the woman who comes after me will be a
bootleg version of who I am
she will try and write poems for you to
erase the ones I've left memorized on
your lips
rupee core might just be the most famous
poet on the planet
[Music]
for books of Soul millions of copies and
have been translated into more than 40
languages
and oh yeah in the past year alone she's
performed in more than 50 cities on a
world tour that's also been turned into
an Amazon Prime special
so are we ready la
I'm so happy that you're here you know I
had I thought I had to become like a pop
star not an actress to get here no but
somehow poetry is poetry is the new pop
man absolutely core's first
self-published book milk and honey helps
spark a revolution in poetry with her
trademarks short poems and sketches she
caught fire on Instagram any millions of
followers who connected with her stories
of heartbreak trauma and the Immigrant
experience
it's an inspiring story that began in
India and then to Canada's little girl
and is now taking her to stages around
the world
[Music]
you are a poet who tours like a rock
star who's been to Europe and South
America and Australia and Singapore and
now back in Canada what's it been like
it's been a dream like kind of hasn't
felt real and uh I think when it was all
starting out for me and I was traveling
a lot I was sort of overwhelmed by it
but now I'm at a place where I'm feeling
really present and when I'm up there I'm
like oh my goodness is this real life
like how am I in Paris or you know
Venice and sitting with these incredible
human beings and connecting on this
level it's beautiful I was born in
Punjab and I was three and a half when
we moved to Canada I guess
so I always felt split between these two
lands and so even though I grew up in
Canada when I got home after school you
better believe I was walking right back
into the motherland
we have to speak read write live breathe
everything Punjabi
English until like the third grade
because nobody around me spoke any
and so the kids at school called me a
fob short for fresh off the boat because
I spoke English in a Indian accent and
then my cousins in Punjab made fun of me
for speaking Punjabi in a Canadian
accent and that's what I realized I'm
[ __ ]
these kids don't give a [ __ ] about me
a big part of your story is the
Immigrant story a family that moved here
from India and uh and and
tried to fit in eventually did fit in
but you tell an interesting story about
walking into kindergarten class uh tell
me a little bit about that yeah I was
I'm the oldest of four kids and so
parents don't speak any English didn't
really have any cousins who spoke any
English and uh
so I remember going to kindergarten it's
and everyone around me is yapping away
in English and I felt like I had been
abducted by aliens because it was the
first time I was in a setting where
people were talking and I had no idea
what was going on and that's when I
I felt so voiceless because I could not
communicate for that early part of my
life with my peers but then even when I
learned to I'd probably I'd been silent
for so long that I just chose not to
speak anyway being extremely shine
introverted and that's when I sort of
fell in love with books and I really
just used books as not only my crutch
but they were my first friends and so I
read and I read and I read and hoping
that nobody would notice that I had no
other friends
[Music]
so this young girl who had been abducted
by aliens who has no other friends who
for whom English is a second language
and who is shy
finds her element not just in books but
performing on stage I mean somebody
reading that it might kind of seem
surprising but when you got there on
stage you loved it I did I did the first
time I performed I was in high school
and uh and I remember going to this open
mic it was in this community center in
Malton there was maybe 25 people in the
audience but something magical happened
when I was up there
it felt like I
Was Heard for the first time and I was
like I love this feeling and I realized
that the stage is where I started to
find my voice
[Music]
you are a Trailblazer in so many ways
and a story that people who are fans of
yours will know but maybe not everyone
does is is that first self-published
book
and you turn that into really an
extraordinary part of your career can
you read us a poem from that book of
course yeah let me just
so milk and honey you can surprise me
okay I already know which one I'm
reading
this one is called the art of Being
empty and it's on page 33.
