Wandering for Words

I stumbled upon this video of Alicia Keys on Def Jam Poetry. I think I have a pretty good excuse for not knowing how talented she is. I’m a WASP, (meaning I’m not exposed to R&B much unless I seek it out) and I’m older,(seriously too old to know these things, not like 31or even the borderline number 35), and haven’t had much time to wander lately. Not wander as in ‘backpack around the world’ wandering, just the plain ‘no place yet everywhere to go’ wandering that i have been famous for at other times of my life. Last night, my son took me to a seedy part of Atlanta to hear this guy Shane Claiborne. He wanders a lot, in fact he goes from place to place in a souped up school bus to preach the truth of Jesus. Not Sunday morning, all dressed up, white washed Jesus, but the shoeless, dirty, hangin’ with drug addicts Jesus. This guy has some cool words. He has some friends that are the band and they sound like a combination of rock-a-billy and some call to prayer playing through the air in India at dusk or maybe sounds from a Jewish chant. Don’t you think it’s true that we would have more interesting words if we all wandered more? Do words wander like I do? Can they change their meaning based on their experiences or take on a new meaning by seeing through another’s eye? Have I been limiting myself to the same old words because I have been too busy to wander? I need to change that soon, because I have really enjoyed stumbling upon Alicia and her spoken words. That is some powerful stuff! Check it out and let me know what you think.