That House

In that house is where my innocence lies;

where the innocent me died

giving rise to the me that i've become.

The me that works overtime comparing and contrasting the prior me to the present me searching for the differences and similarities,

but all I find are pieces-broken.

That house holds the secrets of my past;

segmented secrets that my heart yearns for;

wanting to connect the dots of my secrets held captive by the mute, unkind walls of that house

to the present dying me, until the little pieces transend one art form to another;

from collage

to poetry

to story.

That house on a corner in an unfamiliar place made familiar by my secrets held

has my eyes fixed on it

circumferencing it with each glance I take;

hoping to see the little pieces of my past waving;

screaming;

looking out for the present me;

wanting to make the connection too.

That house has my mind in overdrive from my wanting to reclaim impossibility;

from my wanting to reclaim the innocent me.

That house in an unfamiliar place made familiar by my secrets held - has stolen the prior me,

leaving the present me dead!

Miracle 5000

Everday, I try not to forget the only man in my life.

Love

Love is much more than the physical.

It's getting to know someone on a holistic level.

There's more to love than having sex or making love.

It's about taking the risk, of getting hurt, to know someone.

It's not about staying on deck looking over into the water.

It's about diving - deep sea diving.

It's about getting into that water with all you have and all that you are

knowing that you'll not come out the same way you went in or you may never come out at all.

This Passion

Impregnated with a passion to trod a particular path.
Decapitated by the fear of getting lost, I involuntarily settle for mediocrity.

Trying to forget about the passion growing inside me, I am transformed into a miserable, confused being.

I try to hide it.
I try to abort it
but it's too far gone!

This passion has always been apart of me.
It's what aids in making me, me.

Where do I turn? What do I do?
Am i willing to fore go a part of me;a part of who i am for no apparent reason, but fear?

Am i willing to deprive this passion of it's survival needs?
Am i willing to allow the passion to die within me:depriving someone else from sharing the passion too?

I'm at a crossroad, but can't seem to read the signs.
The light's on green, but I'm not sure if I'm to go;yet i don't want this passion to die.

Do I go here? Do i go there? Do i go now? Do i wait awhile?
I'm trying to move, but fear has me cemented in a place call indecision.
How do i break free and move away?
How do i break free and be me?

This passion is who i am.
It's me.
Allowing it to die would be a mass suicide.
I Would've blatantly lied to myself.

So though cemented by fear, I'll take a chance.
I'll give birth.
I'll allow this passion, that has impregnated me for far too long, to become a life form.

One that I'll nurture and it'll nurture me for we are one.
I am this passion and this passion is me.

My sight sleeps on the ocean's floor.

Always look for the good in the worst of situation.

It's been two days and I am yet to see the good in my present predicament.

Well maybe it's because I can't really see.

Haunted all morning to take a swim, I was the first to get ready.

I was leading the flock to a destination i'm igorant of.

Finally, we were led there by someone else.

The tides were high, but I enjoyed been tossed about.

Soon I grew tired and retired from the water and was walking the shores.

They that remained seemed to be enjoying themselves and wanting to be apart of it I jumped back in.

Two lasting laughs and two overpowering tides soon left my heart bleeding tears.

I was under the water, bearly breathing.

I was searching for my sight that had fallen off my face.

But had to make a decision and fast.

Do I continue feeling for my sight and cease to breathe; Cease to exist?

Or do I leave my sight wrapped up or under the raging tide and feel my way to life?

I decided on the latter.

We stayed for hours hoping that my sight would ride home to me on the waves, but while it might have, a glimpse of it was all that was had, yet not by me.

For even though I tried I couldn't see my sight if it were staring me in the eyes.

As if to tempt and tease us, the waves octopussed it and brought it home with it..

I returned on the eve of the morn to see if the sea were kind enough to return my sight to me, but it was a sightless hope.

So here I am, two days later, mourning the loss of my sight that sleeps on the ocean's floor.

The Kiss

Just recently, my bf and I were talking about any and everything, but kisses.
However, kisses, squeezed their way through our cackles and silence and made themselves the theme of our discussion; coercing
me to blog about kisses.

Not just any kiss, but THE kiss.
The kiss differs from person to person and preference to preference.
For one, a thin-lipped, semi-passionate, suddenly started and swiftly ended kiss is IT.
For another, a full-lipped, loving, unending, lips swelling, tongue curling, saliva swapping kiss is IT.
For me, the kiss is not defined by the thinness or thickness of the lips. It cannot lack passion and must be born out of spontaneity. It can’t last too long, but can’t end too quickly either. It all comes down to what was put into and what ‘comes’ out of it.

THE kiss will etch itself onto not your lips only, but your subconscious, consciously reminding you of not just it, but its effects upon you.
THE kiss will have you wishing, wanting and comparing every other kiss to it.
It will leave a void that no other kiss can fill, causing you to be constantly yearning, craving, thirsting for the kiss even for once more.

