What impact has art had in your life?
As I’ve navigated the often challenging journey of my mental health — facing loss, trauma, depression, anxiety, and more — I’ve found that art has not only been a companion through the hard times but also a voice for my emotions. Whether anger, fear, elation, frustration, or happiness, art has served as a snapshot of human truth, one that we sometimes struggle to capture on our own but that artists allow us to feel deeply within.
From paintings to graffiti, cross-stitch to dance, poetry to music, film to novels, and the natural beauty of the world…
These artistic expressions give us the opportunity to truly see, to feel connected, and to realize that someone else is experiencing what we are going through. Sometimes, they articulate something we never knew we needed to hear.
It’s this last point — hearing something I didn’t know I needed — that brings me to write today. Yesterday, I got a tattoo.
It’s a tattoo of Florence Welch, of Florence + the Machine fame. I’ve been a huge fan of Florence since Lungs, and I firmly believe that she has the ability to encapsulate grace, love, hardship, and more in what seems like effortless expression. One song in particular spoke a truth so loudly and so deeply that it shook me to my core.
“King,” released in 2022 on the album Dance Fever, captures the struggles of labels and identity that women often face. It highlights Florence’s desire to be inherently herself, not defined in relation to others. The song also reflects the dissonance many women feel as they explore the paths available to them while balancing all that life throws their way.
The chorus of “King” declares, “I am no mother. I am no bride. I am King.” When I first heard those lyrics, it felt like my heart might stop. No one had ever spoken it so succinctly, with such ferocity, and with such resounding truth. I, Sarah, may be married, but I am certainly not defined as just a bride or a wife. I have struggled with fertility — or rather, infertility — and hearing this declaration made my heart sing. I am me, Sarah, myself. I am not defined in relation to someone else or in service to some gendered expectation of who I should be.
Mother. Sister. Wife. Aunt. Daughter.
“But she is someone’s sister…” “That’s someone’s daughter you’re talking about…”
Yes, she is. She is. She is.
She is, simply, deserving, human, whole. Not because she serves a particular role or exists in relation to someone else, but because she is inherently valued and valuable.
Florence spoke a truth that I can never unhear, an anthem I will never stop singing.
This tattoo, capturing a woman and musician I love deeply, completed by an artist whose work I cherish (shoutout to Cutty Bage), embodies the impact of art in healing, in hurting, in celebrating, and in living.
