A review by C.E. Hoffman.
I am in full support of separating the art from its artist. However, one cannot appreciate Pupa:
Growth and Metamorphosis without understanding the person from which such deep feeling
hails.
Sadee Bee is a poet/author with a degree in Liberal Arts. She openly shares her diagnosis of
Bipolar Disorder, Borderline Personality Disorder, and complex PTSD, and “spent a long time
trying to make sense of her own world and mind.”
Sadee says she “uses her work to shine a light on the hidden parts of mental illness and the
effects of childhood trauma… speaking to her specific experiences… as a Black, queer woman in
Black communities.”
This is particularly evident in her collection of personal essays and evocative verse released by
Alien Buddha Press. Bee succeeds in the artist’s noblest aim: to unearth secrets reverently and
tenderly, and elevate the personal to the universal.
We’re reminded resurrection is neither simple, nor pretty (though Bee’s text could be described
as both.) Healing hurts as much as the wound it seeks to close; speaking up is scarier than
silence. How lucky for us that Sadee Bee found her voice.
When she unblinkingly details her sexual assault, medication routine, or being institutionalized, I
resist shouting at the page, “Samesies!!”
When a writer is this honest, a reader knows they can be trusted. I finished Pupa feeling closer to
Sadee, though we’ve only talked via Twitter/my podcast, and, better still, I felt closer to myself.
By daring to drag her skeletons out of the shadows, mine too are safely seen.
It may help that her diagnosis is the exact same as the psychiatric assessment I’ve received, but
suffering by any name hurts as much, and anyone can find solace in someone else’s story.
This is the alchemy that makes art imperative. Art is not a soft option. It’s not a recreational
activity. Art is the rigorous process by which we elucidate the struggle -and growth- of our souls.
Without art, we’d be robots- or animals.
Reading Pupa is akin to watching someone crawl out of their grave. (Buffy Season 6, anyone?)
Bee claws through her coffin, shovels through the dirt, and arrives above ground with a surfeit of
wisdom. One feels like they’re reading her diary, or something even more intimate. These are
earnest, aching scrawls; a morass unassailable without Bee’s gracious retrospective. Look how
far I’ve come, she says. Look how far you can go.
The syntax is unrefined, but so is the healing process.
This is art at its most personal, and most poignant.
With all the candour of a heartfelt confession, Bee draws us into an emotionally-formed
landscape of gentle poems and agonizing anecdotes. Her observation of “I only want to feel free”
reminds me of my favourite Zadie Smith quote: “The universe wants you to be free.” Bee is
aligned with the universe- as is anyone so sincerely dedicated to personal growth.
Bee is an old soul, a new, important voice, and another Sylvia Path- one who will not be
consumed by the fire, but crawl anew from their cocoon.
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