What Can I Say

    I feel paralyzed, face beyond statue stoic. I wish my hands would creep up to dry her cheeks wipe aways tears of other disappointments, previous abandonments, everything I couldn't prevent, and my failures mindreading 101 ans 202, but these hands remain on my jeans clenching into fists, relaxing only to recreate the gesture. How did I get here again?

    I remember warm summer night intoxicated off feminine wiles and giggles. Felt too good to have a girlfriend, all eyes on us in the club, shopping, and borrowing clothes. She never spit either, in all my time insulated by hyper-masculinity, I never grown accustomed to the spitting. Five tracks into her mix cd and nothing but dope female artists and the fellas gripe at the third in a row. So I told her I loved, asked her to pull over to negotiate it's acceptance because it came with a price. I still hold onto some samurai, knights of the round table, by gone era code. My earliest memories are ride or die, blood in blood out, is you wit me or what, I've never left anyone behind, never broken a heart. I haven't the gradient lenses that allow me to see the shades of difference in familial love, romantic love, platonic love, it's all the same to me it just has to last. I offer no lover grander gestures than I offer friends, which could be why I don't maintain lovers, but later for that. Nigga raised and nigga trained, it'd surprise you to know how long it took me to get the dude out of my walk, but I never had a mother been looking for one in slumber parties, movies, & BFFs, someone to scratch my head when I am ailing. All goes well til they find out my dirt little secret, and drop me cold, completely and utterly heartbroken. I'm too grown for lying in bed all fucked in the head, which nobody understands if it wasn't your lover, I've gotten over as much as I can of my abandonment issues , and I'm not shooting for any records of how many I can handle.
     Before she can get too far into wondering what sort of crime I'm about to make her accessory to after the fact, with as serious a face my silly ass can muster, I don't speak uterine. No seriously all that estrogen filled shit is Klingon to me and what I do understand, is fire ant irritatingly bugnuts to me. So when you get to asking the ovarian questions you don't want answers to, when you want me to cosign on some delusional shit like dudes really the one, or you look better than her, but she's still the one he's screwing, you don't want to change anything about the situation you're complaining about, you like the problem because it affords the opportunity to vent, I really won't have the right answers. It seems crazy you won't believe but remember what I say for when the moment comes, you'll get mad, passive aggressive, I'll ask you what's the matter repeatedly you will repeatedly tell me nothing. You'll start throwing little slings & arrows cause you're hurt and you mistake my coolness for being cool, and you won't believe me when I tell how bad it stings. You won't believe me cause you'll be crying and I won't cause I don't. My eyes well up & don't spill listening to Otis Redding, Sam Cooke & some occasional gospel, country, or opera, other than that somebody pretty much has to die. Even after meeting my family and seeing how they act, you'll think I'm hiding my feelings or some Oprah nonsense and you won't get that when my poker face appears, I'm crying as hard as you in a more mascara friendly manner. I'll remind you just cause you can't see it don't mean it don't hurt, this will probably only piss you off more, like I'm mocking you, so you'll shoot out more venomous barbs, til one goes way too deep and you'll see a quick flash of a face I never meant for you. I'll revert back to poker face, quickly enough to make you feel safe enough to throw out something stupid like "what are you going to do hit me". I'll merely raise my eyebrows to let you know the thought had crossed my mind, and finally find my regular voice lost in a sea of me begging: let's talk about this, that's not fair, can you please stop using these exaggerations, are you sure I did all that, so it's all my fault, how was I supposed to know, you never said anything, how was I supposed to know, you didn't tell me, how was I supposed to know, you could've talked to me while all of this was building, now how could I have known that.
    Then I'll say something to the effect of we aren't getting anywhere we're just going back and forth give me some time to process and we can regroup, but this is just getting ugly. You'll keep going, I'll say please stop, ouch low blow, seriously that's how you feel, for real just knock it off for now, until you finally get far enough that I get this rush of words something like OHYOUGOTMEFUCKEDUPBITCHIFYOUTHINK and the worst shit I could think to say to you that'd probably have you suicidal cause I won every dozens, signifying, roasting battle. I'll remember my grandmother and what it feels like when she uses that sword of tongue and you wish she'd only have aimed truer and been done with you. I remember how words from ten, fifteen, twenty years ago can keep me up late, though I know I'm grown I can handle it now, and they just won't fall from my mouth. So I leave the room, for just a second, heavily consider fist to walls, then come back and announce this conversation is done. You'll probably start to say something else til I thunder, not very loudly, but you don't get to be completely stoic and tearless under emotional duress without developing a thunderously stern voice, NOT ANOTHER FUCKING WORD.
    I'll send some softer text messages, process what might have been right out of what you were saying,  and try to have the new and improved healthier version of that conversation, while battling all the thoughts of letting your low blowing, selfish, passive aggressive ass do you, way away from me. I'll come back all nice and malleable because of the Semper Fi never leave anyone behind nonsense I'm still holding onto. It won't matter it'll be too late because you saw the tip of the iceberg of the temper, you know that I definitely have unapologetically hit girls, and despite full knowledge that those circumstances were drastically different you won't care, it's mostly that shadows of whatever monsters that made you that have you so shook anyway. So you'll quietly slip out the door and make new BFFs because you're a girl and that's what you all do. I won't cause I don't understand mammary, so I'll be shopping alone, and getting pissed off and wannabe weepy, two years later every time I hear Destiny's Child singing Girl. 

