Patti Smith: Free Money, Raw Punk-Rock Poetry
On a summer afternoon, somewhere on the edge of a town’s cape, the sky darkened and it seemed like someone had taken a shade of grey, and smudged it across its face. On this same summer afternoon, the wind rose and ruffled the black locust trees’ crowns so passionately, it made them sound like they were raining.
A mother cat, black and white with eyes the colour of an emerald sea, leaned against her babies – protecting them from the storm that was surely approaching. The steps of an old woman, always dressed in black, sounded the end of the sixteenth hour. From the backyard, where the apple tree wooes and croons the tree of the pear, the voice of a chicken crying for her mother is carried on the rain-scented air entering a room overlooking the west.
Thunder crashes in the distance.
A look falls onto my hands – typing on the keyboard words coming from beyond their making - and certainly from beyond my own making.
The left one, I broke in the seventh grade, hanging from the goalpost in the schoolyard.
I injured my right hand years later.
A slight, dull pain is felt in both of them whenever tiredness decides to linger a bit on my body -as it does at this instance.
“Free Money” plays from the speakers on my laptop, and Patti’s voice coincides with the thunder in the greyish skies – both powerful, natural, electric and free. As if a conductor, the lighting passes through her, it seems, and she moulds it, nurtures it, transforms it, and births it into song – not meddling with its nature, and the rawness of its being.
The voice of freedom.
Becoming Patti Smith: Loving Blake, Morrison, and Mapplethorpe
Smith's Early Life and Meeting Robert Mapplethorpe
Patricia Lee “Patti” Smith was born on December 30, 1946, in Chicago, Illinois as the eldest of four children. Her family moved several times before finally settling in New Jersey. The arts kept pulling her into their arms, at all times - the poetry of Arthur Rimbaud and William Blake, the Little Women of Louisa May Alcott, Harry Belafonte, Bob Dylan, Godard’s mark in the New Wave, Pollock’s paintings, Maria Callas’s voice, and Jim Morrison’s mysticism.
In 1967, Patti moved to Manhattan in New York City, and on her first day being there, she met photographer Robert Mapplethorpe. Theirs is a story of love, passion, art, and the purity of being human. As the Moon appears, undoubtedly, in the arms of the dark sky, each time the day fades to sleep, so some people appear in our lives and grace it with liberty. They appear and selflessly offer us the space in which the currents of the deepest parts of our internal seas can revel free. This space, natural and true as the falling of rain, is the source of what we call love. And love - true, unreserved love - is always pure.
Just Kids: The Artists' Love Story
Patti and Robert lived and created together – painting, writing poetry, and listening to records on the edge of countless nights - helping each other become the people that they were always meant to be. She became active in the downtown New York arts scene - writing and performing poetry, which soon expanded into music- and he fell completely in love with photography. One of Robert’s black and white photographs of Patti became the cover of her first album Horses, which came out in 1975.
“You drew me from the darkest period of my young life, sharing with me the sacred mystery of what it is to be an artist. I learned to see through you and never compose a line or draw a curve that does not come from the knowledge I derived in our precious time together”,
We are, as individual human beings, each of us, utterly alone, yet, the meeting of someone else’s loneliness gives us the chance to discover more - to explore our gifts, our flaws, and without a question, the depths of our hearts. Even the day becomes night. Night then turns to morning, and so, the transformation of something seemingly cut off and alone, testifies of an unspoken connection in everything.
What Does Being an Artist Mean?
The sky turns cotton-candy like.
And, the memory of myself in a sun-soaked apartment, insatiably studying people who, in a magical way made my heart flutter with inexplicable power, comes back. It rolls in the mind as the words of a much-loved song that one, perhaps, hasn't listened to in a while, rolls in the mouth. I came across an article titled How To Write A Poem According To Patti Smith, The Ultimate Punk Poet.
It’s still bookmark number one on my Google Chrome.
I read it repeatedly - taking in every single word of hers as a dessert soaks up water - and I felt as if this woman, whom I had never met, somehow knew me. As if she had inspected my insides and the most hidden parts of my being, and used them to create a guide which, then, she passed back on to me. I’ve found, and accepted, that this is always the case when someone speaks from their heart, to the heart of another. And, when two hearts speak, the mind stands silent.