Like love, there is no prescription that aids in the identifying of the kiss. When you experience it, you’ll know.
Have I experienced it?
I never kiss and tell!

Blacks and Books

I have one time too many heard the statement "if you want to hide anything from black people put it in a book."

And while that is sad, there is something even more depressing.

I believed.

Now that I think about it, I wonder if I was suffering from I.I - Ignorance of Identity.

I love to read.

I am always reading.

Have always been reading.

There was never a point in my life when I couldn't read; that's as far as my knowledge serves me though.

I can't say I learnt to read at age one, two or three caz I really don't know when it happened.

It just did.

Another thing is that I am black.

Have always been black.

Well, as far as my knowledge and memory serves me.

Shhhh.

Wait a sec!

I think I am on to something.

I am black and I love reading.

If there's something to be hidden from me - a black person - it cannot be placed in a book.

Unless it's in a language I don't understand and I couldn't or at least shouldn't be required or expected to read such, as there's really no point in reading unaccompanied by understanding.

Okay. So now that I have established that, I am trying to wrap my mind around why exactly I believed the aforementioned statement.

Could it be that I am among a minority that has either been deliberately overlooked or ignorantly ignored?

Or could the statement be true?

I am not in a position to opine on its accuracy or not, but what I can say is this: as far as history goes, things were hidden in books from blacks, but them not finding the hidden or reading the book was no fault of their's.

It's as simple as they were not allowed to read the bloody books.

So, ahmmm ... how else were they to have found what was hidden inside?

Did you know that, in the America for example, blacks who could read had to pretend that they couldn't?

The stop lights became their nemesis.

If they got to it and it was on green they were forced to become colour blind, as they couldn't stop.

If they did, it would've been noted that they could read and there would be no reservations in their punishment.
So what the blacks did was to pray the light was on green when they got to it and if it wasn't they just ran the light, caused the accident and then they'd be forgiven.

Why? Cause it was assumed they did so in ignorance.

I believe that blacks not reading as much as we should is all apart of our slow recovery from slavery and it's impeding effects.

Now, if overtime you've gotten used to not looking in a particular place for something because it was always out of bound; because you were restricted from doing so and harshly punished if and when you did, what exactly would you do?

Think about it!!

The 1st time.

To one person the first time means one thing.
To another, it's something else.
For some, it's absolutely amazing.
For others, it's everything but.
For me, it's nerve rocking.
There's a lot of sweating, heavy breathing and breath control involved.
It's all about remembering what you were taught and then some.
The first day on the job can never be compared to butter against sun, at least, not for me.

Starts out that I arrived an hour and a half late.
The usually one hour long drive turned out to be two and a half hours.
First, the chi chi bus stopped at every bus stop and everything that resembled such, resulting in that 15 minutes drive turning into 30 mins.

Finally, I was down town. Only to be told that I had to take a #700 to Halfway Tree and then make a transfer to a #44 which would take me to my destination.
Okay.
No biggy.

Got to the bus terminus in Halfway Tree after becoming familiar with every bus stop on the way from there to ahmmm ...
Don't remember.
No.
More like, don't know.
Oh, I forgot to mention that I told the driver where I wanted to go.
Ding dong!!!!
I only did caz I didn't know where I was going.
By the way, let me also mention that this was about10:00 or so, an hour after I was supposed to have arrived.
So, I'm sitting in the bus, wondering if the driver remembers me.
Slapping a half smile across my face I asked, "did u hear when I asked for a stop at Nationwide?"
Only to be asked, "A whe dat deh lady?"
I'm LMAO now that I'm writing, but there was everything but a smile on my face then.
I thought of crying, but what a shame it would be, so I composed myself, made a call to get the exact address, told the driver, sat up in my seat and hoped for, if not the best, something good.

It couldn't get worse.
I sat back, relaxed and waited for the driver to tell me to get off at the next stop or something, but that was just a thought; one that was not to be materialized.
At 10:30, I was sitting, still in the bus, at a cul-de-sac.
Might I add that I was the only passenger left on board.
What the hell is happening now, I thought to myself, but before my thought could have been verbalized, the very nice and helpful lady driver asked me, "Why yuh neva remind mi?"
Hellooooooooooo?
I couldn't. I didn't know where I was going.
Putting on the most faux pleasant smile I could muster up, I replied, "Caz I didn't know when or where to stop you."
"Yuh hafi guh wait bout 5 minutes."
The bus had stopped driving- parked to be exact.
I waited and waited and waited and 5 minutes quickly turned into 15.

