Mick Jenkins is poetry personified. With a tinge of Langston Hughes embedded in his bloodstream, the Chicago rapper is immersing himself as of one of the more polished lyrical marksman at his age. By infusing poetic metaphors behind soulful instrumentals, Jenkins enthralling approach has every rap fan hypnotized.

Then again, Jenkins’ sudden foray into the rap game shouldn’t come as a surprise. With his journalist mom serving as an instrumental figure in his life, it's no wonder that he followed in her tracks as a writer. Jenkins also dodged a number of life's obstacles: His mother was diagnosed with Lupus, while his father was nonexistent most of his life. Despite the negativity hovering over his head, he penned his frustrations out. His most recent mixtape, The Water(s) showcases his lyrical ambiance. Tracks like “Vibe,” “Healer,” and “Shipwrecked” give us reasons to gush over his limitless potential.

We sat down with Mick Jenkins to talk about his mixtape The Water(s), his transition from poet to rapper, dealing with his mother’s health, and more. Get soulful with Mick.

Mick Jenkins, You’re the man of the hour right now, man.

Mick Jenkins: That’s what people are saying [laughs]?

Your mixtape has gotten a lot of positive attention. Why did you elect to go with The Water(s) as the name for your project?

I initially was going to call it the Healing Component, but that wasn’t my idea and the person who came up with that idea got a bit upset about it. So then I started thinking, “What is the healing component?” And I came up with, it can only be God or water—and because water is an actual component, that’s what I ended up choosing. I just saw a lot of ways to manipulate it metaphorically and it made the most sense to me and that was the general metaphor and theme and focus of the concept.

We could tell just by examining you lyrically and metaphorically that you were a poet before you pursued rap. When did you fall in love with poetry?

I was in a drama group called Controversy—actually with my church. We needed a poem to accompany a scene and I was like, “Oh, I could do that.” I mean I was a creative writer; my mother was a journalist for a good period of time. And that was when I wrote my first poem and it was really good. I ended up doing it at a lot of different fundraisers and churches and all over the place and that just really grew the affinity for that type of creative writing. And of course Def Jam poetry just blew it open for me. Once I got to college I was a part of a collective called Art and Soul with the rest of Free Nation and it just spawned into everything we’re doing now. That was like an incubation of it and once I realized how serious they took it, I started taking it as serious and project after project we just continued to progress all the way to where I am now.

How would you describe your transition from poet to rapper? 

That was a smooth transition, I haven’t written a poem in like five years.

Wow.

And that’s what’s the most difficult transition is. I don’t want my poetry to sound like my rapping and it didn’t. It was very hard and now when I try to write a poem, it comes out in a cadence and I can’t. I get away from that. That’s what’s difficult. [Laughs]

Is that both a good and bad thing?

Nah, that’s a bad thing. I want to write poetry, I want to do it the way I used to do it. I feel like I would have to stop rapping for awhile, I don’t know, it’s probably just the way I think. It’s naturally going to come with a cadence because I’ve been so dedicated to writing cold-ass raps, so that just all that comes out now. And I wish I could still write poetry in the way that I used to.

You lived in Chicago and Alabama. How would you compare living in both areas?

I could be in Alabama for like a week now. There’s a lot of things that happened. Like Alabama is where my father’s from.  I have an estranged relationship with my father. Like there are just a lot of negative things to associate with there. But outside of those things, it’s just a slower environment and I prefer the city, for sure. Alabama is just slow, and we’re talking about Huntsville, Alabama not Birmingham, Mobile, or Montgomery where there’s a beach or just like a progressive community, like it’s Huntsville. So it’s slow. I prefer Chicago so much.

There is a saying, adversity builds character. You mother suffered from Lupus. How did that mold you into who you are?

It definitely built character. There were a lot of things I had to do as a young man in the house at 14, 15, and 16. Even the nature of Lupus builds up fluids in your body and I use to have to like massage it into the center of her body, know what I’m saying? Like up her arms, and up her legs so it’s in her thighs and not in her feet. And just the conversations that I had with my mom during that time and watching her change as a person in reaction to the disease and what I felt like I should do to help her in that manner, took a lot of growing up and maturing really fast as a shorty. But it’s for the better. She’s good now. It’s under control and it was for the better for me. And then, for the ladies I can definitely give a good massage these days so [laughs] it was all in all positive for sure.

A lot of rappers don’t necessarily go to school. You’re a college man. Did any of your college experiences help you in your writing process as well?

Not so much. I’ll give credit to one teacher that I was pushed by.  Once he heard the poetry, he pulled me aside sometimes and he talked to me about cultivating writing and things of that nature. But college was more a lot more structured writing, MLA and APA.