emptying out of my mother's belly was my
first stocked of disappearance
learning to shrink for a family who
likes their daughters invisible was the
second
the art of Being empty is simple
believe them when they say you are
nothing
repeat it to yourself like a wish
I am nothing I am nothing I am nothing
so often the only reason you know that
you're still alive is from the heaving
of your chest
who's the young woman who wrote that
what was she thinking
um
think that
I was thinking about myself
and all of the young women that I grew
up with who
[Music]
were constantly told
to not speak and not have opinions and
to
be as invisible as possible I mean
I always was a very opinionated kid and
I always made sure to share my opinions
out loud and I remember my mom
would just be like oh my goodness and
you're never getting no one's ever gonna
marry you your mother-in-law is gonna
hate you you know it's like what she
learned from you know her mother back in
India and all of that and she's just
passing that down to me and so I was
really thinking about that and thinking
about the violence also and the abuse
um
that women's bodies hold especially
within the South Asian community
[Music]
foreign
[Music]
so you published this book at first
yourself and it became so popular that
it eventually attracted a major
publisher and you know as they say the
rest is history it was kind of the
turnaround Point like incredible success
you have incredible sales
um and yet you didn't embrace all of
that success like there was a point that
I've read where you felt a certain
amount of discomfort why was that
back to like I'm
I've always been
shy introverted all of those things and
so it is really I think
definitely comfortable more comfortable
with it now but in the beginning very
uncomfortable and scary and overwhelming
to
know that so many people
have read this book and it's so personal
and so I think it just took a couple of
years for me to really process that and
accept it because it's a very weird
feeling
the other thing is you are a poet who
sells millions of copies of books I
can't think of another person who's
managing to do that now when I think of
poetry I think of things that I learned
decades ago in University that had been
written decades before
what what do you hope will happen to
this art form I mean it feels like
you've you've made this accessible to so
many people I mean I hope that you know
for for me is somebody who grew up in a
Punjabi household poetry was like is one
of the main genres of literature that we
consume and that we share with our
families and friends and so
I hope that at least here in the west it
can become one of the you know main
genres that we consume and like still
today like this book has been on the New
York Times bestseller list for over 100
weeks but in the fiction category so I'm
hoping that over time people will
realize that
poetry isn't going anywhere and it does
deserve a space of its own because
people do want access to it
[Music]
I grew up feeling so embarrassed and
ashamed of my parents accent because it
was something that was so mocked here in
Canada and in the West in general and
then I remember turning like 21 and
something just did like a full 180 in my
head and I was like wait a minute
how can I be embarrassed of this thing
when it's the only thing my parents have
left of home and that thought just it
changed everything for me and then this
poem was born
I think about the way my father pulled
the family out of poverty without
knowing what a vowel was
and my mother
raised four children without being able
to construct a perfect sentence in
English
so when I started to really reflect on
the sacrifices that my parents had made
and so many of them and um
so that we could have a life so that I
could have the chance to go to
university
and
I was moved by it to the point of Tears
you know and this is the story of so
many immigrants and especially so many
of the ones that I grew up around so I
really wanted to write this poem as a
love letter to them
they turned a suitcase full of clothes
into a life and regular paychecks to
make sure that the children of
immigrants wouldn't hate them for being
the children of immigrants
you know my mom still doesn't speak
English and it is something that she's
so ashamed about
and I was thinking about how especially
if my mom she was a homemaker
and I often reflect on what that means
for an immigrant woman to be between
these four walls
and that country this new home
or what's supposed to feel like home
will never see her but what she's made
of her life regardless of whether it's
invisible or not is Art of its own so
how dare you mock your mother
when she opens her mouth and broken
English spills out
don't be ashamed of the fact that she
split through countries to be here so
you wouldn't have to cross a shoreline
her accent is thick like honey hold it
with your life
the only thing she has left of home
don't you stomp on that richness
instead hang it up on the walls of
museums next to Dolly and Van Gogh
her life is brilliant and
the thread that stays consistent through
all of my work is immigrant stories I
think I'm not finished
you know diving into that I don't know
if I ever will be you know and I I say
something during my shows I say that I
could probably spend the rest of my life
you know filling book after book with
the struggle and the Triumph of my
parents and my community but that still
wouldn't even scratch the surface and so
I'm really looking forward to
how I continued to explore that in this
next decade but especially how I'm going
to explore that you know three or four
decades from now
Beach