battlin'

so...apparently Nas' name came up in the latest ghostwriting exposé.

folks are upset.
me? not so much.

a disclaimer: i've always been more partial to R&B than hip hop, mainly because singers were more accessible.  my mom pretty much hated rap and thought it was all flin flarn filth, so i didn't start buying hip hop until, say, 8-10th grade when i had a bit more autonomy.  although i love it and see it as a part of the fabric of my generation, i accept that i don't "care" enough about this kind of stuff to be angry, or even disappointed. 

that said...

in most other music, we've come to accept that the greatest lyricists/songwriters are not always the great performers, and vice versa.  the great Black music houses employed songwriting teams whose names were often only bandied about by musicologists and die hard fans.  everyone else was focused on the performers.  

i didn't know until i was half grown that one of my favorite vocalists, Luther Vandross, built a stellar career remaking other people's hit songs.  i never heard him called a fraud.  on the contrary, even folks who remembered the originals often preferred Luther's versions.  put simply: no matter what he sang, no one sang it like he did. 

at its inception, hip hop was the next phase of Black music in America (by way of Jamaica).  the genre grew and expanded as its listeners and performers did.  it wasn't like there was an emcee program at Julliard  teaching the fine arts of cadence and metaphor.

in the main, hip hop was built on pure, raw talent--a voice of urban youth.  it did not emerge from a movement of "trained" musicians or artists. (note: there were--and are--exceptions.  and Nas' father is a musician in his own right).  to me, that suggests a naturally collaborative atmosphere: i can write the rhymes, but you flow better...and neither of us is dope with the beats, so...  

given the output expected of signed artists, how would most manage to write every rhyme, every single time, on their own, from lived experience--no matter how gritty?  genius-level output doesn't happen every day, or even every generation.  by the odds, it makes sense that occasionally someone would write a few bars for someone else. 

folks would probably argue that you "always" know who wrote a song, but ghostwriters get no credit.  well, i'm sure someone got a paycheck.  besides, have any of us figured out all of Prince's aliases yet?  there's plenty of stuff that's been done for the love, the exposure, insiders, or all of the above.        

any art form carries a standard of authenticity, and some are going to take that standard more seriously than others.  it's the constant battle between the sell-outs and the real heads.  fortunately or unfortunately, that's led to the obfuscation of certain information in hip hop circles.

bottom line: can many emcees flow like Nas? no.

plus, it isn't as if he never proved his capability.  if he let someone else do some heavy lifting for a bit, so be it.  according to author of the article, the ghostwritten items never worked as well as his own stuff, so maybe this will push Nas to some new, better work.  


but all this lamenting around "keeping it real"?

stop it, b.

it's that time of year again...

april is national poetry writing month, and i've decided to do napowrimo via posts on the writing blog.

that said, i'll probably be pretty scarce here this month--not that i've had a lot of time to blog regularly anyway.  obviously. more on that a little later...  

in any case, you can follow the poem postings on the blog, thru its rss feed, or on twitter.  enjoy!

fridge poetry

i don't play with these nearly enough...

goddesspace III

long-time readers will be familiar with the evolution and incarnations of the goddesspace. it started out as a sort of eclectic, crystal-centric space devoted to the divine feminine.

phase two was lovely, but short lived. i never really took to the space, and the end of summer ushered in a strange, difficult phase.

so i started again. the initial idea was great, the execution mediocre.

just as i started to birth the space, money got tight and inspiration waned. but as i've been able to give name and form to the shifts i've been experiencing over the last few weeks, the fog lifted and i could finally give the space the time and attention it deserved (i'm sure the new moon energy didn't hurt, either)...

plenty of light, color, and quartz. triangles enhance energy.

feathers...beauty, expansion, warmth; a reminder to keep the spirit light and prepared for flight.

i'm hoping that this one will last at least as long as the first, if not longer.

steppin to the mic

thinking about this entry again...

