Carnival Love Songs From the Caribbean  · Global Voices
Janine Mendes-Franco

The celebration of Valentine's Day in many Caribbean territories is usually overshadowed by Carnival, so the Global Voices Caribbean team thought it might be fun to marry the two concepts – pun intended.  A few of us have chosen our favourite soca love songs, along with a few lines as to why we think they're appropriate for V-Day…
Our new author Jason Nathu‘s pick is “Flirt” by Farmer Nappy:
The lyrics perfectly capture the unspoken Carnival rule that it's okay to “‘tief a wine” – parlance that means all dancing in the spirit of the festival is fair game…because it's only for a moment and all in good fun:
There's no reason to take off the wedding ring
This is the season for the wining
The only thing you could make me take off tonight is meh shirt
‘Cause all I wanna do is flirt…with no strings attached
When ah hold on, ah go wine like dat
That sweet wok nah bother me
It doh make me guilty…
Jason explains:
In Trinidad and Tobago, there is a popular song that says ‘A little wine (dance) never hurt nobody’. To me that's something that's uniquely Trinidadian, that we can enjoy each other's company and flirt good-naturedly.
Author Matthew Hunte, who hails from St. Lucia and is known for his dry wit, says:
I think Valentine's Day is treacly and saccharine so this is the obvious choice…
Baron‘s This Soca is for You epitomizes the poetic Valentine's Day sentiment, which is made even richer – or more predictable, depending on where you stand on the sentimentality tolerance scale – by the singer's melodic vocals, which slip off his tongue as slowly and as sweetly as molasses:
From the moment I saw you I know we were meant to be
From then on to this day there's no regrets
There's no-one else in this world to spend this life with me
So to you, I pay all my respects
God bless the day that I found you, baby
With you by my side and your love to guide me
Honey, baby, doux doux…this soca is for you
Of course, I had to put in my two cents’ worth – and because Jason already covered flirtation and Matt made his case for romantic love – I thought I'd go for love of Carnival – and nothing says that for me like David Rudder's ode to Calypso music:
Can you hear a distant drum bouncing on the laughter of a melody?
And does the rhythm tell you ‘come, come, come, come'?
Does your spirit do a dance to this symphony?
Does it tell you that your heart is afire?
And does it tell you that your pain is a liar?
Does it wash away all your unlovely?
Well, are you ready for a brand new discovery?
Calypso, calypso, calypso music…
Isn't that what love – at least the highest form of it – is supposed to do?  It's meant to be transformative, to make you better, more joyous, to bring you closer to who you really are.  In the Caribbean, our love of Carnival gets us pretty close.  Happy St. Valentine's Day!