She's a poet, a writer, an artist, an entrepreneur and someone who knows how to use her voice to encourage social change. Early in 2016, when Ani DiFranco's Paint Congress Blue Tour came through the 30A Songwriters Festival in Florida, she stopped by for a Folk Alley session. Here, she performs her poem "Binary," the title track from her forthcoming album (due in 2017), which she says addresses the overriding concept that "consciousness is binary."

"Whether it's a community with an opinion or an individual with a perspective, if it's not happening in relationship to other communities or to other people, it's not whole," DiFranco says. "It will never come to the truth. It's all about relationship. That's what makes us alive. And in order to make change in the world, you can't stay at home and shout your outrage to the universe. You need to go to where the problem is, address it and form a dialogue. You have to engage it. That's the way everything changes."

SET LIST

"Binary"

Watch Ani DiFranco's full session from the 30A Songwriters Festival at FolkAlley.com.

Video produced by Linda Fahey (Folk Alley) and Jeff Oehler and Sue Bibeau (Beehive Productions), with audio assistance from Redia Spada and camera assistance from Jeff Bradley.