The burden of words unsaid is often ignored/ as a writer, I’ve become accustomed to the conception, the gestation & the sometimes gut wrenching labor that comes with the birthing of a poem/ many a time I’ve felt the initial excitement that comes with the inception of an idea/ the growth & discomfort in carrying a message & the painful satisfaction that is sacrificing what was once a part of me to the mercy of this world is an overwhelming profusion of emotion that, as of late, I have become all too familiar with/ I can tell you about birthing complications, when recessive syntax & cadence errors manifest themselves in a premature poem & even of the great lamentation that comes when a poem is stillborn & must be abandoned/ or the miscarrying of words that occurs when I just can’t seem to mean what I say & say what I mean/ I’m a writer/... I can tell you/ …About writing/ about holding a newborn poem, fresh, unedited swaddled in loose leaf/ but I cannot tell you the burden of an unwed mother/ I do not know what goes on in her mind with one child on her lap, another steady growing inside of her womb/ she can barely support one, refuses to give away the other who for 9 months will be her inverted appendage, she avails herself to 2 options only/ keep him so that he can grow an inkling of resentment for every thing she cannot give him, relive a childhood empty of promise vicariously through this unborn son/ no, she says…/ I’ll just give this one back to God/ … & you talk about sibling rivalry… / I cannot explain the gaping black hole left by an aborted child/the tears of a mother trapped between the poverty of a rock & the poverty of a hard place/ I cannot tell you of unborn martyrs, of sisters sacrificed for the lives of their brothers, of baby boys given back to God with a receipt for all the firsts they never got/ I don’t know anything about the strained relationship between a mother & father that can’t help but see the child that never was in the face of the child that got a chance to be/ I cannot describe the pain in a man’s pride when he can only give one of everything in the world / I cannot tell you why the son you always wanted will never get a chance to see the sun or why daddy’s little girl will never meet her other half /why a little rain ruins the best of plans & bad things happen to good ppl/ ... I cannot tell you how this sacrifice feels…/ I can only equate it to a god asking his son to give his life for this lucky bastard of a world/ but I digress/… I know nothing of a mother’s last words to that little ball of cells unfortunate enough to be born second/ I am fortunate in that I am amateur enough to know nothing of the strength it takes to make such a decision/ & in no way am I drawing a parallel between aborting a poem & aborting a child/… I was just kinda thinking that considering the number of children born into poverty each year, maybe a responsible woman ought to have a choice as to whether or not she wants to add to said numbers… / all I’m saying is… they’re not all dime store whores flying by the seat of their g strings/ I was just kinda thinkin that the next time you wanna throw blood at the clinic you might wanna consider the one who abandoned his 33 year old son so that heathens like us could have a chance at everything we ever wanted/ because when has sacrifice ever been fair?/... I in no way condone death/ but I do support conscious minds & well thought out decisions/ …because nobody ever talks about the burden of words unsaid/ but I got a good 646 that say it’s time to start.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Random Realization #934798
"sometimes when God wants to protect you, He removes someone; and when He wants to bless you, He sends someone..."
a friend of mine gave me that word a few days ago. this quote pertains to so much more than i initially gave it credit for. i kinda been marinating on it on & off since then, picking it apart, conceptualizing it... 2011 is upon us & i can't help but think back to years passed.
specifically it opened my eyes to an old relationship that has recently become relevant again. an ex of mine had been heavy on my mind for the last month or so maybe. he was that first love kinda kid. the one where afterwards, you swear up & down you can stay friends. but you can't. at least not right away. in the nearly two years it's been we 've made a few attempts to be friends between the two of us, to no avail. each time we were trying to fake a growth & a maturity that wasn't there, trying to force ourselves to be at a place to which we had not yet arrived. i texted him merry christmas saturday. he opted to call back & we talked for hours. & it was easy. didn't feel forced or out of obligation, no longer felt premature in our efforts. it was easy. the day we broke up a friend told me straight up, "yo it's over. & if it's meant to come back around, then it will." & if the relationship aspect of it does come back then i'm down. but i must say i'm quite content with this simple restoration of friendship. you never know how important good ppl are until you feel/ fill the hole they left. & i didn't know that this closure was what i needed until it happened, didn't know i was missing anything until it came. whatever's supposed to happen between us, i will be patient. i will trust God. i refuse to try & make anything happen on my own. what God has for me is for me & i refuse to try & manipulate His plan.