You said your mom was a journalist. Was she open to the idea of you rapping full time?

No, neither one of my parents were. My dad still isn’t. My mother is my number one fan now. I mean, I come from a Christian background and there’s just so many negative connotations that come with rap, especially when you’re in a space where it’s not doing anything for you as far as being able to support yourself. She was really against it. These days like I said she’s my number one fan but there’s still a lot of my family that look down on me or it’s frowned upon that I’m rapping.

I had to give your mixtape a couple of listens because lyrically, you have to listen more than once. How do you feel about some of the comparisons you’re getting?

It’s whatever. If you want to ask me about specific ones, I’ll tell you what I feel. But I feel like when people say “What does it sound like?,” they need something to say.

I’m sure you’ve heard of the Kendrick Lamar comparisons.

Yeah, I take that as a compliment. He’s one of the best, if not the best doing it in this new age. So I just take that as a compliment.

Do you see any similarities?

I mean, I learn things from Kendrick. I look at Kendrick’s music and the way it’s affected people because he’s doing a similar thing where he’s putting so much content into the songs and still keeping it in a vibing manner. Like his album was crazyyyy. He had legit radio hits on there that didn’t compromise who he was. I try to learn from that for sure.

What was so dope—because I was putting the whole water concept in my mind when I was playing the tape—is that your ear for production is top notch. Was that conscious? Was that one of the first things in your mind when making this?

That was one of the first things that I felt like a really needed to work on coming from Trees and Truths. It was just because the production was all over the place. There wasn’t any real continuity and I just wanted to make sure that the production and The Water(s) was a lot more cohesive with developing their sound. It’s not the sound that I’m going to keep through my career, but I think that’s what makes a project a project. I’m working on this sound right now.

Being cohesive.

Yeah.

Looking at it now, do you have any dream collaborations of anybody you care to rap with?

3K.

Andre?

Yeah.

Why Andre?

He’s one of my favorite rappers. He’s a genius.

I mean, I think he said he’s going to retire at 40. 

I don’t be believing it. Like if ni**as fuck with you, like anybody that’s retired that does music is still creating music, they’re just not putting it out. I don’t think ni**as is ever going to really stop writing raps. I don’t believe that, and if I feel like he fucks with me enough…

He’ll do it.

He’ll do it [laughs].

I remember when Drake tried to holler at him and he said, “Nah, he’s not ready yet.” Then he gave Drake a record. So do you see yourself doing this on some Hov type flow and making 10-12 albums?

Nah, I don’t even know how long I’ll be doing this, but you can definitely expect five albums. But I don’t know, I’m definitely not trying to be in this for 20 years and shit, if that’s what happens, if I can do it at my leisure like a Justin Timberlake or a Sade like they come, do runs when they drop they albums, and then they gone, but it’s always good music so if I could do it in that manner, then I would. But that’s rare for rap, you feel me? Like, that’s rare.

I’m curious: You use rap and poetry to express yourself. Is there any other form of art you use to express yourself?

Yeah, I’m pretty good at drawing. I try to play instruments, but the thing about that is it’s just all artistic. It’s all art, and to do it the right way which is the way I’m gonna try to do anything, it just requires just as much focus. I gotta picture on my Instagram, right now, should be like 59 weeks old, that I drew, and it’s not even half way done. It still looks the same today. It requires just as much energy and effort to do it the way I would want it to be done. So most of the time, it’s just rap. It’s just writing, where I really get to express myself and flex my creative nature.

I gotta ask you this: Common dropped Nobody’s Smiling about the current problems plaguing Chicago and everything. Do you feel as a rapper on the come up repping the Chi, you have a responsibility to somewhat do the same?

I feel like as a person I gotta do that shit. I have a responsibility. I have a bunch of people’s attention and what am I gonna do with it? And I have a responsibility to do something responsible. I want to do a lot for Chicago. But yeah, I feel like I have a responsibility as a person. My goals are real as far as like heaven [laughs]. You feel me? And a way to get there is I can’t just be doing this for me, I gotta actually be helping people.

Name the last record that just grabbed you emotionally, either made you cry or you were like, “Damn.” and it just took you emotionally.

“WTF” by [Big] Krit. 

Krit makes records that make me want to cry. Seriously, it makes me somber after I listen to it, but it was real shit. Why that record in particular?

It was poetry; I mean it was two poems about two real ass situations. I don’t know. I just never heard the song before even though I’m a fan of Krit. And I heard it and was just like damn.

Mick Jenkins is embarking on a tour with Joey Badass this summer—for tour dates and tickets, click here.