      She said she loved me too, promised none of that would be an issue, it was all good, we continue driving, and yo is this mix cd all female, this might be heaven. That was then and now here I am sitting between snipey little barbs and if you don't know that you must not understand me at all. I feel fucking handcuffed by logic and reason. I can't feel my heart I don't know if it's beating slow or fast, there's just pain radiating in my just and I wish I could cry and tell her, I told you this would happen and you promised, YOU PROMISED. Temper's rising, stoic cold stonewashing over my face, what can I say to keep it down,what can i say to keep it down, what can I say to keep your love around me? She's going in about how I'm just like a nigga, I should just be a dude. I'm wondering what the fuck possible purpose this shit could serve but to hurt me or piss me off, and it kinda hits me. It's like a tap at first then it kinda slaps me upside the back of my head. Dawg I am a grown ass woman. I dance all night in stilettos, and no amount of alcohol prevents me from walking like the fiercest drag queens and supermodels, my makeup game would make you blush, and I can still run to the store unshowered with a messy ponytail in sweats and feel beautiful. I'm not pulling tomboy apologies and martying myself for slumber parties and secrets anymore, and i don't have to cry to prove I'm in pain. I'm done here. Almost as quickly as this wave of resolve washes in it ebbs away, what if she needs me, I've invested too much to let it go.

What can I say to keep it down, what can I say to keep your love around?
     Not a damn thing, no really not a damn thing. Time to move on.

Mute

     Now it's rare that I can crush on somebody that ain't sent eyes my way
I mean I like the guys that like me
But you got some poetry about you and moves like waves on cliffs
And I mean I swear I try hard to live without regret but when we got so evolved and respectable
that we have to do all this getting to know each other before you can put your hand on the small of my back
got me achin for a reset button
cause I already know I want to get to know you
so I don't see why this can't happen whilst I enjoy the view from beneath your shoulders
with deep enough kisses I can show you my past lives, shit that I don't even know
so whether I'm holding on to some antiquated notions of women shouldn't make the first moves
or maybe it's the instruction of my all male cousins who taught me to date like a chess game
I don't know
I think it's that when you step to me
It's my rare shot at feeling like a lady
and you could be my last night in Morocco
we could fall in love and have honeymoons and lifetimes
and part on good terms
maybe we'll make so much love my downstairs neighbor will get her groove back
in just thirty-six hours we could show the world how its meant to be
and I think we're smart enough to see past the past
we could admire and inspire each other, not try to control
we won't focus on being apart, missed calls and opportunities
we'll concentrate
like this is our only week in the DR and we gotta get it all in
I'm smilin so much at the mention of your name that I'm all in
just need you to speak