i went to an open mic last night at the urging of a couple of talented brothas, and i had a nice time. lots of very talented folks came through and performed.

i also realized that i have no desire to go back to that scene--at least not as a participant.

i'm not saying i'll never write a poem again--i just wrote one the other day--and i'd most certainly go to poetry/spoken word events ("i need to get out more" is a vast understatement). but i don't have any need to share my own musings beyond these online spaces.

the selective stage fright has dissipated. the idea of reading doesn't fill me with dread, but there's also no burning need to speak my peace.

time and space, apparently, have neutralized me.

i'm always going to write because, well, it's what i do. but perform? probably not.

for now, i'll keep (most of) my notebooks, but there will be a massive digital purge. it's all just dead creative weight at this point; fragments that have been lying around for so many years, there's no way to know how to reassemble them.

some things i've "thought" of, i've seen written since. it was my personal proof of the theory that ideas are literally floating through the air, and you and 500 other folks might discover a concept at the same time, but only one or two will actually flesh it out in a way that exposes it to the wider world. the other 498-499 will simply think you a genius when you do.

i've probably lost more half novels and semi second drafted stories than i've ever written--either to outdated technology, the death of my laptop, lost disks, torn up notebooks, etc. and so on--hence the paragraph under this blog's title.

and i'm not sad about it.

i don't know if it's because i'm still finding my voice, or that i'm just not meant to write the next great (american?) novel.

but i'm coming to think of writing as not my calling, but simply a vessel of expression i excel at.

perhaps i will write a book or a blog about my calling that will pull it all together...

but, i'm not a slam poet.
or a mc.
i'm probably not even a novelist or story writer, despite my bits of training.

just a girl who plays with words now and then.

pardon my shimmer, beautification in progress

having recently realized how deeply affected i am by beauty, i have decided to beautify my life.

i don’t mean this on a wholly superficial level, but more a project designed to entice and enhance the senses; indulge my sensual self with the goal of discovering my true loves, passions, desires, and needs. it is also a means to spiritual symmetry and loveliness.

i am making an effort to dress in ways that are comfortable, yet flattering. since i’ve (unintentionally) gone down about 1 size, i’m having to rediscover what fits, what doesn’t, how my body has reshaped itself.

i bought a lovely new journal on my birthday. i’ve been carrying one kind of notebook or another with me daily for some time, scribbling thoughts and other things as they arise. the new, beautified journal was part of a commitment to (a) buy no more anonymous, spiral notebooks and (b) no longer compartmentalize my thoughts/feelings/words (typically i’ll have the "daily" notebook, something for poetry, a diary for journaling, another for spiritual matters, etc.).

the goal: regain my flow, let things spill out wherever they please. get messy. become reacquainted with myself.

so don’t mind the extra honey and glitter sprinkled around wherever i may happen to be at any given moment. i’m just working out a few minor details.

in search of a powerful eroticism

i reread audre lorde's (iba t'orun) "the uses of the erotic" on the train the other day, and it made my heart hurt a little.

during a conversation with c., i realized (again) how complacent and sedated i've become; how i have betrayed my wild woman, allowing parts of her to hibernate or suffer from dehydration for far too long.

first, mama audre tells us:

There are many kinds of power, used and unused, acknowledged or otherwise. The erotic is a resource within each of us that lies in a deeply female and spiritual plane, firmly rooted in the power of our unexpressed or unrecognized feeling. In order to perpetuate itself, every oppression must corrupt or distort those various sources of power within the culture of the oppressed that can provide energy for change. For women, this has meant a suppression of the erotic as a considered source of power and information within our lives.

We have been taught to suspect this resource, vilified, abused, and devalued within western society. On the one hand, the superficially erotic has been encouraged as a sign of female inferiority; on the other hand, women have been made to suffer and to feel both contemptible and suspect by virtue of its existence.

furthermore...