in a more general sense, it helped me see that 2009 was a year of removal & of letting go & of protection while 2010 was a year of sending in, of introductions & entrances. '09 was by far thee hardest year God has seen me through. matter fact, we'll talk about 2009 in depth in another post one day lol long story short, God separated me from some people that i swear i couldn't live without-- 2 in particular. one was my best friend at the time, the other was my man friend at the time. i can see now that both of these "breakups" were to protect me though at the time i was sure it was the end of the world. i see now that the man & i had to split quite possibly to protect each other. after catching up with him the other day i see that our lives were similar in that we went through alot of the same things while we were apart. we both went through very raw and painful growing stages that i know for a fact would have killed us had we stayed together. & sometimes that's the way growth is. everybody wants to be grown but nobody wants to actually grow because it hurts. & as immature as it is, hurt people hurt people. lesson learned. notice i didn't divulge into particulars about the ex best friend lol that's for another day.
2010 though... that's another story entirely. please believe it was not without its ups & downs, hell & high water, trials & tribulations. but i was surrounded with amazing people to sustain me. this year He sent me peacemakers, He sent me manifestations of His love & His favor that i would not have survived the year without. 2010 fully embodied the second half of that quote & since they know who they are & i've been alll the mushy about them before in this very bloggy blog, i'll bow out gracefully before i get in too deep :) #pause
the same friend that gave me that good word up there also told me that a time of restoration may be upon some of us right now. & i truly thank God for it should that word pertain to me. whatever He decides to do in this season, i would hate for Him to do it without me. so God i'm down. for whatever. i won't strive against You. whatever You got going down in 2011, take me with You. please.
a friend of mine gave me that word a few days ago. this quote pertains to so much more than i initially gave it credit for. i kinda been marinating on it on & off since then, picking it apart, conceptualizing it... 2011 is upon us & i can't help but think back to years passed.
specifically it opened my eyes to an old relationship that has recently become relevant again. an ex of mine had been heavy on my mind for the last month or so maybe. he was that first love kinda kid. the one where afterwards, you swear up & down you can stay friends. but you can't. at least not right away. in the nearly two years it's been we 've made a few attempts to be friends between the two of us, to no avail. each time we were trying to fake a growth & a maturity that wasn't there, trying to force ourselves to be at a place to which we had not yet arrived. i texted him merry christmas saturday. he opted to call back & we talked for hours. & it was easy. didn't feel forced or out of obligation, no longer felt premature in our efforts. it was easy. the day we broke up a friend told me straight up, "yo it's over. & if it's meant to come back around, then it will." & if the relationship aspect of it does come back then i'm down. but i must say i'm quite content with this simple restoration of friendship. you never know how important good ppl are until you feel/ fill the hole they left. & i didn't know that this closure was what i needed until it happened, didn't know i was missing anything until it came. whatever's supposed to happen between us, i will be patient. i will trust God. i refuse to try & make anything happen on my own. what God has for me is for me & i refuse to try & manipulate His plan.
in a more general sense, it helped me see that 2009 was a year of removal & of letting go & of protection while 2010 was a year of sending in, of introductions & entrances. '09 was by far thee hardest year God has seen me through. matter fact, we'll talk about 2009 in depth in another post one day lol long story short, God separated me from some people that i swear i couldn't live without-- 2 in particular. one was my best friend at the time, the other was my man friend at the time. i can see now that both of these "breakups" were to protect me though at the time i was sure it was the end of the world. i see now that the man & i had to split quite possibly to protect each other. after catching up with him the other day i see that our lives were similar in that we went through alot of the same things while we were apart. we both went through very raw and painful growing stages that i know for a fact would have killed us had we stayed together. & sometimes that's the way growth is. everybody wants to be grown but nobody wants to actually grow because it hurts. & as immature as it is, hurt people hurt people. lesson learned. notice i didn't divulge into particulars about the ex best friend lol that's for another day.