The Epic of the Most Extraordinary Writer Who Never Wrote

     If you would have had the most auspicious opportunity to read The Epic of the Most Extraordinary Writer Who Never Wrote then you would know, it defies review, critique, and any attempts at analysis. It's the piece that erases the line betwixt poetry and prose. Fool that I am, given to composing written word about as articulate as Chicago winters are cozy, I'm in no danger of becoming fool enough to offer my two cents on it. However, I just have to venture a tribute. Cue the back story.
   I met a muse with the most beautiful afro the south side has ever seen, she had one of those names that make the chorus of songs, or at least it should: Martine. She blogged, and I blogged, well I tried to blog, tried to try to blog? Don't judge me. We decided to build, I'll encourage you, you reciprocate, and what a pair of writers we'll make. Some time later and we made great friends, not so much great bloggers, but I'm still trying to try and she's still encouraging, she even makes me edit and shows no signs of irritation when I curse her for it. Being the sort of friend who values nurturing some sort of delusion she possesses about me having some talent, more than my comfort, she decided I needed a shot in the arm. Scene: Our two-woulda-coulda-shoulda-bloggers in an art gallery after a riveting panel discussion, one of the panel experts greets Martine.

M: Have you met my friend Amika? She's great!

(Panelist & Amika exchange pleasantries)

M: Something you have in common she's also a great writer!

(Quizzical expression washes over Amika's face)

A: thinks [Now why would she say that when she knows I do not write; I try to try, Panelist please don't ask me what I write]

M: Another interesting thing, this increeeedibly wonderful writer, doesn't write!

A: thinks [ Am I being Punk'd? I thought that show was over? She doesn't even like Ashton Kutcher! I did tell her I never get embarrassed is this some kind of social experiment? What is this strange sensation I feel ?]

P: Why don't you write?

A: I don't know, Martine why don't you rap?

M: laughs I have no talent for rapping, but you are a talented  writer, who relegates profound work to highly unedited infrequent Facebook notes, where only friends, not even friends of friends, can read them.

A: thinks [someone isn't going to have to worry about, as they are about to be unfriended, grrr]

P: So why don't you write?

A: thinks [ I've never minded personal questions, but daaaamn don't you want to know my cup size or how many people I've slept with? ok fine! I'll just lie!] I don't know I guess I'm a mother, of a lot of kids, I'm trying to organize communities, & come up with snarky, hood political analyses, the kids generate way too much laundry & never finish the dishes, I'm trying to make more loot, crack too many jokes, and fantasize about guys, and sitting down to write make me feel like I'm going to be sick. [that wasn't a lie stupid!]

P: Why don't you write about that?

A: Ok. Food smells good; who's hungry?! [Touche Martine! Tou-mutha-freakin-che!]
 End Scene

    The high point is I'm pretty sure I've now experienced embarrassment, and I deeply value friends who dish out such swift kicks to the rear, when needed. The low point is I have no idea what the panelist's name is due to said sensory discovery. So I march home like Miss Sophia goin' to tell off Miss Celie, to write. Leave me lone kids, Mama's got get her honor back! Thirty minutes later I'm queasy, staring at a blank screen, utterly flabbergasted at how hard it is to write the dopest piece ever. I don't even understand why I feel so sick?!  Embarrassment is not nearly as fun as I'd thought it'd be and who knows what tricks Martine will pull next. I have to write! I wonder if I get to the root of this sick feel, can I maybe pluck it out? Here goes, close your eyes: Cue the back, back story.

