Voila

A poetic interpretation of the performace of the song “Voila”, sung by Emma Kok.

Here I am.
No mask.
No curtain to soften the beam.
No script to save me
if the room goes quiet.

I bring
nothing
but the truth
stitched
in a quivering key.

Here I am-
Do you feel it?
That hunger behind the beauty?
That is where I live.
That is what I give you.

This voice-
it did not come
gently.
It was carved
out of absence,
out of rooms that forgot my name,
out of nights where machines
fed me
what food could not.

Still,
I learned to feed you.
With this.
With sound
that knows where your silence lives.
With story
disguised as song.

When I sing,
I trespass-
my notes brush your yesterdays,
unlatch the rusted bolts
you swore were sealed.
And you let me.
Because you want to be shattered gently
by something real.

I do not sing
for the echo of your hands.
I sing
because the air demands it,
because silence
is a grave I refuse to lie in,
because without this,
I dissolve
into the drone of souls
too timid to burn.  

Voila.

This is no sleight of hand,
no shimmering chance.
This is the toll
of being witnessed-
Crossing a the entry-sill 
even when the hinges screamed.

You think this is a performance?
No.
This is a plea
wrapped melody.
A question
asked in a language
only the broken understand.

Do you see me now?

Not the girl,
not the dress,
not the pretty vowel held too long.
Me.

The hunger that cannot be eaten away.
The song that lives
where meals might have.
The voice that stayed
when the rest
was too tired.

And yes-
it is a masterpiece.
Not for its polish,
but for its price.
Every measure
a coin I paid in full,
every refrain
a flame I held
though it scorched my palms.  

Only one story lives in me.
Still, I tell it
like it is scripture.
Like it can stitch the crack
in your memory
where your first dream died.

And if you feel that-
the tightening in your throat,
the turning,
the part of you
buried
trying to sit still-

then I have done it.
Then I am seen.
I have christened the hunger
Holy.

Voila. Voila. Voila.
That’s me.
no shield,
no armor
just a girl
bold enough
to break you
into something whole.