Several months ago, Blavity reported that Normani Kordei, member of the girl group Fifth Harmony, was the latest black celebrity forced off of social media due to a racially charged Twitter attack. Now the songstress has finally opened up about the experience in a way that artists often do, through the art of performance.

In an emotional dance performance Kordei, a contestant on the current season of ABC's Dancing With the Stars, decided to channel the pain of her struggles with racism and cyberbullying into a live dance performance with partner Val Chmerkovskiy. The couple wowed the DWTS judges with a routine that showed Kordei trapped alone in a circle of faceless dancers who represented the hoards of strangers who harassed her online. Set to the song “Freedom” by Anthony Hamilton and Elayna Boynton from the Django Unchained soundtrack, the symbolic performance garnered the duo a perfect score.

"I shouldn’t want to change the color of my skin, or the texture of my hair or the fact that I am woman, I felt really alone and just like everybody hated me,” she said in a behind-the-scenes interview. “We all want to be loved, we all want to feel accepted, but when that doesn’t happen then it just breaks you."Kordei credits her instructor and dance partner, Chmerkovskiy for helping her relay her pain through dance. "The piece is symbolic of times that I felt helpless and desperate,” she said.

Check out the spell-binding performance above.