As women, we have come to distrust that power which rises from our deepest and nonrational knowledge. We have been warned against it all our lives by the male world, which values this depth of feeling enough to keep women around in order to exercise it in the service of men, but which fears this same depth too much to examine the possibilities of it within themselves. So women are maintained at a distant/inferior position to be psychically milked, much the same way ants maintain colonies of aphids to provide a life-giving substance for their masters.

But the erotic offers a well of replenishing and provocative force to the woman who does not fear its revelation, nor succumb to the belief that sensation is enough.

precisely. sensation is not enough. my hunger goes much deeper than that.

one of the first steps towards my satisfaction was obtaining fulfilling employment. all praise to my ori, egbe and the orisa, i have done that.

but it's only the first movement. in many ways, i'm still starving.

The erotic is a measure between our sense of self and the chaos of our strongest feelings. It is an internal sense of satisfaction to which, once we have experienced it, we know we can aspire. For having experienced the fullness of this depth of feeling and recognizing its power, in honor and self-respect we can require no less of ourselves.

indeed. it has touched me, fully and deeply--and not just in love.

It is never easy to demand the most from ourselves, from our lives, from our work. To encourage excellence is to go beyond the encouraged mediocrity of our
society is to encourage excellence. But giving in to the fear of feeling and working to capacity is a luxury only the unintentional can afford, and the unintentional are those who do not wish to guide their own destinies.

This internal requirement toward excellence which we learn from the erotic must not be misconstrued as demanding the impossible from ourselves nor from others. Such a demand incapacitates everyone in the process. For the erotic is not a question only of what we do; it is a question of how acutely and fully we can feel in the doing. Once we know the extent to which we are capable of feeling that sense of satisfaction and completion, we can then observe which of our various life endeavors bring us closest to that fullness.

hallelujah.

The aim of each thing which we do is to make our lives and the lives of our children richer and more possible. Within the celebration of the erotic in all our endeavors, my work becomes a conscious decision - a longed-for bed which I enter gratefully and from which I rise up empowered.

Of course, women so empowered are dangerous. So we are taught to separate the erotic from most vital areas of our lives other than sex. And the lack of concern for the erotic root and satisfactions of our work is felt in our disaffection from so much of what we do. For instance, how often do we truly love our work even at its most difficult?

i feel like i would be terribly dangerous if i were so empowered. seeing women like dark daughta making the attempt is a blessing. she and others encourage me to find my own way towards freedom, past the fragmentation and the lies i tell myself to fit in and make it through the weeks.

i am learning that it isn't just my creativity that's fallen away from the nucleus of who i am--parts of my sensuality, sexuality, even parts of my spirituality feel incomplete.

i don't just have writing blocks these days, i have prayer ones as well. what can i say to my shrines when i can barely speak to my ori? what once seemed so simple has become a chore.

As women, we need to examine the ways in which our world can be truly different. I am speaking here of the necessity for reassessing the quality of all the aspects of our lives and of our work, and of how we move toward and through them.

The very word erotic comes from the Greek word eros, the personification of love in all its aspects - born of Chaos, and personifying creative power and harmony. When I speak of the erotic, then, I speak of it as an assertion of the lifeforce of women; of that creative energy empowered, the knowledge and use of which we are now reclaiming in our language, our history, our dancing, our loving, our work, our lives.

somehow i have been cut off from the source.

i'm wondering what part the last month has played in this drama, how much i've dealt with and how much i haven't.

...but that'd be another blog altogether.

Beyond the superficial, the considered phrase, "It feels right to me," acknowledges the strength of the erotic into a true knowledge, for what that means is the first and most powerful guiding light toward any understanding. And understanding is a handmaiden which can only wait upon, or clarify, that knowledge, deeply born. The erotic is the nurturer or nursemaid of all our deepest knowledge.

this is going at the bottom of the blog as my newest quote. maybe posted above the goddesspace. a new mantra.

The erotic functions for me in several ways, and the first is in providing the power which comes from sharing deeply any pursuit with another person. The sharing of joy, whether physical, emotional, psychic, or intellectual, forms a bridge between the sharers which can be the basis for understanding much of what is not shared between them, and lessens the threat of their difference.

