lady amy

03/16/07
sxsw
@
la zona rosa
&
making her way across the
sea…

amy.

that vinci heldt’s beehive torch being carried into the
21st century (made her
signature)---
bearing a white wife-beater
& she smiles over at the one guitarist sitting with an
acoustic
ready to begin---
stripped down to just the bare essentials:
-a captivating & absolutely engrossing voice
-one line of stringed melody as a backdrop

with her right boot beginning to tap
&
keep the tempo of the song---
gently snapping her right hand on the offbeat---
she quiets the whole joint with the
opening of her
eyes simultaneously with the first words that come
in a paradox of
exhaustion & relentless
stalwartness---
eyes of a woman who has endured a long fight &
is still alive to tell the
tale.

she starts
“back
to
black”
with her left hand slowly rising
punctuating each
point of pain
appropriately.

& her eyes pierce right
through
you.

she may weigh in at 100 lbs. but you do not want to
fuck
with her---for she has been through what she sings
about---
made herself
numb
& indestructible---
there isn’t a punch you could throw that would make her
flinch.

you cannot move your gaze away,
because while she holds you in a trance
she rips out her own heart
so exceedingly quick
that it’s still beating when she grips it in her
hand.

then,
she shakes it at you---
it is bleeding down her tattooed arm,
pumping & spurting out
all which ways
promulgating her presence
with a visual & aesthetic explosion of
torment, distress & heartache---
& with this
horrible heartache,
she points the thing at all of us watching
forcing us to see what she is going
through
exactly in this moment
she may sing about the current past
but her pain pulsates with each note that comes
wavering
with
only
the
soul
of
which
she speaks so eloquently in the explicit
NOW.

she takes you down with her
dragging you on the ocean floor
like a shark who has just nabbed his prey---
then she sits with you at the bottom
&
as she labors out the end of the song
pulling no punches herself
through each striking tone of strife
&
we are gasping with her
trying to breathe
trying to come to a better conclusion than what seems
so destined
&
then we both make it to the top of the water
with
mutual breaths of relief.

all that much stronger she is for taking our hearts into a place
that only she knows
and making it one that we can all understand
because of its
brutal honesty.

her smile at the crowd when the song completely ends
& is engulfed with
applause and loving yells
is evidence
of a woman
defiant.