At 10:45, the bus was finally on it's way.
"Memba mi when mi reach a di gas station. When wi reach out deh, jus seh, driva, memba mi," she made no mistake in telling me as we drove out.
By this time, tears were sitting crossed leggedly on my eye lids and lashes.
Don't cry. You can't cry I kept telling myself and then just when I thought all hope was gone, a gas station eased out of nowhere into plain view and like a child following directives given to it by its parents, I recited her words.
"Memba mi driva," I called out to her, to which she shoved her head through the window and called out to a nice, little , well I can't say gentleman for I am ignorant of his manliness or the gentleness of it, and asked, "A which way dem numba Mannings Hill road fr?"
But before he could answer, she blurted out, "A whe Nationwide deh?"

It was down the road.
How far down the road is a totally different thing.
"Di nex stop a yours yuh hear miss?"
Whether or not I responded is nothing I remember or care to.
The next stop came and on my way off the bus I attempted to tap into her creole by asking, "Where do I go from here?"
To which she responded, "Di whole a yah suh a Mannings Hill road. Walk gwaan till yuh find whe yuh a guh."
And while my being found it humourous, my flaring emotions didn't and the look on my face coincided with the latter.

After a few almost wrong turns, hi sexy girls, tooting of car horns and pssssts, I was finally there. Time?
Less than a stone throw way from 11.
Phone swinging from left to right in my hand - needed something to channel the pent up energy into- walking as briskly as I did, I dragged myself up the stairs, buzzed the door, went inside, introduced myself then sat down.

Images of what I would have wanted to do to the nice lady driver skated across my mind, but I soon dismissed the anger.
Soon dismissed the whole ordeal.
Soon I had replaced it with more wholesome, thought worthy thoughts, but that was only after meeting the very friendly, down to earth GM and the staff.
But while I dismissed the ordeal, I came away with a well learnt lesson: never blame someone else for my tardiness.

The Offering

Expecting too much, yet way too little, I can hear the expectations accompanied by their opposites ringing out of her like school bell after recess.

“Yuh mek mi look bad. Yuh is nuttin but a bloody shame nasty, dutty wukless gal. Yuh nuh have no ambition. Yuh likkle dawg,” her mother shouts.

It’s been two years, give or take a month or two and even now, it’s the picture; the only picture they hang on the walls of her artless museum.

It’s what they talk about before and behind her; the only thing they’ve been talking about, using it against her. A constant reminder of the disappointment she is.

Molested, but said naught to either of them. Didn’t trust to tell them; didn’t trust them, so she opted to unload what had been unloaded into her to the person/s with whom she had experienced trust; a faux trust, but it was all she knew.

She told them she’d been raped by the guy she’s in love with.
“Aint no wolf crying. It happened, but I soon gave in and it was no longer that,” she says.

But now, something else had happened. He had watered her soul with fluid that would soon give rise to her inside; that’d give rise to a new soul.
What would she do? What could she do? Tell them – her mother and sister- or end it? Does she take her life, putting an end to her soul and the soul growing within her soul?

No decision made. Guess she didn’t need to make any cause the guy she ‘loves’; the guy who - though married - told her he loved her too, beats her to her own suicide.
He gives.
Not support.
Not words of encouragement.
Not hope.
Not a solution, but five more steps toward the ending of two souls.

He gives her five tiny pills. Talk about killing two birds with one stone! Just that in his case – its five stones killing-slowly killing two.

Bleeding, cold sweat washes her fourteen year old body, leaving her cold and for dead. She’s dying, dying, dying then by a few mercy seconds, she’s saved.
“Your daughter is pregnant. She tried committing suicide …” the doctor said to the clueless mother. Shocked, bewildered she delivers a three-piece-combo-box across her jaws. Pressure rises then drops and a body gets rid of a soul; a soul that never was.

That was then – approximately two years ago, but they refuse to live in the now; refuse to accept or reject what happened and heal. Instead, they take on jobs as professional taunters- taunting her everyday- every second of every day- every waking moment and when she sleeps, she sees them still.

Abuse follows suit. The verbal, the physical, the emotional.
They don’t trust her. They don’t try to trust her. They make no attempts at trying to repair the trust.

Nothing she says is the truth, so she lies to satisfy their expectations.
Nothing she does is good enough, so she tries harder, yet never able to deliver the expected.

No room for mistakes, but the human in her makes them anyway and sticks, stones, pots, pans, kicks, boxes, fists, cuts, aches, pains become her mantra. Cries, cries for help, cries for help from her drowning in her mistake go out; go unheard.
She smiles and I see her tears, hear her cries.

I smile back, offering her a word that does not cease, but promises to dry her tears each time she cries. I offer her a hand to hold when she feels like running, two arms to run into. I offer her two ears that will not always be in her presence, but will always be present. Ready to listen, yet not judge, not criticize, just listen.
Unknowingly, she offers me a glimpse of her heart and I want her to keep it pure; I want to help her to keep what’s left of it pure.

