, but whose heart is on stage with her poems, tells Outlook that her favourite place to perform are funerals.
The aim, she says, is to find the right words to bring "smiles through the tears" and a new perspective on death - something that so few of us know how to bear.
She often succeeds, she claims.
"I try to put myself in their (those who grieve) shoe. It's not difficult."
Born with natural oratorical skills, the words that she writes are only half of her appeal. Her voice, part the product of her parents genes and part the result of training, oozes emotion like silt-laden river.
The sound is mellifluous, tragic and happy by turn. It is no surprise that she is also often called upon to perform. She has enhanced her natural voice with several courses in Voice and Speech pursued at the Creative Production and Training Centre (CPTC) in Kingston.
Eulogies and tributes are favourites, for the poet. The aim, through it all, she says, "is to laugh, not to cry."
Not surprisingly, Neil Wright performs at weddings, too. A recent piece written for a couple who wed in January and delivered very lyrically reads, in part:
Watching you
journey up the aisle
My heart in suspense
and awe
stops beating
Neil-Wright started putting pen to paper at age 10 while attending Pembroke Hall Primary School. She clearly remembers a piece written about a little dog of which her teachers were most impressed. She has been writing ever since.
"I write when the inspiration hits," she states.
Anything that affects society, generally speaking, and children in particular, are enough to bring on a writing spell.
A little girl,
no more than 12
Walks with her folders pressed close
to her breast
Mummy won't listen to her cries
Daddy is a pedophile
Social issues are a favourite topic. Her poem, "Mama blood deh pon mi han", a lyrical dialogue between a woman and her 'gunman son', was inspired by the spate of killings in the year 2002.
The chant, she said, was her take on a policeman's report who spoke after the killings about the silence of mothers who defend their sons. In that time, also, one mother was killed by her own son.
Mama blood deh
pan me han
it a run
It a drip
Me jus help de man dem
Kill a man
"I think its important that someone writes about what is happening in the world," she tells Outlook.
Neil-Wright's most recent achievement was the receipt of a bronze medal at the Caribbean Championships of the Performing Arts for the poem entitled 'The Questions'.
The graduate of Oberlin High School and Stony Hill HEART Acadamy states that she has always been good at English.
Currently working on a CD featuring herself in performance, she hopes that this will be the start of a life of greater achievement and real independence.
The secretary, separated form her spouse, admits that she is scripting a new life for herself and her son, who is her only child.
Let there be light, God said, and there was light.
In not so many words, and with necessarily more faith, the performing poet is hoping to change lives.
'Let there be life', is the clear cry of her heart.
Avia Ustanny