...and this is why i like DD, despite her insistence that many of us (whoever the "we" happen to be who stumble upon her musings) won't.

i don't need to nitpick with her about the different ways in which we see the world. i respond to her as my heart and mind dictate, and she responds to me in kind. in that, we don't bicker, but find common ground. when we disagree, we don't polarize one another--we teach each other.

that's the way it's supposed to be.

mama audre had so much to contribute in the way of the conscious acknowledgement and acceptance of difference...it breaks my heart that we didn't have her for just a few more years.

Another important way in which the erotic connection functions is the open and fearless underlining of my capacity for joy, in the way my body stretches to music and opens into response, harkening to its deepest rhythms so every level upon which I sense also opens to the erotically satisfying experience whether it is dancing, building a bookcase, writing a poem, or examining an idea.

That self-connection shared is a measure of the joy which I know myself to be capable of feeling, a reminder of my capacity for feeling. And that deep and irreplaceable knowledge of my capacity for joy comes to demand from all of my life that it be lived within the knowledge that such satisfaction is possible, and does not have to be called marriage, nor god, nor an afterlife.

This is one reason why the erotic is so feared, and so often relegated to the bedroom alone, when it is recognized at all. For once we begin to feel deeply all the aspects of our lives, we begin to demand from ourselves and from our life-pursuits that they feel in accordance with that joy which we know ourselves to be capable of. Our erotic knowledge empowers us, becomes a lens through which we scrutinize all aspects of our existence, forcing us to evaluate those aspects honestly in terms of their relative meaning within our lives. And this is a grave responsibility, projected from within each of us, not to settle for the convenient, the shoddy, the conventionally expected, nor the merely safe.

this is why my relationship with him was and still is so important; we lived and breathed this essay before i even knew it existed. we still do.

now that our love is shifting and transforming into another form of being, i'm wondering how it will still be capable of feeding me, how my current situation may need to shape shift.

how fear has factored in to my desires and loves.
the walls are getting thin.

During World War II, we bought sealed plastic packets of white, uncolored margarine, with a tiny, intense pellet of yellow coloring perched like a topaz just inside the clear skin of the bag. We would leave the margarine out for a while to soften, and then we would pinch the little pellet to break it inside the bag, releasing the rich yellowness into the soft pale mass of margarine. Then taking it carefully between our fingers, we would knead it gently back and forth, over and over, until the color had spread throughout the whole pound bag of margarine, thoroughly coloring it.

I find the erotic such a kernel within myself. When released from its intense and constrained pellet, it flows through and colors my life with a kind of energy that heightens and sensitizes and strengthens all my experience.

mmm hmmmm...

We have been raised to fear the yes within ourselves, our deepest cravings. But, once recognized, those which do not enhance our future lose their power and can be altered. The fear of our deepest cravings keeps them suspect and indiscriminately powerful, for to suppress any truth is to give it strength beyond endurance. The fear that we cannot grow beyond whatever distortions we may find within ourselves keeps us docile and loyal and obedient, externally defined, and leads us to accept many facets of our own oppression as women.

...But when we begin to live from within outward, in touch with the power of the erotic within ourselves, and allowing that power to inform and illuminate our actions upon the world around us, then we begin to be responsible to ourselves in the deepest sense. For as we begin to recognize our deepest feelings, we begin to give up, of necessity, being satisfied with suffering, and self-negation, and with the numbness which so often seems like the only alternative in our society. Our acts against oppression become integral with self, motivated and empowered from within.

In touch with the erotic, I become less willing to accept powerlessness, or those other supplied states of being which are not native to me, such as resignation, despair, self-effacement, depression, self-denial.

i believe that this is the message mama gena intended when she, essentially, watered down and commercialized this lesson for her school of womanly arts.

it's definitely a wonderful beginning--if that's the level you need to be reached on--but i hope that the actual classes touch on something deeper and more critically minded than what glitters on the surface.

back to the essay:

And yes, there is a hierarchy. There is a difference between painting a black fence and writing a poem, but only one of quantity. And there is, for me, no difference between writing a good poem and moving into sunlight against the body of a woman I love.

