Meet Sublime Luv and Amber Williams

Today we’d like to introduce you to Sublime Luv.

Every artist has a unique story. Can you briefly walk us through yours?
I was born and raised in Boston, Ma. I have lived in almost all neighborhoods within the city during the course of my life. My aunt and grandparents were my support system growing up. My mother battles intensely with a mental illness and my father was absent. I began writing early on as a means of coping and healing. I received a full scholarship to an all-girls, independent school (Dana Hall School) in a suburb of Boston and I attended that institution from 6th grade to October of my 11th grade year. I left after years of experiencing micro aggressions from other students and staff. I moved on to a Boston public high school and became an activist through words because of the immensely contrasting experiences within those institutions.

I am a proud alum of Simmons University with my Bachelors of Arts in Sociology. I began reading my work at open mics locally in my early 20s. I began memorizing my work and professionally performing in 2012. I also renamed myself SublimeLuv that same year. I choose Sublime because it is defined as “supreme; outstanding.” I included L-U-V to symbolize a new take on l-o-v-e. The traditional love is often misused and represented. People tell others they love them and sometimes they may not even truly love themselves. Luv is a revolutionary love that embodies not only love for ourselves, but love and respect for oppressed communities, love of queer community, love of transgender community, love of poor communities, and an unconditional love of humanity that surpasses space and time.

I call myself a Black lesbian womanist that always speaks my truth and I believe that the “personal is political.” I am a member of ‘Team Be Spoken,’ located at the ‘if you can Feel it you can Speak it’ Open Mic at the Milky Way (in Jamaica Plain) every second Thursday of the month. Through my art and future endeavors, I aim to empower women of color to impact positive global change.

Please tell us about your art.
Poetry is my art and ever since I could form words it naturally poured out of me onto literally anything I could write on. I feel deeply that it is my gift. I am dedicated to my art. It is a means of coping for myself and when I discovered that it helps and inspires others I ran with it. Some common themes in my work are shaped from my lived experience and pride of living in my body as a Black woman. Through this experience, I want to gift other Black women with words of love and pride. My words honor our sacred greatness. A young Black woman recently wrote about her reflections after seeing me perform in July. Her sentiments were that my words “helped affirm to me that my skin color was my power and it was nothing to be ashamed of.” This is my why; why I share my work and why I continue performing.

I am also inspired by all facets and phases of life. My fiancé is a major inspiration of all of my poems about love and sensuality. I am inspired greatly by nature and even random experiences. At times my poems help me think and reflect deeper about what is in my heart. I write often because my soul is moved by a plethora of things. I write when I’m happy, angry, or sad. There are times when a journal entry morphs into a poem. I hope people will take away their own inspiration from my art. I hope my words challenge them to think deeper, I hope they feel truth and love from my poems. I also hope that my art leaves them wanting to hear more from me.

As an artist, how do you define success and what quality or characteristic do you feel is essential to success as an artist?
Success to me is nuanced. One layer of attaining success as an artist is working consistently on your art and remaining passionate about it despite the monetary outcome. As long as one remains serious about their art, monetary success will come. One can be extremely talented but it takes determination and tenacity to see it all the way through. Another layer for me, is that success looks like tons of people being moved by my words that have no stake in me. Family and friends love and support you by default, but when strangers are impacted and transformed by your work, you have truly made it!

How or where can people see your work? How can people support your work?
I share different forms of my writing and some performances on my social media pages. I also have a chapbook that can be purchased for $10. There are a few things I’m currently working on. Such as a website, vlogging, a new chapbook, and other exciting projects that I can’t yet disclose. Stay tuned!

Contact Info:

• Email: sublimeluvspeaks@gmail.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/mssublimeluv/
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/MsSublimeLuv

Image Credit:
I wrote these short poems and created the images with the TextGram app.

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