Dear Charles: An Open Email to Charles Hamilton

aka The Pink Panther

aka Sonic

Everybody has to hate a man who gets to walk on clouds
Because nobody ever dreams to have their feet on solid ground
So the people trying to bring you down will only have to see
That with a change of frame they'll be up here with you and me
Rest easy, be at peace and don't look down at jeering voices
Their protests are the dying pangs of ignorance, that noise is
Just the rattled cough of all our sins, the sickness unto dying
But we are the cure, the weight will lift and all will soon be flying

True to Youth, but Young to Truth
Each nook is a studio and shower a booth
Each hour the power to get Dreams out now or
To Glare in the Mirror, to ataxic to move.

Dear Charles Hamilton,
I am writing you as a great admirer and lover of your music. Your work, your lyrics in particular, have always possessed a certain ethereal quality, of a greater weight in spirit than things other rappers may say, and your metaphors distinguish you as a man with a very unique and beautiful brain. I'm writing you because I worry about that brain, about the great potential that is about to be squandered by the career seppuku you are committing.
I remember first hearing your music, Charles Hamilton, and feeling so fucking invigorated that I shook, excited as a child with an expensive new gift. "Is this the new wave?" I thought, hoping I was seeing the fresh face that hip-hop would take, a return to the mastery of language and poesy as much in thought as in word, as much in the resonance of ideas as the assonance of syllables, that has led to the production of what are now considered "immortal" works of art. I thought you might be going in that direction, not to stand amongst the ranks of Pac and Big (no disrespect), but with Whitman, Milton, or Blake. Taking so much stock in the opinions your contemporary artists, as Ye and Em, will only frustrate you. Be content that, if you stay true to the art and the heart, you will be remembered as readily as they when America is a memory and Hip-Hop the name of a university class studying outdated forms of expression.
The world is very big, and history is very long, Charles Hamilton. And we, all of us, are very, very young. Cultivate your Thirst for knowing and skill, ignore your Hunger for fame and power, and you will be given that which you surrender. Don't take it as a slight against you that neither Mathers nor West responded-they circulate in different globes than you, as you do in relation to me. Don't try to be talked about for throwing punches above your weight-nobody would attempt to compare you to Hov at this point. Don't battle in barbershops-there is a time and place for it, and if you respect the conventions, people respect you.
Focus on your music and words, Charles Hamilton. Find a Voice that is undeniably yours but yet more than yours, that speaks from your mouth but from a larger and broader Mind, and you will see that matters of "career" are transient and irrelevant, purely incidental and without value to people as Artists.
I hope to continue hearing from you via mixtapes and singles. ("All Alone" was great, by the way) Eventually I'd love to hear you perfect and finalize an album. But I think it will take a radical change in perspective, "getting your mind right." Break out of where you're at, change some settings, meet new people, and get a library card. Yeezy's where he's at because he told himself he was the best since before anybody'd heard his name, and it took ten years, but people are beginning to agree. Will you wait ten years?
Good luck.
With the best intentions,
Your Fans

More important than what you die for is what you live for. It is not meant for us to choose the way we die, which is why most of us don't, and won't; but the way we live is ours to choose.

Every breath is an artful stroke, every death the final signature on a masterpiece, and whether we are the painters, or God, is inscrutable, irrelevant.

Maybe better than what we accomplish is what we intend, what we dream, and who we inspire.