The elevated feelings of love, hope, and knowing that appear in moments of this sort, appear because we are all, fundamentally, the same. One’s individuality is a beautiful expression of form - their thoughts and feelings, their personalities and routines, are uniquely one's own. No one can ever be the same as the one next to them, on the level of form. Some ever-present, sweet-as-honey, difference - whether it’s the way one articulates, or how the sound of their voice evokes one’s mouth to fill with the taste of cherries, or how they shyly avert their eyes when illuminated by the moonlight - must take place. But, our inner beings, our souls, are - and always have been - the same. They dwell in the sacred chambers of love, beyond the physical, guiding one’s self on the path of self-discovery.
“The artist seeks contact with his intuitive sense of the gods, but in order to create his work, he cannot stay in this seductive and incorporeal realm. He must return to the material world in order to do his work. It's the artist's responsibility to balance mystical communication and the labour of creation”.
Discovering the gifts that one possesses is a very unrevealing thing. It requires one to meet one’s self as they are in their most natural way of being -both on, and past the level of form. The same way as a child cries when the child is hungry, as they laugh when they are happy – with no restrictions, no doubts, and nothing to do with the way in which the outside world might perceive them.
This is not only true about the art of writing, or painting, but also about the art of loving and taking care of one’s self and others, the art of observing and noticing, and the art of being alive. Being human, we tend to live life, more often than not, not questioning why we are the way we are, and whether that way is our fundamental way of being, or someone else’s opinion of us. It doesn’t even have to be a particular person – it can be the society in which we live. And so, the very beginning of the process of self-inquiry opens the door to conscious creation, reinvention, and metamorphosis.
This is a process of natural change, and so the growing pains that will surely take part, can be eased with the help of our fellow humans. We are connected. Others, before us, have walked this Earth with the same aches, same longings, same desires, pains and fears, and they’ve left the stories of their bare hearts to us. Here, to remind us that life is far greater than the grasp of the mind. It stretches over it, and dives deep into the dark, but is always present. And it is always true.
If we only try, and open our souls to the beauty of truth, we’ll face the realisation of no fear. And, where there is no fear, awareness remains. Out of this awareness, then, both our internal and our external worlds can, and inevitably will, change.
So, questioning the norms, the limits, the politics and moral values, the ways in which one expresses oneself, how they perceive the world and co-create with it, is the path one has to walk on - if one wants to grow.
The Patti Smith Group and the Art of Humanity
Following Horses, which featured a cover of Van Morisson’s “Gloria” and Patti’s opening words “Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine”, from her poem “Oath”, the Patti Smith Group recorded three more albums: Radio Ethiopia (1976), Easter (1978), and Wave (1979).
“When I started performing a lot with Lenny Kaye and Richard Sohl, we had goals: to infuse new life into performing poetry—merging poetry with electric guitar, three chords—and to re embrace rock and roll. It drew us together and kept us informed, whether through Bob Dylan or Neil Young or the Who. In the early seventies, rock and roll was monopolised by record companies, marketing strategies, stadium rock. Tom Verlaine and Television were for me the most inspiring: They were not glamorous, they were human,”
Being human is the lesson one keeps on learning. We are eternal students of the art of humanity. And, people whose entire life revolves around the expression of that humanity, are the embodiment of love. There is a force within them that is no stranger to the heart. One only needs to see, or hear Patti Smith perform, and become enchanted. Her unique way of expression is like a prayer - meditative, yet, extremely intense. It makes one feel, and once one feels, one becomes vulnerable. Vulnerable, as a bird at the mercy of the wind.
Vulnerable, as we are supposed to be.
As we truly are.
The mere existence of life, at this instance, in a universe so vast and powerful, is nothing if not vulnerable. But it is also a sign of extreme endurance, and sacred, inexplicable beauty.
Patti and Fred Smith: The Dream of Life, Joy and Grief
Joy: Finding Love With Fred "Sonic" Smith
Patti took a break from live performances and touring after an accidental fall from stage while performing, and the meeting of her husband Fred “Sonic” Smith, who adored poetry with the same, passionate intensity as her. They moved to Detroit, and had two children, a boy and a girl. In 1988 they recorded Dream of Life - the album featuring the song “People Have the Power”.
