Spoken word, beyond words

What translates through performance poetry when you don’t understand the language

Ever gone to a poetry night where you don’t speak the language the poets perform in, like not even a little bit?? Ever had the best time at a poetry night when you don’t even understand a word?? Me either - until last week.

I had the joy of trotting off to Estonia to the Tallinn Slam Finals. Almost all the slammers performed in Estonian, and there were no subtitles, so for most of the night I had absolutely no idea what the poems were about. And it was one of the coolest and most profound experiences I’ve ever had at a poetry event. Yeah. I know. Seriously.

Sounds silly maybe. But there was something about that night, about being in a room of people feeling and responding to poetry and not understanding why, but feeling along with them anyway, that felt so totally special and novel. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so connected to an audience, or more aware of all the other performance aspects besides words that a poet can bring to the stage.

Being stripped of my understanding of language intensified everything else.

With no clue what the poets were saying, I had space to fully take in and absorb every other element of their performance: their presence, their movements, the rhythm and music of their words rather than the meaning behind them. How their voices shaped and shared the vowels and consonants, how their bodies packaged their physical delivery. I entered an almost trance-like state, the one part of my brain that’s wanting to process and understand the poem completely switched off. I was present in a way I hadn’t experienced when listening to poems in English.

Not a clue what’s being said, but enraptured nonetheless.

One of the most special things about a live poetry event is how you have your own experience, yes, but you also experience it all as a collective. These nights are always a shared conversation between you, your fellow audience members, the poets - everyone in that room, really - as you share something one-of-a-kind together. Your individual experience, your own response to the poem as you watch, forms part of the collective audience experience.

But when you can’t understand what’s actually being said, some parts of your individual experience dissolve into the space around you - in the best way.

I had to surrender myself to the energy of the room, let myself drift on the current of the crowd, to get some sort of sense of what the poem might be about and how it was making people feel. When the words have no meaning to you, the audience becomes your barometer, your interpreter.

Their laughter, their breath, their clicks, their cheers, the weight of their silence, everything they did told me something about what the person on stage was sharing with us. Translated the impact of their words into emotion. And somehow, despite my lack of understanding in the moment, I was still completely swept away with it all. When the audience laughed, I laughed with them. When the atmosphere shifted into something more sombre, I felt it, carried it too, though I had no idea what was being said.

Connected to feeling rather than thought. Sensing and observing rather than thinking and judging. Listening to everything other than the meaning of language.

It was a night I won’t ever forget. Not only because of the whole not-understanding-a-thing-but-having-the-best-time-anyway stuff, but also because the vibes overall were chef’s kiss. Hosts Lee Jenner and Kelli Kiipus are not only brilliant at what they do, effortlessly diffusing the potentially tense environment of a poetry slam final into this beautiful warm glow of an evening, but they are also some of the most wonderful and kind people I’ve been lucky enough to meet. The corners of my eyes and my cheeks eventually began to ache with how much I was smiling and laughing during my time with them.

The impeccably dressed hosts with the most, Lee and Kelli

They were also very generous and offered me the honour of being the sacrificial poet to kick off the night and warm up the stage for the slammers and get the judges ready to do their thing. One of the warmest, most receptive audiences I’ve encountered so far, who gave me so much back, even in the brief window of time I was up there. I had so much fun on that stage.

(Also, does this technically make me an international spoken word poet now?? It just might, you know. I’ll take it. From London, to Tallinn, and then the world.)

Very important visual proof of performance going international

The slammers were fantastic too. It’s one thing to be a part of an established poetry scene and carve your place in it. It’s quite another to be part of a scene that is still shaping itself, giving poets the opportunity to mold themselves along with it. It feels very fresh, alive, full of possibility, and I could feel this as I watched them all do their thing.

And Tallinna Slämmi Kollektiiv is really nurturing and uplifting their poetry scene by not only putting on these (warm, well-run, wonderfully hosted) events, but also by inviting established and award-winning poets to feature at their slams and showcase what performance poetry can look and feel like and what fun you can have. This time it was 2024 Roundhouse Slam champ, and your favourite poet’s favourite poet, Bradley Taylor (in his first international poetry performance - step aside Pitbull, there’s a new Mr Worldwide in town) for a headline set, in which he demonstrated just how brilliant a spoken word poet and performance can be.

To sum it all up: it was all very inspiring for everyone involved.

Aitäh to Lee and Kelli and the performers and the audience for a truly unforgettable experience. I’m still thinking about it all. I can’t wait to see how this night filters through into everything I go on to do next - because it most certainly will, somehow. It was too magical to not. ❤️