2010 though... that's another story entirely. please believe it was not without its ups & downs, hell & high water, trials & tribulations. but i was surrounded with amazing people to sustain me. this year He sent me peacemakers, He sent me manifestations of His love & His favor that i would not have survived the year without. 2010 fully embodied the second half of that quote & since they know who they are & i've been alll the mushy about them before in this very bloggy blog, i'll bow out gracefully before i get in too deep :) #pause
the same friend that gave me that good word up there also told me that a time of restoration may be upon some of us right now. & i truly thank God for it should that word pertain to me. whatever He decides to do in this season, i would hate for Him to do it without me. so God i'm down. for whatever. i won't strive against You. whatever You got going down in 2011, take me with You. please.
Sunday, December 5, 2010
10 Things I Wanna Say to the Next Dude That Claims to Love Me
1. It’s impossible to love me.
2. I kinda have a problem with commitment/ but it’s not that I’m unfaithful or anything/ it’s just that people who have promised to hold me forever never really meant it so by virtue of experience & muscle memory, I physically just don’t get it/ for example/ the only things I’ve ever committed all four fingers and one thumb to is holding my first love’s hand, groping this mic stand, & gripping a pen/ &, as you can see, the one that mattered to me most didn’t stick around as long as I would have liked so, as far as MY hands are concerned, you’ll have to excuse them/ the concept of forever was never an easy one for them OR me to grasp
3. Baby im a thug/ I don’t smile much, half the time they say im muggin and you’ll probably never ever see me shed a tear/ or maybe, I just keep my smile behind my eyes because people hate to see you happy these days/ or maybe, my eye’s don’t cry no more because God made my heart a well to hold the rain, an elixir to ease other’s pain/ so at times I may seem stolid or depressed but I think that if NOLA’s levees were more like me, Katrina woulda been just another rain storm instead of the devastating flood that it was
4. I have the most amazing sisters/ we were made friends by divine incident, sisters by holy convocation and so at any given time I may drop everything, including you, to tend to them/ but know that it doesn’t mean I love you less, it’s just that blood is thicker than water and im anemic so I’d rather be warm/ wait, what?/ look ima just put it this way—I got three brothers. For 20 years, it’s been me and them boys! And recently God saw fit to give me four sisters/ so you’ll have to excuse me, but we’ve got some catching up to do.
5. I love my god more than I will EVER love you/ you will NEVER be the most important thing in my life/ so I ain’t really tryna hear all that “baby if you love me you’ll do this that and the other” because my father loves me unconditionally and seeing as how I did nothing to deserve his love and there’s nothing I can do to make him take it away, you can actually move around with that there—my love is not a barter system to be negotiated
6. Sometimes I think it was not meant for me to love. but i do still. with reckless abandon i love just to spite the universe because defiance is the strongest motivation so i love to prove that i am capable. prove that i have a broken vessel human heart & not an energizer ironman apparatus, not indestructible but rather made for destruction-- it loves like helicopter blades fighting through arctic blizzards. like an iditarod race because winning is not synonymous with survival, winning is not coming out on top. winning is loving like your heart is made of cinderblock instead of paper mache, like it's a porcelain doll instead of a pinata, like love is holy matrimony worship between mother nature & father God not a lonely, pleading prayer in the garden of gethsemene. not a cross to bear—some say love is pain/ but with me, it doesn’t have to be
7. I did some time in Chicago but I am STILL country as I wanna be/ I race barefoot in the street/ I play tackle football with my brothers and their friends/ I pop sparklers in the front yard on the fourth of july/ I eat neckbones and ox tails and collard greens and cornbread and I put butter and sugar on my white race and I’m willing to bet I can probably eat more than you/ but know that your smallish stomach doesn’t make you any less of a man
8. i am a daredevil lover. not an evil kanieval stuntman catapulting out of cannons through rings of fire… no/ my heart loves like an aging indian man treading barefoot over hot coals slowly & deliberately like debussy's 'claire de lune' on a baby grand-- a perfectly pitched premature piano solo accompanied by no one... i give my heart straight-- no chaser. because eventually, the risk it takes to remain closed tightly in a bud begins to outweigh the risk it takes to bloom and so sometimes my heart is just a sacrifice my love is all too willing to make