But, the dream of life remains as fragile and as mighty as a sparrow’s wing - it carries one to the heights of heaven with but a flap, yet it breaks and falls just as easily. We are given but a breath - a short spring with warm sunshine and orange blossoms, a bit of rain and storm, full moons fading into new moons, and dusks of passion growing into dawns of love - and from that giving, from the very first cry of the newborn, that breath rushes to go back home, to its source. And, the vastness of night at the core of its existence, is one of utmost power and conviction - we have no control over it. It has its own path - one of order and chaos, of laughter and sorrow.
As a mischievous little wind, it plays with the waves of the seas, and the leaves of the trees, breaking them, when breaking is to take part.
It takes from us - everything that we ever had the courage to call our own.
Yet, if one stills one’s self for an instant, and stands as an observer of the ebbs and flows that are an inevitable component of life, one realises that nothing is here to be owned by anyone. It only exists - for the sake of love, growth and experience.
The only thing that is ever truly our own, is the way in which we consciously choose to express ourselves - especially when we are wounded.
Grief: How Patti Smith Lost Her Husband and Her Brother, and Continued To Create
Patti’s husband, Fred Smith, died of a heart attack on November 4th, 1994, and shortly after, she lost her brother Todd, as well.
“Grief starts to become indulgent, and it doesn’t serve anyone, and it’s painful. But if you transform it into remembrance, then you’re magnifying the person you lost and also giving something of that person to other people, so they can experience something of that person.”
Grief. Such is our predicament, that we must meet it. When one loses a loved one, they are never the same person again. Nothing can be done to mend the wound they’ve suffered. A void, ancient, and eternal, comes into being, and it becomes their companion until the end of time. Yet, time is of no importance when you love someone, and it is of even less importance when you lose them. Love transcends time. It transcends space, and boundaries, the known, and the material. When one looks at something, or someone, that was close to the one they’ve lost, the notion of death dissolves. Their presence, the essence of the life that was them, continues to live on.
Someone told me once that we see the people we’ve lost in those who loved them.
I believe them.
Smith continued to do her work after the loss of her husband and brother, and in 1996, she released the album Gone Again. She went back to performing, and supported the album by opening on tour for Bob Dylan. The album featured the song “About a Boy”, a tribute to Nirvana’s beautiful Kurt Cobain, who committed suicide in 1994. Also in 1996, she met and started collaborating with photographer Steven Sebring, out of which came the documentary film Patti Smith: Dream of Life.
Five more albums were released in the following years, including Peace and Noise (1997), Gung Ho (2000) Trampin' (2004), Twelve (2007), and Banga (2012).
Peace and Noise featured “1959”, a song about the invasion of Tibet, which later was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Female Rock Vocal Performance at the 40th Annual Grammy Awards.
Another nomination also came in 2001, for the song “Glitter In Their Eyes”, which appeared on the album Gung Ho.
Because the Night Belongs To Lovers
Understanding True Connection
The Christmas lights hanging on the window frame cast a yellow glow on my desk. Christmas is nowhere near, but I keep them up all year round. “Because the Night” plays in my headphones. A dog’s bark penetrates the cool night air, smelling of rain. On a lone, sandy beach, a seagull gently lands from the sky. The mountain notices, but is silent. So is the soul.
And, what the soul finds, eventually, is that, in the midst of a sorrow that might seem greater than the very joy of life, there lies a stillness far greater than all the noise ever created. An awareness, as acute and true, yet subtle, as a heartbeat. A liberation, stripped of labels, and restrictions, as a blue morning stripped of clouds.
Perhaps we’ll never be able to fully understand love - this power that breaks us open to freedom - and we don’t have to. We only need to let ourselves experience it. For, true courage lies in loving consistently, deeply and completely, beyond the laws of the intellectual mind.
Beyond the fear of losing, and the grips of ego, true connection is meeting another being in the silent, and feeling heard and seen - past the spoken, and that which is obviously shown.
Because the night does belong to lovers, one must admit to themselves that, an unending darkness rests in the centre of who they are. And a true lover has to love in the dark, with the fearlessness of darkness. For only those who are capable of loving the whole, will have known the truth of love - and the pain of heartbreak.
“For life is the best thing we have in this existence. And if we should desire to believe in something, it should be a beacon within. This beacon being the sun, sea, and sky, our children, our work, our companions and, most simply put, the embodiment of love.”
As I continue to marvel at the ferociousness of the artist’s expression, the remnants of what was once a Blue Moon, show their face on the back of a warm, early September night.