This brings me to the last consideration of the erotic. To share the power of each other's feelings is different from using another's feelings as we would use a Kleenex. When we look the other way from our experience, erotic or otherwise, we use rather than share the feelings of those others who participate in the experience with us. And use without consent of the used is abuse.

In order to be utilized, our erotic feelings must be recognized. The need for sharing deep feeling is a human need. But within the european-american tradition, this need is satisfied by certain proscribed erotic comings-together. These occasions are almost always characterized by a simultaneous looking away, a pretense of calling them something else, whether a religion, a fit, mob violence, or even playing doctor. And this misnaming of the need and the deed give rise to that distortion which results in pornography and obscenity - the abuse of feeling.

deep.

The erotic cannot be felt secondhand. As a Black lesbian feminist, I have a particular feeling, knowledge, and understanding for those sisters with whom I have danced hard, played, or even fought. This deep participation has often been the forerunner for joint concerted actions not possible before.

But this erotic charge is not easily shared by women who continue to operate under an exclusively european-american male tradition. I know it was not available to me when I was trying to adapt my consciousness to this mode of living and sensation.

...and it's still not available, mama audre, not even for a heterosexual black woman--whatever scraps of privilege that offers me.

i am built for this kind of life.
it is always on the tip of my tongue.
the rhythm of it guides my heart...
whether i'm loving someone
writing
designing sacred space...

it's there. it's waiting. it's mine.

but i still have plenty of work to do before the erotic is fully fused to my life.

maybe that should be my new prayer...

reasonable silence...

i've been more concerned with experience than words. i'm ruled by my senses...the touch, feel, taste of things.

when i'm thrust into something new, i have to feel my way through. my capabilities for speech are diminished during the adjustment period. i have only been able to write enough to achieve understanding of the reasons that i am not writing.

if that makse sense.

my exposure to him* is probably a factor as well. our experience of each other is largely one of pure sensory overload. his presence is catalytic.

among other things.

anyway, y'all have a blissful weekend.

the moon is waxing. seeds are growing.
hope you've got a bountiful harvest to celebrate once she's full.


*note to self: he needs a blog-alias...some of y'all know the full story. any suggestions?

a mad, mad, mad world

there are things i'd like to write about that are better kept quiet until i'm sure of the outcome.

other things i can feel, but have few or no words to express.

i'll try to touch on what i can, 'cause i have to get something out...

i feel another project coming on--that, or something calling out to be finished. i had a promising story/novel come to me a few years ago that i haven't been able to develop into any kind of coherent whole. it pokes me every now and then, i scribble whatever comes, then i leave it until the next time. not exactly a winning strategy.

the love project is...stalled. that was easier to work from a place of angst and a need to organize unrequited emotion. but, as he's wont to do, the subject of the piece has reared his head. now there's a new set of sentiments to deal with.

i recently began to reread ...said the shotgun to the head. i may have mentioned before that i enjoy saul williams because he's the only male poet i've read (to date) who seems to be trying to understand the divine feminine on a deep level. he also seems like the kind of man i'd probably fall head over heels for, but that's beside the point.

something in his words hits me on levels i didn't know anyone knew i had. he has a way of stirring the parts of me i've attempted to subdue in the name of normalcy. i realize that that is probably due more to his mediumship than the beauty of his poetry. i sense that he is often a vessel, same as i am.

i'd like to ask him how he learned to surrender...

there's also a lingering sense of need for...a spark. some sense of purpose, a goal, something. it seems that whenever i gain a new understanding or realization it just leaves me lusting after something else.

and now, instead of the depression it caused a few weeks ago, it's starting to feel like an itch. irritating and almost intangible. there's also a sprinkling of rage i like to call hungry baby syndrome, i.e., you scream until you're fed.