    Second grade, St. Patrick's Day, we have to write a two paragraph short story under what appears to be a coloring book image of a leprechaun. Everyone else's stories would've fit in a Care Bear movie and I wrote two pages about a leprechaun going all Scarface over his missing gold titled: Why the Chicago River Ran Red Not Green last St. Paddy's Day. At recess my teacher pulled me to the side, and with a perfect smile told me to lay off late night television, but I was a natural born writer! When I handed the evidence of my newfound literary genius to my mom, beaming with pride, she said I was disturbed and to knock it off. In the years to follow I'd be told by several teachers that I was profound, inspiration herself, and would soon rock the literary world. I was once referred to as the next Maya Angelou, by a classmate no less, but Moms never tired of telling me my writing made no sense and how morbid it was, and the necessity I maintained for mental healthcare. She wasn't impressed by my perfect grades either. Sophomore year I got a C on a creative writing assignment. Certain something was amiss, I checked my classmates work; A's as far as I could see. I confronted my teacher about her mistake, and she had the nerve to tell me they delivered their A game, I was a better writer & she was sure that was my C game. She kept the assignment to show to my mom, who decided this one was at least better than the others, and she didn't even care that I got a C, when I never got C's. Okay. Screw you writing, screw you grades, I am now all about being cool and class clowning. That is how I discovered I was also a natural born leader of the pack. I had a few best friends, at different intervals, who found themselves inspired by me enough to rock my style, my catchphrases, my jokes, and my music. Inevitably some hater would hiss in their ear that they were only a number two, and my flunkie. So my friends flew from me, with harsh criticisms.

    As it turns out, quitting writing has nothing to do with quitting being a hypersensitive ass artist, so the creative writing center of my brain became hardwired to senses of penetrating loss, frustration, wasted potential, and maternal disappointment. In addition to discovering my capacity for embarrassment, It appears I found the root of my blank page nausea, my aversion to being called an inspiration and likely why my first email address and the name of this blog coincide. So now I'm sure you've guessed gentle reader, you've no hope of ever reading The Epic of the Most Extraordinary Writer Who Never Wrote because it's stuck in the head of a woulda-coulda-shoulda-blogger, stuck staring at a blank page trying to try to write. Now if you're saddened or pissed off, well you should've believed my mother about my penchant for dark, twisted tales, but take heart gentle reader, remember Martine is clever, persistent, she don't play, I'm pretty sure she can kick my Mom's ass, and if you'll keep reading and commenting I'll keep trying.