The sky, as if it knew, chased even the littlest of clouds away.
The waters stir.
On a busy street, a kid drops their ice cream. Tears rise from the purity of their soul, and fall rushingly from the jewelled-pools that are their eyes.
Who will they become, I wonder?
What currents will they have to navigate?
Change, at every corner. Loss, and gain, at every breath.
Always here, never the same, we all are.
Patti Smith's Books
Throughout the years, in which life changed, and each being on it - including the Earth herself - has been altered in their own, particular way, Patti has also published a number of books, including:
Woolgathering (1992),
Early Work (1994),
The Coral Sea (1996),
Just Kids (2010),
M Train (2015),
Devotion (2017),
Year of the Monkey (2019), and
A Book of Days (2022).
Collections of poetry, prose, photography, and devouring, beautiful storytelling, greet the reader in the most intimate of meeting places. One finds the artist floating in the vast infinitudes of imagination, and drinking black coffee in small, peaceful cafes, as well. Scribbled words in black ink on white, not-long-ago empty pages, appear in scenes of faded colour. Dreams taken from behind closed eyes and secret corners, are walked in the setting sun, as children on soft, beach sands.
Patti won the National Book Award in 2010 for her book Just Kids, which chronicles her loving, deep, relationship with her friend, lover, and partner in arts, Robert Mapplethorpe.
“Where does it all lead? What will become of us? These were our young questions, and young answers were revealed. It leads to each other. We become ourselves.”
Today, in the spheres of the modern and technological, creation, at its most fundamental and inexplicably raw coming into being, flickers on her Instagram profile.
Her last book, A Book of Days (2022), is the result of that flickering. Featuring more than 365 photographs, the book offers the reader a first row seat in the artist’s life and expression, giving them a unique chance not only to see, but to get to know her, in the everyday ordinary.
Smith's Voice: A Beacon For Justice and Raising Awareness
Using her voice not only to create art, but to raise awareness and inspire change, as well, Patti spoke and sang at the first protests against the Iraq War as U.S. President George W. Bush spoke to the United Nations General Assembly.
In march, 2003, ten days after the death of American activist, diarist, and member of the pro-Palestinian group International Solidarity Movement (ISM), Rachel Corrie, Patti performed an anti-war concert in Austin, Texas. Rachel was crushed to death by an armoured bulldozer of the Israel Defense Forces in the southern Gaza Strip during the height of the Second Intifada under contested circumstances. Patti later wrote and dedicated the song "Peaceable Kingdom", to her.
Supporting human-rights issues and environmental groups, she continues to do her work, even today, consciously, and unreservedly, and shares it with a world that is in much need of it.
Notes on Patti Smith's Creativity, Force of Expression, and Humanity
The span of Patti’s creativity and the force of her expression - which has given form to music, poetry, drawings, photographs, books, and talks - is one which words cannot really do justice. And, this was never supposed to be a rundown of those forms.
These writings are a rest stop. An old, wooden chair stands under an olive tree, where one can sit and catch their breath. And, as the memories of another August, now gone, continue to grace the dark-stained sky, one gets a chance to see themselves in another - in one who has dedicated her life to being an artist. Or, better yet, one who has dedicated her life to being human.
One who uses her voice to remind others that freedom is within them, and love truly is the way.
One who has lost, yet her eyes still glitter with kindness.
One who inspires - change, hope, and compassion.
Patti Smith is a light in a dazzling, yet dark world - proof that the matter of our existence is finding, meaning, courage, and true love, and using them to create a better, kinder world.
The nature of our world - the stars and the galaxies, the rivers and the oceans, the thoughts and the feelings - is cyclical. Things come and go with the lightness of the changing seasons. We cannot break nature’s force of change into submission. We can, however, gracefully accept our mortality, and with it, the mortality of everyone and everything around us.
To die before one is dead.
Once we accept this notion, the soul becomes like a feather - it can do anything. It can jump over riverbeds, and sing in the trees, it can lie under the stars and sleep in the open fields.
It becomes free.
And, once one acknowledges freedom, freedom becomes their life.
The choice of how that life will be expressed, is one’s own.
May you love deeply, and may you be loved truly.
Yours,
Meri
Discover the rest of the story VOICE OF FREEDOM: On Patti Smith and How Being an Artist Means Being Human First, completed with photographs, quotes, and more here.
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