9. I want to be the one god appoints to watch over you in your sleep, when you are most vulnerable/let me be your dream catcher/ let me hold your hidden passions, your ignored desires and should you ever forget what they taste like I will feed them to you little by little until you are full with purpose/ let me become your rib again/ let me protect your heart from all that wishes it harm/ allow me to wrap my arms around you/ let me be your backbone, your spinal cord even/ let the steady bass of my esperanza spalding heart keep you, drown out all that seeks to paralyze you/ baby dance with me instead/ and we will sway to these sad songs together/ the drunken dance of the depressed and the downtrodden/ and though disparity and displacement be our muse from time to time, I will not let them take you under/ I will hold on for dear life, for your life/ and I promise, I will not let your heart break
1 It is impossible to love me/ 10. It is impossible to love me… 3rd times the charm/ 10. It is impossible for you to love me/ as much as I already love you
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
no sleep tonight: part two
the hardest part about having a music box heart is deciding which melodies to play/ i long to hold 16 gigs and play every weeping willow ballad ever written, every riff and run of travailing prayer in your garden of gethsemene/ when you asked God to take the pain away, to remove this cup from your hands, i heard you/ and, if i could, i would take every cup from you/ take them back like shots of hard liquor, if it meant it would keep you from stumbling through this life in a drunken stupor of struggle/ let me be your drinking buddy/ i will match you shot for shot, treble clefts & half notes of sorrow until my heart is just as full, if not, overflowing-- i was created for this/ with this ironman music box heart, let me hold your muse/ we were made friends by divine incident, sisters by holy convocation-- it was not meant for you to be alone/ this piece was not meant to be a solo but an ensemble/ so let me accompany you/ and, because i'm selfish, i will steal the show, snatch the mic from your hand in a drunken rage and no one will notice when you leave the stage free/ i will let them crucify me/ so when your heart comes near to bursting and your weeping willow ballads begin to crescendo, allow me to wrap my arms around you/ let the steady bass of my esperanza spalding heart keep you, drown out all that seeks to paralyze you/ and we will sway to these sad songs together/ the drunken dance of the depressed and downtrodden/ and though disparity and displacement be our muse, i will not let them take you under/ i will hold on for dear life, for your life/ and i promise, i will not let your heart break.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
no sleep tonight
i flip through old photos of us/ and i realize that, yes, the poetess was right-- sometimes love ends just like this-- in 2 dimensions/ so i comb through our skeletal remains/ polaroids of past passion/ we are frozen in memory of ourselves, the you and i that was us at one time/ captured smiles & constricted muscle solidified under ash/ it was not the eruption that killed us, not the lava that burned us-- it was the debris & the secondhand smoke that constricted our airways/ and so here we lay/ freezeframe tricked into being genuinely happy because this midas touch we had sounded like such a good idea until your heart turned to gold, no longer malleable by the warmth in my palms-- baby you turned cold/ and so i turned around/ in hopes that you would maybe come back to life if you thought i wasn't looking/ but one swift about face later, she had you standing at attention and i haven't felt at ease since then/ i love you/ but only because my heart loves you, only because my spirit longs for you, because our souls, they match/ & so i just do what these things tell me because love itself is incapable of reciprocity & unlike violence & racism & war, there is no justice or peace in love/ no piece outside of the ruins of what was our pompeii/ the mighty has fallen/ & the mighty was me, & me only/ a king mourning his metallic daughter/ an emperor bathing in the remnants of a dead city/ i have melted what was left of you & formed it into a locket/ &, yes, i make pilgrimages to our mt. vesuvius from time to time/ but if this sounds like a heartbroken lovesick take me back piece, just know that my heart is far from it/ this piece is just my periodic hero worship eucharist in remembrance of the one that taught me to love in the first place/ i in no way regret you & sometimes i may even miss you/ but i'm tired of this brian mcknight internal longing for what once was, on some "do i ever cross your mind anytime" bullshii-- miss me with that, "i will no longer audition for your attention"/ so when you come back to look at our photos, i won't be there/ see baby, i found my pulse in my womanhood, heard myself smile until i could not see & while you were turned around not looking, i came back to life again.
