Dear Uraeus #19

All ways loving you.

Mom

freestyle poem on creating spaces for today

finding balance between
words for my journal and words for the world
why the balance
why not all words for the world
protecting myself
from myself
from my anger
from rage

against you
not all of you
but you
you know who you are
the psychopath reading this right now
living more lives / lies than you can keep up

you

finding space today for loving myself
finding space for art
thank You Mother/Father God that there is always space for art
thank You that there is always space for Spirit
thank You for mornings like this
waking up to Your whisper in my ear
its all going to be fine
everythings all right
feel all of it
write about it all

I hear you Mother

the dance of quiet space

there are women in my head
bold church hat wearing soldiers
connected to Source
and all Her creations
connected by promise

women who are clear
that beauty is more than looking good
deeper than smelling like roses and jasmine
more tedious than press n curls and pedicures

these women
these earth warriors
make life look easy
these seeing women
with word from the Lord
these big boned women
bumped from the pulpit
excused from his counsels
made small in the gospel

these big footed women
more dangerous than their fears
using their voices
as weapon as sheild as balm

these straight talkin' women
chocolate of every hue
change the tapes in my head
when i replay the sore spots of my past
longer than the lesson

they lead me, these humming women
to new language
new perspective
other stories

they dress me in their reds, their blues
sing me in their arethas
their big mama thortons
their Jesus keep me near Thy cross
scarves from their grandmothers
prayers from their closets

i am ready

i hear these women of God
whispering in my blood flow
see them translucent on the streets
behind the babies
comforting the homeless
between their breasts

i dance with them
when i am weak
they stand my legs
stregthen my tongue
still my spirit
quicken my gait
steady my breath
remind me
to listen

Quotes from Rev. Dr. Renita Weems

1. I never wanted to be a small living, small loving, small thinking woman.
2. Religion has a way of making you small.
3. Religion becomes our way to escape the world, not engage the world.
4. I chose the route to be unconventional and ask unconventional questions.
5. Your preaching will only be as strong as your life.

The please God bargain (short story by Jaha Zainabu)

The trip to Ocho Rios was business and had been planned for three months. I didn't say anything to Gina until a month ago because she always gets so nervous when I leave her for more than a day. Gina is my older sister by two years and even when we were little girls I always had to take care of her in some way or another.

Daddy died and we didn't have much family so we stayed with Uncle Bennie until I went away to college. What I do that for? She told me that if I left and went all the way to Louisiana it would kill her. I left and stayed gone for a year and it didn't kill her, but it got bad. Nobody could control Gina. The sex, drugs, drinking. But mostly it was the drugs. I went to meetings with her, saved up and put her in rehab and did everything I could to support her. Secretly though, I was angry that her problems have always controlled my life. Angry at God, my dad for dying, Uncle Bennie, myself. Angry at everyone. For the last five years though, it's been ok. Well, predictable. She's even been attending meetings by herself. But when I leave for more than a day, we all get nervous.

We talked about it last week and she said she would be ok. Four nights ago though, the night before I left, she called me at work and asked me to go to a meeting with her. I had to work and couldn't go. She didn't come home till eleven and I could tell she had been crying, but she wasn't high.

The next morning she was standing above my bed, then started jumping and screaming and telling me that if I really loved her I would stay.

I snapped! I got up in her face and screamed on her like I aint never before. Then left. What I do that for?

God, let her be ok. Please let her be ok. I promise I'll go to meetings with her every day. I haven't heard from her since I left. I keep calling, but nothing. Uncle Bennie hasn't seen her, nobody we know has. Whatever You need me to do, God, I'll do. Just let her be ok. I'm on my way back home now and sitting in this airport is driving me crazy. God, please.

Take us back

it was the moaning mostly
the whispered gutteral base
escaped pursed lips and sunday pink lipstick
that groan from underneath belly
granted go ahead to
say it sistah!
preach pastah!

hallelujah shouts from peppermint breath
knocked cracked leather black pumps
holding swollen ankles on wooden floors
with tight fist grabbing air
closed eyes and tears falling slow

bread of heaven, bread of heaven
feed me till i want no more

i remember you, grandmama
we honor you, auntie

negro women not hooked on simple words
like fair, justice, right
negro women who could out walk a lie on broken toes
courageous women who got a prayer through breathing a breath
deeper than the last

we came from these women
spread noses, wide feet
carry the world shoulders like theirs
lest we forget and think we carried ourselves

those are our mothers
with backwoods grammar and perfect memory
we have come into new names
they called themselves negro

we need you now, grandmama
our fine homes are poison
without your wrinkled fingers
folded over breakfast prayer

there was something about
your Jesus, your John Kennedy, your Martin King
glued to dusty wood mantle
over stale candy and crystal glass bowl

your God who had the whole world in His hands in His hands
was too big to argue love, death, resurrection