welcome to my mess.

y'all mind the retrograde, now.

shakti

i've realized that my creativity has not abandoned me, it's been invested in recreating my reality.

my list of needs and wants is a mile long, but i'm also accomplishing goals and setting new ones in record time.

i find myself praying, manifesting, and readjusting almost constantly. my dreams are overflowing with guidance and support.

still, it's been awkward adjusting to the feeling of "missing" my writing; i'm used to leaning on a pen and pad for support.

yes, blogging is writing--but different. i miss the poems, stories, the choreographed wordplay that used to dance effortlessly across my mind.

blogging is more of a release of nervous energy or filing system--a tool that helps me track my progress, tuck away distracting thoughts, converse with folks and spark discussion.

on the other hand, i am grateful that my creative energy understands the necessity of metamorphosis depending on my needs.

right now i don't need to write as much as i need to move, visualize, and mold.

today i am grateful for the gifts granted by evolution.

cleansing...

whenever i start to feel heavy and out of place, i know it's time for a fast.

the program that seems to work best for me is goo gobs of fresh fruit, smoothies and/or fresh juice, water, and cleansing supplements and herbs (e.g. ultimate cleanse, psyllium, flaxseed, green pills). i usually end with salads/raw veggies, gradually building back up to my regular diet. i'm also fond of lemon water, yogurt (in the smoothies and before/after using the cleansing pills), and chlorophyll.

given february's ordeal and this entry from march, it's high time for a break. my natural urge to cleanse comes up every 3-4 months or so if i've been bad--which i have.

experiences like this tend to lure me back into unhealthy habits and cycles in the name of grounding myself, but i'm learning that maybe it's better for me to walk around on tiptoe just a little bit.

i've read mixed reviews on fasting/cleansing during one's cycle, but i think i prefer it, especially since i've begun to realign with the strength of the full moon. menstruation is a profound cleansing in and of itself, so i'm taking it as a signal that in this cycle i need to clear obstacles with some physical discipline vs. prayer.

cleansing also means more clarity of mind and spirit, so i'm hoping this will also lead to a breakthrough in the battle with writer's block. i tend to journal more frequently and freely during a fast, and i've been hiding from my thoughts lately. time to stop that.

peace & clarity, y'all

today i am thankful for intuition and understanding.

sometimes i can't keep up with my mind

stories and poems race through, trying to be caught and heard
but i can only do about three things at one time well
get into four or five and i start slippin on at least one
but the words want all my attention
they abhor multitasking

my creativity is pretty overwhelming
which is probably why i've spent so much time trying to
tame
bend
subdue and/or
harness it

by now i understand that it's like my hair:
does what it wants when it wants
and grows like wildfire
or weeds
different textures and colors
all thrown into one me

and i gotta try to make sense of it.

another one of those days.

sometimes i don't understand why i'm here or what i'm doing.

i get tired of unpaid bills,
not being paid enough...or being paid just enough...

i don't want another job like the one i have now, but will i have a choice?

going back to school would only put me in more debt. and the things i could concieve of studying wouldn't guarantee me shit.

i'm tired of being an underling to people who are half as smart as i am. most days i feel like my gifts mean nothing because there seem to be so few outlets for them in this culture.

i wanted to help heal people and ran into another spiderweb of red tape.

and what the hell is up with the disappearance of my libido? groan.

i'm not saying i want things to be easy...it'd just be nice to feel like i have a place in this world.

i know i have to stay motivated...that i can't let the bad days get me down. it's hard. the one person who could always make it better is gone now, and my internal "you can do it!" voice hasn't become strong enough yet. there are still huge parts of myself i struggle with.

it's taking just about everything i have not to run to some bathroom on another floor and cry my eyes out.

but...i won't.

it's payday. so after i finish this, i'll go pay a couple of bills

this evening i'll get some groceries and things to clean the house...i'm already planning a curried potato, lentil and spinach dish. and i can get at least the bathroom done tonight, put some clothes away (finally). maybe get some laundry done.