♥
♥
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
Open Letter to the Current Residents of 6203
*except for yall heaux asshh lil baby sheep dawg
OR "Popsicle Thug Love: installment two, End of Year Reflections: part one"!!!
so of course, me being the OD thinker that i am, this whole popsicle thugfest we had talked about has been on my mind a lot lately as i consider people's roles in my life & learn to separate the leaves from the roots & whatnot. & so consequently i've been thinking about you guys. #pause, #word to jerrid for preaching that in HV the other day. when he told us to stop & think about having another year of life, i immediately thought of you guys. because this time last year, someone i was sooo sure was a root in my life, proved that she was indeed a leaf. around this time last year i was learning a whirlwind of lessons, none of which felt particularly good-- i was learning how to be alone without being lonely because little did i know, God would soon break me from people that i wasn't aware weren't good for me. #sidenote-- spiritual and emotional growth can be THE absolute most painful growing pain ever in life lol anywho tho, he opened my eyes to sooo many things that everybody saw but me. but i digress. the biggest change between november 10, 2009 and november 10, 2010 is a change of scenery and surroundings. & that's where you harTlets come in. so fastforward to me writing poems about yall individually & thangs & God gave me the idea to address yall as a household first because of what just being in the place where you all dwell has done for me... because literally, 6203 has become a place of refuge for me. & i doubt you will ever understand the caliber of people you are & thus the type of environment you've created, not because your mind can't grasp it, but because i can't put into words what yall have done for me in the short time since we started kickin it heavy this summer. but, you people have called on me to try. & so, here goes:
metaphorically, 6203 is my sanctuary and our friendship is my religion. literally, the freedom i have there and the fact that any burden i may carry is nonexistent after i cross that threshold has been my salvation this semester. a lot of ppl get caught up in religion-- in services, masses, rituals, traditions-- so much so that they lose sight of the fact that all God wants is a relationship. with that being said, i literally feel closer to God when i'm with you all-- his most important commandment is to love & i have experienced nothing short of an outpouring of God's love through yall every time i'm in that house. when school and work and organizations and relationships and the weight of being a poet alone got too heavy for me, i found refuge in 6203. i'm taking 17 hours, working two jobs [I DON'T HAVE TO TAKE THISSSS!!!], puttin in work for a couple organizations, tryna figure out wth ima do with my life and who i'm gonna get to do it with-- that's a full plate lol but i literally feel weightless in yalls house. i know that there was many a time when there were things i woulda coulda probably shoulda been doin while i was kickin it with yall but... i could not miss the therapy and the relaxation in arguing and jumping around and effin shii up and cussin out yall lil baby sheep and... etc. etc. lol. my point is, in 6203 i felt more at home than i have ever felt in the 2 & a half years i've been on this campus & for that i cannot thank you enough. you all taught me that you don't have to play with the first kid that invites you to the sandbox, that if ever there was a time to be selective about who you choose to surround yourself with, college IS that place because people WILL assume things & lump you in with whoever you claim your friends to be. and for the first time, in a long time, i'm proud and humbled to be associated with BLACK WOMEN at baylor university. because heauxs can be so so so sooo triflin these days-- this we all know, so sadly this thing we have with each other is looked at as a miracle, as a feat of epic proportions as if we weren't created to love so yes, i am proud. proud to have succeeded in this-- or rather grateful and blessed that God has allowed me to be apart of something so... rare these days. he thought enough of me to surround me with women whose reputations do indeed precede them, his favor is amazing; the fact that he would give me you all to personify HIS love, to make that ish real to me??? it's crazy yo. so yes, i AM friends with dede, i AM friends with coco, i AM friends with muhfuggin mojo jojo! ... i don't consider myself to be friends with a lot of people. to me being a friend entails something much deeper than this kindergarten bull these kids at this school tryna pass off these days. so in an effort to be more specific we say family and that's who yall be. i effs wit a lot of people who think they know me, think i like them, think we friends but yall know good and well i hate everyone. most people i come in contact with on a daily basis i can actually live without. and of course that's no fault of their own, i'm just very low maintenance. it don't take all day to realize sunshine & i don't need all of everybody in my eye tryna make me feel important and gas me up. plus when you have too many friends, they be havin birthdays, they want gifts fuh holidays & shiii, ain't nobody got time for awwllllat! but i digress again lol i have my team, my squad. everybody else are just subs. & we all know subs ain't never good as first string. so thank you. for letting me see the heart of God in your eyes, hear His voice in your smiles and feel his love for me in your unique hospitality; i could not have made it had you all not let God use you as vessels for his work.
so this is for MY colored girls. who have ever questioned God's love-- His intentions, His directions, His presence-- but are realizing that His love... and Their love... is just. too. real.