big mama, we call on you now
forgive us please our education
our money
our everything we think we know
too good for your pork chop, your hymn book, your hot comb

put your feet in our laps, great warrior
let us massage your boiled blood
and blistered backs
we are listening, queen
all the time we heard your songs
but not really

let witch hazel leak between your fingers
rub our temples
sing your songs again
we are wiser now
those spirituals we ignored
sing them to us again
see mother? see?
our arms are not smooth like before
we have our own battle wounds now
we can hear you now
sing with you now

take us back
take us back
fo we can be baptized
again

You 4

I am tired of protecting men who use the church as their playground. For money, for women, for power, for fame. I am tired. I am angry. And I get to be. I am tired of being nice. Nice is NOT woman's work. I am tired of watching women believe men like you. I am disgusted that I did. Sex addiction is sex addiction. The desire and the unwillingness to control it does not end because you spend time in South Africa. Do you know the AIDS stats?

It bothers me that you stand in the pulpit and tell your jokes and then juggle more women than God only knows. And God does know. But what about us? AAAAAlllll of the women you juggled and lied to. Lied about. Paraded in front of the others as "friends."

I am confused, even about this post. What it will do to you, your reputation, your feelings, me? And why? Why do we do that? Protect the feelings of our abusers. It is abuse by the way. To leave my bed and get into hers, and then hers. It is abuse by the way. To run your business in the name of God. To collect money in His name.

I go back and forth about whether or not this is right. Putting it out this way. You know, "vengeance is mine saith the Lord." But this is not vengeance dear. This is love. Vengeance would have been me slashing your tires (like I wanted to), busting your windows, denting your fancy rims. But I restrained. I am older than that. When I pray for the hungry to be fed and then walk by a hungry person and don't feed him the sandwich in my bag, what was my prayer for? To pass the buck? When I pray for justice and then say nothing about allll of the women you are having sex with and letting them believe that they are the only ones and climbing out of their beds and into another pulpit, then what are my prayers for? I am being kind in this post. You know I am. We were fooled. We ignored the scratch behind our ear that was only Mother Spirit telling us to "let this one pass." We stayed.

Remember when you told me your ex was crazy? Crazy because she sent me a message warning me about you. I didn't listen. I didn't want to. I wanted to believe she was crazy too. So when I called to give your new one a similar message, is that who I was? Your new crazy? My prayers for her. For you too.

There is no way you will be able to keep up this kind of life. No matter how long it has been. This post doesn't even scratch the surface of what I know. And I do. I know.

My prayers for all of the ones who know about you and watched me love you and said nothing. My prayers for all of the women believing you. For all of the congregations spending their money on you. My prayers for you. My prayers for me.

Jaha Zainabu

You 3

"musta thought I was gonna go out like a chump. Like a sucka or somethin'." Pharcyde

You 2 (w.b.)

there are easier friends to have than i
i suppose
more comfortable women to be around
i guess
there is always a younger booty
flatter stomach
more money
better job out there
i reckon

but hearts like mine come few
i know

i will not take on your load
of fear and blame
i will find the freedom i need
to make peace with whats so right now

there is too much talk about
what i dont have
wont do
the economy
who will be president next

scarcity is a big lie you know
and so i will let you
and the others in your ear
live it by yourselves

i was tired anyway
of juggling ponies
and swallowing fireswords
only to your side eyeing and teetering of your hand
to suggest my missing the mark again

it would be too uncomplicated
for me to play your victim now
i am older than that
i am bigger than you

i was broken when we met
running from some yesterday
and needed a soft place to land
for a time i thought you were that place

and you pretended to be

but the wind from all that running
left me deaf
to red flags waving
and sirens shreeking

i told Spirit i was grown
and i saw what i wanted to see
and She let me

and you did too

so here i am
declaring myself
the source of my own problem
not just you
the yesterdays i ran from
before

you see, i am every liar
cheater, abuser, thief
who has ever sat at my table
drank water from my cup
kissed me between my thighs
how else could you enter my space
except some lesson for me to learn
about life
about love
about the possibility of me
and so i delete myself
from my molecular structure
and when i forget
the delete button
will be there again

You (w.b.)

I read a quote once that said "how you do anything is how you do everything." That would explain it I guess. How you could misrepresent yourself to me and also do it to the churches you work for. Wow. They should know though. Don't you think? About who you really are.

the flow

having a great and productive day today. doing work on RED STORIES, my new one woman show. looking forward to it. look out for more info.

who's in a word

she can't say nigger
you can say fag
he's a racist
you called him a beaner
they lazy
you livin' off a trust fund
she nappyheaded
you got a perm
she a blackie
you got a tan
they gointa hell
you burned the crosses
she told you she was hungry
there are your leftovers
he been married ten years to the same white woman
you cheatin' on three sistas now
and i'm the bitch?