Teaching the Kids to Fly

     I'm so over our American education system that I'm reading books on unschooling which, I thought was absolutely bug nuts a few years back. Here's why: a little sprout heads over to kindergarten, feeling good, because he's a little obsessed with all things celestial & he was told school is all about the knowledge. So even though we know kids learn better in groups, older siblings teach younger siblings to talk, read, and ride a bike faster than adults can, all the classmates will be the same age as Sprout. It's okay though, because Sprout's incredibly curious, and really wants to learn about the stars, rocketships, lightning and the moon, so he'll put up with a lot, even the really bad food, if that is indeed what it is. Then the teacher asks Sprout to learn colors and circling what is bigger or smaller, and other things that would he would have learned the same way he learned what a plane and a car was, and very little of it had anything to do with rocketships, space, stars, moons, and lightning.
    Entre first grade, Sprout declares, okay I can read a bit, I've got some basic math in me, I am ready to learn about rocketships, stars, space, moons, & lightning. Unfortunately, first he has to learn spelling, grammar, sequence, and other things he has no interest in, but would've likely learned organically anyway, and he does this sitting quietly at a desk for hours on end. He even learns how to tell time on an analog clock, which he's certain he'll have no use for. It's okay because Sprout is dedicated, and he caught a video on Youtube about the Milky Way, discovered what a satellite was, and zero gravity. These glimpses into what he wants to learn keep him curious enough to tolerate the drudgery until he can get to learning what he wants.
      By the time Sprout get to third grade, he's certain that this is the year he'll learn all about galaxies, dimensions, lightning, thunder, suns, and rocketships. When he arrives Sprout's asked to learn how to prove he can comprehend stupefyingly boring articles, and cursive. Cursive?! No one in my family ever writes in cursive, why can't I just learn to sign my name?! Seriously when can I learn about rocketships, space & lightning?! Then our poor Sprout is finally told the truth : late high school if you can get into a magnet program or college, and he thinks fuck this!
    I recently attended a workshop on youth organizing, I chose to, I wanted to learn more. There was pretty good food, no one griped at me for playing on my phone, or talking or passing notes, but it went on for four hours without breakout sessions, so I felt murderous rage rising in me. I'm pretty academic, I like learning about almost anything, I'm patient, I dig sitting, and even allowed distractions, I was still enraged by having to sit still and listen to predominantly one voice for four hours. So when I hear people wondering why so many youths are dropping out of school, I wonder why isn't it obvious. We the supposedly learned adults insist, on an archaic systems that don't work, we scrap resources, and remove the voice of the students & the community from school decisions, we making teaching such a shitty job, you'd have to be crazy in love with kids to do it, we scrap recess, music and art programs, force the students to wear uniforms and feed them what appears to be high fat, high calorie dog food.  Then we become fool enough to ask why the youth don't value this education that you'd have to be either nuttier than squirrel poo, or incredibly self-depricating to appreciate.
   Well I decided I'm paying for this so I took a hundred kids, many of their parents, and teachers, who were pissed about their neighborhood school closing down to the school board to talk about it. We never even got to Sprout's systemic problem, we focused on closing a school a community needed open. The board members, all business people, no educators, typed on their Blackberrys and smiled like it's so cute how you think we care. The city misses out on a lot of money when the kids aren't in school though, furthermore the state, so  suppose we go out and get our own schools. I'm not talking about charters, because we don't want to privatize education, because it becomes profit motivated and for every good charter you can name, three bad ones spring up. I'm also not talking about our stereotypical view of homeschooling, because socialization is pretty important, and I think parents don't make the best teachers owing to them usually being pretty annoyed when the kids don't already understand something. I am talking about renting spaces in churches, community centers, etc., mixing age groups and prioritizing what the students want to learn first, and what they are required to learn as a chore of learning what you want. I'm talking about using the internet and letting kids teach kids and having a teacher there to encourage and gently guide. I bet we could find grants to cover costs, and I bet that we'd get a lot more thirteen-year-olds creating new surgical techniques, and Sprout may discover a new star or some celestial technology. I also bet that the loss income from these students being in school, will make the city and state more willing to listen.  I know it may sound a bit utopian, or like a lot of work, and therefore a bit scary, but it's got to better than teaching our youth to be nuttier than squirrel poo, right?
    

 

Summer of 98'

I remember long, late night, caffeine-fueled, drives battling sunrise hard
bass vibration beatin my heart
we sang off-key but it sounded like drought rain
first kisses kept creepin in the corner of my mind
mischief kept creepin round the corners of our lips
La Luna smiled on our youthful iris sparkles
We ruled the night & drank it deep like the desert  lost
Metropolis gave up all her secrets...but only to us
late night cafes knew our names
not a single fight
not one single fight
The now me would've kissed you
for the taste
too bad I was too inhibited then
but regret is only for suckas
I probably never told you how much pain I was in
It became so manageable when you appeared
 but I'm sure you saw the bruises
probably caught me not sleeping, when we slept in piles
I never let you fade
only tucked you away for safe keeping
if you have any left
send me kisses on a warm breeze
I just need two more summers like that