OR "Popsicle Thug Love: installment two, End of Year Reflections: part one"!!!
so of course, me being the OD thinker that i am, this whole popsicle thugfest we had talked about has been on my mind a lot lately as i consider people's roles in my life & learn to separate the leaves from the roots & whatnot. & so consequently i've been thinking about you guys. #pause, #word to jerrid for preaching that in HV the other day. when he told us to stop & think about having another year of life, i immediately thought of you guys. because this time last year, someone i was sooo sure was a root in my life, proved that she was indeed a leaf. around this time last year i was learning a whirlwind of lessons, none of which felt particularly good-- i was learning how to be alone without being lonely because little did i know, God would soon break me from people that i wasn't aware weren't good for me. #sidenote-- spiritual and emotional growth can be THE absolute most painful growing pain ever in life lol anywho tho, he opened my eyes to sooo many things that everybody saw but me. but i digress. the biggest change between november 10, 2009 and november 10, 2010 is a change of scenery and surroundings. & that's where you harTlets come in. so fastforward to me writing poems about yall individually & thangs & God gave me the idea to address yall as a household first because of what just being in the place where you all dwell has done for me... because literally, 6203 has become a place of refuge for me. & i doubt you will ever understand the caliber of people you are & thus the type of environment you've created, not because your mind can't grasp it, but because i can't put into words what yall have done for me in the short time since we started kickin it heavy this summer. but, you people have called on me to try. & so, here goes:
metaphorically, 6203 is my sanctuary and our friendship is my religion. literally, the freedom i have there and the fact that any burden i may carry is nonexistent after i cross that threshold has been my salvation this semester. a lot of ppl get caught up in religion-- in services, masses, rituals, traditions-- so much so that they lose sight of the fact that all God wants is a relationship. with that being said, i literally feel closer to God when i'm with you all-- his most important commandment is to love & i have experienced nothing short of an outpouring of God's love through yall every time i'm in that house. when school and work and organizations and relationships and the weight of being a poet alone got too heavy for me, i found refuge in 6203. i'm taking 17 hours, working two jobs [I DON'T HAVE TO TAKE THISSSS!!!], puttin in work for a couple organizations, tryna figure out wth ima do with my life and who i'm gonna get to do it with-- that's a full plate lol but i literally feel weightless in yalls house. i know that there was many a time when there were things i woulda coulda probably shoulda been doin while i was kickin it with yall but... i could not miss the therapy and the relaxation in arguing and jumping around and effin shii up and cussin out yall lil baby sheep and... etc. etc. lol. my point is, in 6203 i felt more at home than i have ever felt in the 2 & a half years i've been on this campus & for that i cannot thank you enough. you all taught me that you don't have to play with the first kid that invites you to the sandbox, that if ever there was a time to be selective about who you choose to surround yourself with, college IS that place because people WILL assume things & lump you in with whoever you claim your friends to be. and for the first time, in a long time, i'm proud and humbled to be associated with BLACK WOMEN at baylor university. because heauxs can be so so so sooo triflin these days-- this we all know, so sadly this thing we have with each other is looked at as a miracle, as a feat of epic proportions as if we weren't created to love so yes, i am proud. proud to have succeeded in this-- or rather grateful and blessed that God has allowed me to be apart of something so... rare these days. he thought enough of me to surround me with women whose reputations do indeed precede them, his favor is amazing; the fact that he would give me you all to personify HIS love, to make that ish real to me??? it's crazy yo. so yes, i AM friends with dede, i AM friends with coco, i AM friends with muhfuggin mojo jojo! ... i don't consider myself to be friends with a lot of people. to me being a friend entails something much deeper than this kindergarten bull these kids at this school tryna pass off these days. so in an effort to be more specific we say family and that's who yall be. i effs wit a lot of people who think they know me, think i like them, think we friends but yall know good and well i hate everyone. most people i come in contact with on a daily basis i can actually live without. and of course that's no fault of their own, i'm just very low maintenance. it don't take all day to realize sunshine & i don't need all of everybody in my eye tryna make me feel important and gas me up. plus when you have too many friends, they be havin birthdays, they want gifts fuh holidays & shiii, ain't nobody got time for awwllllat! but i digress again lol i have my team, my squad. everybody else are just subs. & we all know subs ain't never good as first string. so thank you. for letting me see the heart of God in your eyes, hear His voice in your smiles and feel his love for me in your unique hospitality; i could not have made it had you all not let God use you as vessels for his work.