So I offer - not my hand, my arms, my ears anymore; not parts of me, but me.
Will she learn to trust? If not me, my intentions?
Will she accept my offering of myself to her or not?

There is a poem

There is a poem whispering in the wind
Waiting to be heard, but if only.
If only we’d listen;
Listen to the poem written;
Waiting to be written by the bruises in the skin of the little bare-footed
Runny-nosed
Tear-stained face girl

There is a poem speaking
Screaming out
To you and I and we and us
Speaking in a voice unfamiliar to us
So we don’t hear caz we believe not in unfamiliarity
So the poem speaks and speaks and speaks
Yet never heard

There is a poem on the fingers of the little boy
Who steals to satisfy his hunger
For food
But love also
And acceptance and
Security

There is a poem on the lips of the speechless
On the eyelids of the sightless
There’s a poem traveling through the ba-ba-baas of the babies
And the ha-ha-haas of those dubbed crazy.

There is a poem lurking on the faces of the old man
Or woman
Who resides on the side- of the road; of life-
On the side of what you and I call normalcy

But there is a poem
Somewhere
Crying for the end of normalcy that neglects
Normalcy that cares
Not

There’s a poem stuttering on the tongue of the woman
Beaten, battered, bruised
In the name of love


There is a poem
Somewhere
Everywhere
There is poem
For you and I and we and us
And if not for
It’s in
Caz there’s a poem
In you and I and we and us
Waiting to be written;
Waiting to be heard.

The permanence of a smile

On what has become my journey of choice to and from ‘work’, this morning, something happened.

It was not one of those OMG, I can’t believe that just happened moments, but more of an insightful one.

I was in the taxi when a lady came in and sat at my side opposed to my left.
She said a general hi, but upon realizing it was me she kind of used her elbow to tug me in the side and all I could do was smile then said, “Hi. What’s up?” But I noticed something, well more like two things.

With kids, the tugging into the side with the elbow is more of a provocative, offensive gesture. One that would give rise to a fuss or a fight, but with adults, it’s the opposite.

It’s a sign of contact when a handshake is impossible and a hug is not permitted given the time or the limited space and the reaction, depending on the situation, is usually the reaction I gave – a smile. And this brings me to my core epiphany.

Moments after I had first smiled at her, I realized that the smile had not crept off my face like it ought to have done and this instigated another smile followed by another and then slowly they faded from my face, but I became conscious of the fact that, while the smile had left my face, I was still smiling.

For my heart had made a curve identical to the one my mouth makes when I smile and I smiled again because my heart was smiling; I realized the permanence of a smile.

It doesn’t come then disappear in a jiffy. It lingers, as if wanting to tickle you into laughter, gently forcing you into experiencing something else; something more.
It kinda runs an errand through your entire being, walking leisurely in an effort to ensure that no cell, no artery, no intestine was left untouched by its effect.

And having experienced infinite smiles prior to this moment I wonder how much permanence was in them? Was there any permanence in them at all? And if the answer to the latter question is no, does it mean that prior to this morning I’ve never smiled for there is nothing temporal about a smile, but simply a persistent permanence.

The Larger Side of Love

Larger, fluffier, fatter, plus size women always seem to be the punch lines on and off screen. Always getting the “she fat eeh” or “What a way she big?”

Judged, disrespected, embarrassed. If not with words, with stares – unwarranted stares.

But what are the odds that we have taken the time to think that the “fat” or the “fluff” doesn’t define the woman? Slim to none, right?

This might come as a shocker, but fatter women are no different from the “slim things” among us, except for a little more warmth.

They have lives, jobs, husbands, lovers. They need fulfillment; to be cared for, respected, love and be loved and yes, accepted.

They desire to be accepted by a society that always boasts that, “thin is in.” A society that screams that to be fat is a handicap and as such, she who falls in such a category needs to be remedied by either some medical surgery or an endless string of diets.

But again, have we even thought about the facts that while some may, not all fatter, fluffier women are going to end up size two’s? Not all of them are going to fit society’s ideals of what a woman’s size should be. In fact, not all of them desire to be thinner and truth be told, they need not be.

Who makes the rules? A society that breaks said rules, because of its own inability to keep them? Or does/ should each woman construct the rules, at least with regard to size, for herself?

Whichever way, no woman should have to be pressured into fitting into an extremely minuscule box that society dictates is the norm.

What if she doesn’t fit? Better yet, what if she cannot and will not be able to fit? Do we cast her into an oversized box and then view her as lesser than? Do we hand her a one way ticket to some far away place where she’s accepted without reservations? Or do we, as cliché as it sounds, accept her for who and not what she is?

After all, we couldn’t all look the same. If we did, the probability of our experiencing and appreciating variety and diversity would be rather slender, don't you think?