Where it all started

Cydney Brown performing her poetry at The Philadelphia Museum of Art on May 7th, 2021.

Photo: Albert Lee /https://urphillypal.darkroom.tech/

Cydney Brown on stage performing her poetry on August 5th, 2016.

Photo: Kayla Brown https://kabrown345.wixsite.com/website

Looking back I remember the girl sitting in her bedroom writing poetry in her mint green journal. She felt so aloneand like no one understood her, but she always had this need to create. She didn't let anyone stop her. She had this need to share. She willingly got up on stage and shared her poetry even if it made her legs shake.

I'm writing this post because 5th grade me wasn't worried about making things perfect. She just wanted to make things. She wanted to tell a story and move people through poetry. That's what I want to do, so this is my introduction.

Hi, I'm Cydney Brown, I've been a poet since 5th grade. I became the Youth Poet Laureate of Philadelphia in 2020, one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. I do poetry readings, write commissioned poems for events, and I do poetry performances as well. I published a book entitled Daydreaming back in 2020 and it's a book that shares my thoughts and experiences from middle school to high school. It goes from friendships to owning my blackness to checking people on their privilege. It's all very me. A Black girl from Philadelphia who wants to inspire people to speak their truth because she feels like she has been silenced by the world. But when I don't feel like I have the weight of a million on my shoulders...

I like to bake red velvet cupcakes, go bowling with my family, play mini-golf, go on hikes and see the way the light beams through the leaves, I like to take photos of places and people and really capture their beauty, I like watching Rom-Coms on Netflix and seeing happy-endings, I like to eat brownie sundaes with chocolate cookie dough ice cream and hot fudge and watch birds fly like synchronized swimmers in the sky against a bright blue backsplash amongst cotton candy clouds. I like living life and experiencing the world with incredible people.

I recently produced a Spoken Word album entitled "Roundtrip", a collection of Spoken Word poetry set to music that speaks to my journey through life, because no matter where I go, I always come back home. I always come back to that little girl who wanted to share her voice with the world. So if life is like a Roundtrip, I hope you'll join me on this journey of imperfections and typos, because I'm so ready to get started!