Sunday, October 31, 2010
love is for thugs-- #PopsicleThugLove 101 #ClassIsInSession
before we even start, the original title for this was:
black people do not love each other enough. black WOMEN do not love each other enough. we instinctively hate each other initially as a way to protect and validate ourselves when we were created to love. but thus is the de-evolution of the black woman and consequently black love altogether because socialization has changed our very nature to one that no longer nurtures. we are catty, we are evil, we are guarded. but when we love each other i swear it's the most beautiful thing. but between harsh words & side eye glances, many of us will never see this love.
luckily, i have. i have witnessed a love like an eternal electric current, an infinite transfer of energy unlike most friendships i've been in since i've been in college. this relationship i have with my current team... is not one of constant sacrifice & trial, of constant taking without reciprocity. this love we have loves like a circular definition, it loves redundantly, like synonyms, like burning kinetic energy. it loves like it's never been hurt. & truthfully, without those contrasting contrary "friendships" i don't know that i would be able to appreciate the ones that i have now as much as i do. these people that i have are FAMILY. so yes, cliches get played out, but only because they're true-- everything does happen for a reason & yes seemingly good things do fall apart so that better things can come together...
... & clearly i suck at trying to convey thoughts & feelings in a straight up nonpoetic way these days so maybe this will help understand how i love the ones i love & what it really means for me to do this:
"maybe it was not meant for me to love. but i do still. with reckless abandon i love just to spite the universe because defiance is the strongest motivation so i love to prove that i am capable. prove that i have a broken vessel human heart & not an energizer ironman apparatus, not indestructible but rather made for destruction-- it loves like helicopter blades fighting through arctic blizzards. like an iditarod race because winning is not synonymous with survival, winning is not coming out on top. winning is loving like your heart is made of cinderblock instead of paper mache, like it's a porcelain doll instead of a pinata, like love is holy matrimony worship between mother nature & father God not a lonely, pleading prayer in the garden of gethsemene. not a cross to bear-- i love like an elixir... like a balm in Gilead... "
"i am a daredevil lover. not an evil kanieval stuntman catapulting out of cannons through rings of fire, my heart loves like an aging indian man treading barefoot over hot coals slowly & deliberately like debussy's 'claire de lune' on a baby grand-- a perfectly pitched premature piano solo accompanied by no one... i give my heart straight-- no chaser. because eventually, the risk it takes to remain closed tightly in a bud begins to outweigh the risk it takes to bloom..." #wordup to miss keys-beatz
#ToBeContinued. sensual seduction for anyone who guessed that those chunks will most definitely be part of a poem one of these days. but i digress.
anywho. i love because it's the only way i could think of to show my appreciation for all that is done for me and in me. i don't have money, i'm not the cutest, i'm not the coolest. i don't have status or accolades. but i love like my heart IS an energizer ironman apparatus. i love like i am invincible. i love like the shirt off my back is yours. like whenever you call me i WILL be there, no cliche. like i'll carry your cross when its splinters rub your shoulders raw. i do not love by understanding or logic or because our lives make sense together. i love by being present. because, for me, love is time. is marathon conversations about money, sex, God & all of the below. is catching the itis & napping together. is running through apt complexes snatching up spare tires & goodie bags. love is government sponsored debauchery by night, fried bologna sammiches by day. & the fact that i just sung "oscar mayer has a way" to spell b o l o g n a lol love is attention deficit disorders & nothing is wrong with us. love is knowing that heauxs ain't people cuz #wordup to Aristotle.
love is not knowing how to properly close out a blog & deciding to just tell you that ima go get some cereal cuz the sun gone be up soon. so in conclusionary type ways, love is hoping this makes your day :)
#DickSlangPOW! #PuddittInyaMouf
"ramblings about love: why i love my friends & hate everyone else on some eff them other nigglets cuz... well, you know the rest- type ish."