Facing All Sides

So if you question the switch up, you may not have ever truly known me. Fluid Pisces, but water is water. Got new appreciation for my streets. Got new appreciation for my fam, for the ones whose blood pumps as much real as mine does, who will find me no matter how far I go, for makidada & sticking tight no matter, how hard they tried to keep us apart, for big cuzs who inspire so much daughter in me, especially the fave who occaisionally enlightens me to what it feels like to be babied. Lovin the hustle and the grind right now, & realized that this world don't revolve around art, and truth, & I'm lovin & hatin that too. In a strange mix of bedtime stories, hustlin hard, blocks, smoke, and libations, I can feel my mother & father, feel proud for who I am, & where I came from, not what I left behind. My dreams tell my old age is not likely in my cards, marriage, settling down, not for me, but it's still my life, for better & worse I love it for that. Lost some more who didn't die, felt the needed more space, the space of their world without me. To you all, that shit hurt, cut hard to know that I gave my best, & there wasn't a corner of your world for me, had to be disowned. Know also that the pain helped to teach me who I am, that my intelligence, and my vocabulary, is just a little part, & I never belonged in your world,& apparently you couldn't exist in mine. I asked to be loved or left the hell alone, you did, good look. I'm a woman without a country, fit in nowhere but easily accepted, more feared than loved, & I'll never know why, but I'm me, I'm me, I'm me, and das got me feelin like Celie, I'm here.

Walk With Me

Black Love

In Your Arms

Muah

Think of the Happiest Things, It's the Same as Having Wings

FAK!

Fairy

Scent

I Dream in Colour

Regal

Gumsmacking & Hair-Twirling

It's late, we're texting...probably, scratch that, almost definitely shouldn't be. I was caught a little off guard. The texting turns to talking, & the summer night air must have him completely drunk cause he's talking about what a great couple we'd make. I laughed throatily, and it isn't that easy to make me laugh. I would have to learn to submit, he cautions. I love it when guys do this, inform of the hard work & the change necessary to be with them, before I've decided I want to be with them. He reminds me it doesn't involve genuflecting, but I'd have to let him lead.

Truth be told if you find my buttons, I can be quite old skool & truth be told this is nothing new. My girlfriends calling it playing dumb, or letting him be the man, the matchmaker on Oprah, which my grandmother insisted I watch, called it the pickle jar effect. She said that women have been trained to have & get it all, & we must remember, although we can do it ourselves, to ask him to open the pickle jar for us. I call it hair-twirling & gumsmacking, reminiscent of the secretarial pool in the fifties. I say fuck that, you wanna lead, lead no one has to give you permission or make it easy for you to do so, just go, hard. You want to do things for someone you offer, "let me get that for you" I didn't invent the phrase it's commonly used. I'm just not a hair-twirler, perhaps that means I get to sleep in the middle of my bed as often as I like, maybe it means some nights I won't want to, it might keeps some red lines off my future-ex-husband-list,I might continue to have 99 problems but a bitch won't be one, but it definitely won't get me stuck dimming so someone else can shine, & it definitely won't keep me from looking myself in the eye.

Through the Fire

Didn't go with my gut on some passiveness
didn't have time to scream, doubt I would've
smokey grey, went for a second to bright azure
the color of every hard head/eye injury I've ever had
swallowed all too quickly by black
loud bang followed by deafening silence
...Am I? .....Am I?
no need to look for the ancestor's embrace
I knew instinctively this is not how I die
blind and in pain
heartbeat choking me
summon strength don't ask for it,
face screwed in concentration, either went unnoticed or or mistaken
cause cous had to stop at the liquor store on the way to the ER
made it home unable to see or dress myself
waited for maman to speak
knew there was a lesson in this
she remained silent, but then there came enough words
"you're too independent, too superhuman,
no one ever knows you need help, let alone how to help you"
"I got you, I'll hold you down" promises unfulfilled
even got snapped on a couple times
then came the unexpected waves of righteous anger
permission granted for me to be hurt and angry too
wasn't acrid, nooo, just acright
and this time last year I was barely here
hovering above seeing 360, past present, and future converged
so self-aware I was frightened
when I realized I was alone, or at least so I thought
I got too scared and clung back to earth
roamed this year warrior no more
would be baby, would be dominated, and done wrong
for compliments, laughter, songs and poems in my ear
they came little anyway
and the princess gently prodded: remember who you are love
now I do
maman forgive me
I now embrace the weight of my birthright
I'm atrophied but will ask for no more strength
for I am certain now you ask no more of me than I can bear
to those who needed their space
I ask no more of what you are unwilling to give
I will let the skies cry for me when I cannot
I know now there is no greater loneliness
than rejection of self