there's a stephen marley cd waiting for me somewhere, too.

tomorrow morning i'm going to go speak with the ancestors and take them an offering.

i know it's gonna be ok.

that still doesn't stop you from wanting to throw back a couple of petron shots and toss the world a middle finger every now and then.

who i be

some days i feel like i'm failing at this "integration" thing.

i suppose i should explain.

for the last couple of years--particularly since the loss--i've been trying to get the creative/spiritual/womanly and "gotta pay the bills"-selves all wrapped up into one instead of continually killing off little pieces of me when it's convenient.

my biggest fear is going the route of the phoenix and burning myself out. starving for mental stimulation and sensation can get you in trouble.

doing the spiritual work helps. but it also tends to remove me from my material existence. then, usually around the time my cycle's due, when i come crashing down to earth, i tend to look around and think, "what the fk is going on here??!??"

becoming more mindful and committed to prayer makes a difference. i might feel like hell walking out the door, but taking a deep breath and getting it together so i can greet my shrines forces a reorganization of priorities.

massage does the same thing. a bad day instantly turns into a good one when i have a client. i have to check my crap at the edge of the table and deal with that person's well-being. and the better i make them feel, the better i start to feel myself. it's a wonderful exchange.

that's something i need to be seriously thinking about doing all day, every day.

i need to pull out all those papers and get serious about getting certified in dc. even if i don't do crap with it right now...at least i'll have it.

get my cpr certification renewed
scrape up the change to get my association membership renewed
i won't even talk about continuing education credits...oy.

not to mention that i'll have to basically re-learn everything before i'd feel confident going on a job interview. you think i still know the origins and insertions of the six deep lateral hip rotators? nope.

reiki classes were offered recently at my alma mater, but i missed out on those...have to catch 'em next go round.

and all this starts me wondering, "should i really try to do the house thing now?". but a house would mean a tax break for once. maybe i could actually start looking forward to refunds instead of owing.

i can have it all. i know i can.
i just have to pace myself...

and before, during, and after all that, i need to find the space, inspiration, and will to keep writing.

renaissance

to piggyback my myspace blog...i think i need to get back into the poetry game.

to be fair, i was never really in it, but i used to write a lot more of it than i do now--even if i didn't read.

writing these days has taken the form of snippets of journal entries (compared to the multiple page outpourings i did years ago), blogging, and maybe a couple of lines here & there if the mood strikes.



still, on the rare occasions when i do go out and listen to folks, 80-90% of them have me thinking, "i can do better than that."

during my hiatus i've tried to be mindful of squashing negative mind chatter, getting rid of all the "i can'ts" and "i'm not good enoughs".

i'm not gonna assume i'm the next big thing, either. i mean, i'm damn near 30. full time, broke ass poet status isn't my bag. i write because i've always written. becoming a local celebrity and getting first slot at the local cafe isn't really my goal.

but i have a voice. and something to say.
i deserve to be heard, or, rather, something in me wants to be.

so...we'll see.

feelin' myself

i think i've had the other template for, oh, 3 years. lol.

it was time for a change.

i'm creating new spaces for myself, both literally & figuratively. so...that included my virtual spaces as well. my myspace page even got a makeover.

so...

welcome to my lagoon.

i wanna write

but the words don't come...
or get tangled in the synapses between my mind and my fingers

but i'm writing now,
right?

i suppose...but
everything feels like a half assed
half sketched rough draft of a
something partly finished

notebooks gathering dust on bookshelves
while i stick my nose in yet another book
out of the ideas of others
come papyrus iv's
keeping me alive
barely
as if i'm not creative enough on my own

but i ain't feelin myself these days...

fk.

i gotta
throw out all the old pens and pencils
file away books filled with last year's dreams
grab some sparkling multicolored pens
and plain old bics
notebooks thick with rainbow colored paper
& simple composition books
clean off my desk
and get to it.

