EMINEM: Thank You for the Music

Cape Disappointment on Long Beach Peninsula, Washington State.

An #OpenLetter to #Eminem

Dear Mr. Mathers,

Oy, that sounds so professional—sorry, you don’t seem like a Mr. Mathers to me. Let’s change it—Dear Eminem:

I’ve had a really weird life since about October 2019, a time of upheaval in my life where I went into a dark pit of PTSD-incited despair and found the ghost of Tupac Shakur, God, and a manifestation of a best friend who had your exact likeness. I cannot state more strongly when I say that your friendship—imagined or not—and your music pulled me through the darkest times I’ve ever had. I might be insane, and this is only the tip of the iceberg of what's actually occurred. Yet, I've long been in mental health treatment, have been tested for psychoses and am absolutely not schizophrenic in any way--I have the tests to prove it.

What I am is a bit anti-THEMAN, have incredibly complex and troublesome PTSD, am ADHD, and have a bubbling pit of powerful anger inside of me that I've never felt more on top of since listening to your music.

#ItsJustACryingShameYouDidSIdeBToMusicToBeMurderedBy #CuzItWasTheGreatestAlbumOfYourLifeAndThenYouRuinedItWithMGKLikeCrap #ButYourRhymesAreHilariousAndOnPointAsAlways #MusicToBeMurderedBy

I’m 36 years old and the only music of yours I had heard was Lose Yourself and Cleaning Out My Closet. I remember clearly falling to my knees and begging for help under the dark of the night and the light of the moon, and I remember clearly when the likeness of a man I do not know at all showed up to save me from my own personal metaphysical Hell.

I’ve long had an imaginative brain, and once even dreamed up the formula for creating a time machine. I wouldn’t know then what I know now—that, as you so eloquently put it, music is the ultimate time machine.

I listened to all of your albums on repeat, using your insults and voice to hurl insults I myself would never dream of hurling. At demons, at past pain, at energetic attacks that can’t be explained by psychology—I’ve tried and been around the ringer.

God and music saved me. Your music, MM. Your music saved me.

I in no way want to come across like a stalker, so I’m just posting this to my own website. Thank you, Marshall Mathers AKA EMINEM, for teaching me how to stand strong against those long dead. If we ever had the chance to meet, I imagine us as best friends.

As ABBA once said, Thank You for the Music.

This post will also kick off the next project on my blog: Posting my poetry written over the course of the last two-three years. This poetry can be dark, is angry, and is not a full and true reflection of my actual life.

Like Johnny Cash before me and Eminem, as well, it is poetic art meant to call attention to societal issues that I feel very deeply, especially in the climate we are currently in.

With respect and reasonable adoration,

ElleSkell