Sample of Scribbles from 2011: The Year of FULL

Untitled #1

So hard to keep a consistent thought in a mind buzzing with numerous triggers, disruptions, ideas, pains,

all floating.

A laugh rubbing elbows with a sob…

everything feels too close in proximity…

can barely fit a breath in between.  

So I swallow and stuff it all down, down, down to…where?

Simultaneously exposed and bare

but also closed in tight…

How do i co-exist within these two realities?

It is an act of survival because

I have apparently long passed the expiry date for mourning over a pain that happened two years ago, six years ago, in high school, before birth…before this lifetime.  

Perhaps my spirit is existing right now in some other being and is bringing that emotional residue here

to further fog up 

my already clouded window pane.

 

 

A Place of Rage

Angry.

I am angry that I am forced to walk within the confines of fear.

Angry that I have been taught to hold anxiety close.

Angry that the onus is on  me – my responsibility to stop you from staring, prevent you from approaching, stepping forward across boundaries invading my protective sphere of personal space.

My responsibility to not attract attention.  My responsibility to avoid eye contact.  My responsibility to take note of street lights and traffic and how many people I share the sidewalk with and check who those people are…do they look trustworthy?  What does that even mean? Now it is my responsibility to create markers and signifiers and PROFILES of who may be trustworthy.  My responsibility to not assume.  My responsibility to be cautious.  My responsibility to not be naive.

I am weighed down with responsibility .  Walking with careful steps riddled with anxiety, leading to a prison of confinement,

convincing myself that the risk is too great — I didn’t want to go out anyway…I didn’t really want to wear that skirt…it is kind of chilly tonight, maybe I’ll save that walk for the daytime when the stars I wanted to see are hidden but there sure is daylight.

What the fuck is your responsibility when I am left contorted and heavy  in my prison of consideration? Heavy because you never took up your fucking responsibility of choosing not to assault me.

How about you make the choice to not harass me tonight?

***Thoughts after a Friday night assault  by 5 white men on Ossington Street****

 

 

Sister-Mother-Friend

Black women.

Layered.  Contradictory.  Relationships. We reflect each other’s silent pain a little too clearly, exposing the wounds we have painstackingly dressed in flesh-coloured bandages – hidden from the casual glance but evident to the more perceptive, the more invested, the more practiced eye.  You are a reflection of my hurt, my strength, my beauty, my pride and my love.

We have travelled across waters, endured separations, survived bodily invasions…and so it is a must, a need, to hold each other up.

Please hold me up.

Untitled #2

 

Pressure.  Consistent pressure.

To be on

To be articulate

To be present

To be presentable

To be beautiful

To be available

To be enticing

To be inviting

To be open 

To be aware

To care

To love

To lie

To listen

To provide answers

To build

To nurture

To create

To cake

To call

To come

To

be

the

one

 

 

A Rock and a Hard Place (aka The Game aka The Makings of a Really Bad R&B Song)

Call me please.   I’d like to talk.

Don’t call me please.  I can’t handle talking to you.

 

Call me please.  I yearn to hear your voice.

Don’t call me please.  I can’t handle what your voice does to me.

 

Call me please so we can talk for hours and hours again.

Don’t call me please.  I can’t talk to you for hours and hours again.

 

Call me please so I can feel my heart pick up speed and pound like only you can make it.

Don’t call me please.  I can’t handle the dramatics of a pounding heart, sweaty palms and inevitable dreams of an impossible tomorrow that will follow.

 

Call me.  So I can tell you not to call me.  And you can convince me otherwise.

Don’t call me.  So I won’t have to tell you not to call me.  And you won’t have to agree and say goodbye.

 

Untitled #3

I want to stretch and stretch and stretch and wear lipstick and scream as loud as possible and paint abstract colourful creations and sew remixes onto articles of clothing and cook food that smells good and write and write and write and not feel tired all the time and have time for driving lessons and act in incredible plays and buy beautiful bedsheets and re-design my room and write and write and write and not speak to people for a while and learn new hairstyles and watch lots of good and bad movies and dance with my mummy and write letters to my homeboy and read and read and read and paint my toenails and draw storyboards for future films and stretch and stretch and stretch…