Elizabeth (A Different Love)

At the end of the poem is a note: “From B.S.A.” This refers to the Baltimore School for the Arts, which Tupac attended starting in tenth grade before moving to Marin City in 1988. In the book The Rose That Grew from Concrete, the text is titled Elizabeth, with “A Different Love” as a subtitle. The poem is often listed under this second name alone, since a separate entry for “A Different Love” is missing from the book’s table of contents.

A Love That Does Not Aim at Possession

The poem unfolds in three brief steps. First, the speaker recalls a time when the woman addressed was lost and her soul drifted “in the wind.” It was at that exact moment that the two became friends. Then she finds herself, decides on a celibate life, and forgets about the speaker in the process; the connection becomes a memory. Finally, he notices that she feels the old closeness once again after all, and prays that this time it will hold.

The subtitle explains what it is about: a different kind of love that is not romantic and does not aim at possession. In this regard, the poem aligns with Jada, which likewise dates from the Baltimore years and places friendship above desire.

Two Poems for an Unknown Woman

Nothing is documented about the person. In the same section of the book, Love Within a Storm is also dedicated “4 Elizabeth”. Whether both poems are addressed to the same woman cannot be concluded with certainty from the book; it is natural, however, to read them together. Both deal with a bond that passes through a crisis and continues in a different form afterward.

According to the preface by Afeni Shakur, the poems were written between 1989 and 1991. Like Jada, Elizabeth thus looks back on the Baltimore years from California.

The introduction provides an overview of the entire book and all the poems.