but as you can see i changed it lol
so a good friend of mine told me she loved me today. ok well actually it was yesterday seeing as how it's runnin up on 5 a.m. now but anywho-- like out of nowhere she just hit me wit that 1-4-3 & for a brief moment in the taco bell line, we talked about love [cuz we'ont pass out in drive thru lines when it comes to grubbin round here!] ... what it is, & what it isn't, etc... & of course me being the OD thinker that i am, i really haven't been able to get the concept of love out of my mind/ out of my heart, since then... & so here i am with this random amalgamation of love ramblings in these here wee hours of sunday morning :)
black people do not love each other enough. black WOMEN do not love each other enough. we instinctively hate each other initially as a way to protect and validate ourselves when we were created to love. but thus is the de-evolution of the black woman and consequently black love altogether because socialization has changed our very nature to one that no longer nurtures. we are catty, we are evil, we are guarded. but when we love each other i swear it's the most beautiful thing. but between harsh words & side eye glances, many of us will never see this love.
luckily, i have. i have witnessed a love like an eternal electric current, an infinite transfer of energy unlike most friendships i've been in since i've been in college. this relationship i have with my current team... is not one of constant sacrifice & trial, of constant taking without reciprocity. this love we have loves like a circular definition, it loves redundantly, like synonyms, like burning kinetic energy. it loves like it's never been hurt. & truthfully, without those contrasting contrary "friendships" i don't know that i would be able to appreciate the ones that i have now as much as i do. these people that i have are FAMILY. so yes, cliches get played out, but only because they're true-- everything does happen for a reason & yes seemingly good things do fall apart so that better things can come together...
... & clearly i suck at trying to convey thoughts & feelings in a straight up nonpoetic way these days so maybe this will help understand how i love the ones i love & what it really means for me to do this:
first, a quote from the aforementioned love conversation--
"I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where.
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride;
so I love you because I know no other way than this..."
so I love you because I know no other way than this..."
[[Pablo Neruda]]
hmm... selah... pause & reflect.
& now for my own words:
"i don't love often or easily. but when i do, i mortal kombat rip my heart from my chest inscribed with a suicide note of my own fingerprints & offer it to you to consume like tribes in 3rd world countries so that maybe you can taste the courage it took me to do so in the first place. i offer it beating feverishly out of its element, at the altar of your finicky affections in hopes that maybe mercy would be granted just this once & my sacrifice not be made in vain..." "maybe it was not meant for me to love. but i do still. with reckless abandon i love just to spite the universe because defiance is the strongest motivation so i love to prove that i am capable. prove that i have a broken vessel human heart & not an energizer ironman apparatus, not indestructible but rather made for destruction-- it loves like helicopter blades fighting through arctic blizzards. like an iditarod race because winning is not synonymous with survival, winning is not coming out on top. winning is loving like your heart is made of cinderblock instead of paper mache, like it's a porcelain doll instead of a pinata, like love is holy matrimony worship between mother nature & father God not a lonely, pleading prayer in the garden of gethsemene. not a cross to bear-- i love like an elixir... like a balm in Gilead... "
"i am a daredevil lover. not an evil kanieval stuntman catapulting out of cannons through rings of fire, my heart loves like an aging indian man treading barefoot over hot coals slowly & deliberately like debussy's 'claire de lune' on a baby grand-- a perfectly pitched premature piano solo accompanied by no one... i give my heart straight-- no chaser. because eventually, the risk it takes to remain closed tightly in a bud begins to outweigh the risk it takes to bloom..." #wordup to miss keys-beatz
#ToBeContinued. sensual seduction for anyone who guessed that those chunks will most definitely be part of a poem one of these days. but i digress.
anywho. i love because it's the only way i could think of to show my appreciation for all that is done for me and in me. i don't have money, i'm not the cutest, i'm not the coolest. i don't have status or accolades. but i love like my heart IS an energizer ironman apparatus. i love like i am invincible. i love like the shirt off my back is yours. like whenever you call me i WILL be there, no cliche. like i'll carry your cross when its splinters rub your shoulders raw. i do not love by understanding or logic or because our lives make sense together. i love by being present. because, for me, love is time. is marathon conversations about money, sex, God & all of the below. is catching the itis & napping together. is running through apt complexes snatching up spare tires & goodie bags. love is government sponsored debauchery by night, fried bologna sammiches by day. & the fact that i just sung "oscar mayer has a way" to spell b o l o g n a lol love is attention deficit disorders & nothing is wrong with us. love is knowing that heauxs ain't people cuz #wordup to Aristotle.
love is not knowing how to properly close out a blog & deciding to just tell you that ima go get some cereal cuz the sun gone be up soon. so in conclusionary type ways, love is hoping this makes your day :)
#DickSlangPOW! #PuddittInyaMouf
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