Grand Rapids’ Incoming Poet Laureate Kyd Kane Talks Creative Expression and Community Collaboration

At Local Spins, Nick Moran introduces readers to Grand Rapids's newest poet laureate, Ericka “Kyd Kane” Thompson, who succeeds Marcel “Fable the Poet” Price, and is the first black woman and first openly queer person to be given the honor. "The name Kyd Kane actually found Thompson while she was growing up in Grand Rapids," Moran writes. From there: 

Raised in a household with a love for soap operas, her family called her Ericka Kane, a reference to Susan Lucci’s character on “All My Children” who had her sights set on love, leadership and fame.

Kyd came later, when she was rapping with a group in Grand Rapids during her late teens and early 20s. She said writing and performing as Kyd Kane gave her a chance to reclaim a childhood she never had. Helping her mother raise her three other siblings early on, she felt like an adult for longer than she had been a kid. Poetry was a chance to explore a lost sense of childish freedom.

“When I moved into being a poet and performance, I never felt more free,” she said. “I never felt more like a kid. So, you know, I just stuck with it.”

Poetry found its way into Kyd Kane’s life while she was helping raise her siblings. Long impressed by the expressive power of it, she recalls students back in second grade reciting poetry at a school picnic. She said she was taken aback by the beauty of the language and the sense of reflection it produced.

“It was just such a profound moment for me to be able to just hear people expressing stuff and getting stuff out in a time where I didn’t really feel like I had this space to express,” she said. “I’m like, ‘Oh, on the page, I can say whatever I want. On the page, I can create whatever I want.’”

Learn more at Local Spins.