"fear is the mind killer"

...you should probably read dune if you haven't already.

anyway.

last night was interesting. i said my usual full moon prayers, did a meditation, and tried to get some rest. but i never quite fell asleep. it was like i was still awake...trying to keep some invader away from me.

i ran, i tried to ignore it...but it kept coming at me.

i hid, screamed that silent dream scream...i did everything i could think to do...

except fight.

i woke up briefly, remembering a technique a friend taught me years ago (bless you, wherever you are): i drenched myself in light. steeled myself. i added the vision of a katana sword with a white hilt, and draped myself in white cloth. and fell back asleep.

i told whatever it was that it needed to get away from me. that i was prepared to kill it.

it tried to disguise itself, but that didn't work too well. i cut it and it didn't bleed. it was nothing even resembling a person.

so i left it where it lay.

over the last few months i've been doing a lot of work to get old obstacles out of my way. i have a path to walk, and i don't want to be hindered by ideas/attitudes/thinking that have become comfortable.

i know a large part of this is reclaiming and using my creativity.

i wrote an affirmation for myself a few nights ago:

you are a writer.
WRITE.

it's on the door of the closet that faces my bedroom.
when i get up in the morning and walk to the shower i see it.
my laundry's in there, so i see it when i put clothes in the hamper.
i see it on the way to bed.

i can feel it working.

but when you sweep out the old, something always wants to stay. the universe wants you to win, but your ego can get in the way. either because it's too big and won't take any advice, or it's fragile and afraid of getting hurt. i'm more of the latter.

stay small where no one can see you. don't draw attention to yourself. you're not really that special, you know...

it's not a self esteem thing. it's more so your mind's way of protecting you.

some ppl refer to that as the devil. so be it. i think of it as a human refuge.
no one wants to be assed out and fail--or, rather, have a perception of failure. myself included.

but it's when you take those leaps of faith that you realize you didn't have shit to be afraid of to begin with.

in women who run with the wolves, dr. estes talks about the "predator" that tends to attack women in dreams when they're on the verge of getting in touch with their wild, intuitive, deep selves.

that's what i encountered last night...only it was a far more literal version than the usual bad man in the woods or walk through a dark alley.

i've seen it before.
it happens whenever i shake myself into awareness.
the longer i've been sleeping, the more frightening the awakening is.

but i am a child of ogun.
i am never without my machete. and i rarely lose my way.
i have nothing to be afraid of.
my success has been assured. and i'm on my way to claiming it.

damn the haters.

ashe.

this is what i need to remember about myself...

Sharon Bridgforth, author/performer/activist
Interviewed by Ana-Maurine Lara

What does it mean for you to be an artist – a writer – in the world?

Well for me initially I started doing it just because I had to. It was like breathing. I’ve always been a reader. When I was a kid I just read voraciously. When I was 15 I started writing just trying to survive my own emotions. [Then it was in] reading the Songs of Solomon and Psalms and I just thought they were so pretty, that I saw writing as something that could be transformative for me emotionally. And somewhere along the way, probably around the time I was in my early 30s it all clicked together. Now what I can say is that writing is what I’m here in the world to do. It’s my gift that I have been given. It’s what I can contribute. I see it as a spiritual responsibility; I see it as an ancestral calling. I see it as a privilege. I see it as a way for me to honor not only the reality of my life and experiences, but those who came before. A specific thing I have been given is the opportunity to tell the stories of the ancestors and to keep their voices alive. I see it as service. It’s what I’m here to offer in service to the ancestors, to the orisa, to the universe, to humanity and to my own destiny. So I take it very seriously.

i wanna write.

and life keeps getting in the way...

i don't even know what i wanna write about.

i just wanna make some words do something.
see something dancing across a page.
buy some new notebooks
and pens

have a desk at home again.

make sense of the literary mess in my head.

i'm all halfway rhyming & shit...

*sigh*

i gotta find a way to make this work...