I look at this one as I scramble eggs for my daughter. A whisper, tossing it around my mouth: a “q” soccer ball. Tongue to the hard palate. Sacred unknowing, may I be a conduit of living and loving.
I scrawled it after listening to Krista Tippett’s TED Talk. “…live the questions,” she said, as I blinked at the coupling of familiar voice and unknown face. “This one is a gift from the poet Rainer Maria Rilke, who became a friend across time and space to me in years I spent as a very young journalist in divided Cold War Berlin. In the early 20th century, Rilke wrote a wonderful series of letters to a young poet in which he counselled, "Be patient with all that is unresolved in your heart." He said, "Try to love the questions themselves as though they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language." He said, "Don't try to reach for the answers which could not be given to you now because you would not be able to live them." The point is to live everything. Live the questions now, then, perhaps someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answers.”
This is from Saul Williams’ liner notes for D’Angelo’s Voodoo. The first time I read it, I re-read, re-read it, re-read, threw it in the air, waited to see where it landed. “Thou ART God.” A reminder for when the “why” gets foggy. “What are the rewards of those who tend to their God-given talents as they would have the Creator tend to their spirits and daily lives?” Williams’ writes. “Nowadays, I find my peers more inspired by an artist’s business tactics than their artistry. In fact, we do not seem to mind an artistry that suffers in the face of seemingly good business. More artists seem to yearn to own their own labels, etc., than they seem to yearn to master their crafts. No, we cannot allow any more Bessie Smiths to occur, but once an artist owns their own publishing the question then becomes, what are you going to publish? Of course, I am using the word “artist” loosely. I, personally, believe in an art as it exists in the context of the phrase “thou art God…” A reminder for when the “why” rides a dinghy on a stormy, purple sea. May I be a buoy of curiosity.
I’ve got post-it notes on my fridge, on the inside of the medicine cabinet, in my wallet. I haven’t always been one to be so overt in my searching. In fact, a previous version of myself might’ve smirked at Post-its freckled on walls. They started when I was in early recovery from a bike accident. First, a note by my bed, where I spent many reeling, queasy hours. Then, a note on the wall of the hallway, outside the bathroom, just above the light switch. Flowers springing up, saying, “You are healing. You are love.”
I knew when I encountered performance and visual artist Pope L. that “enter the ignorance” was the clarion call for the performance project I’m making that seems bigger than what I’m capable of. I don’t know if I have the guts, gall or words for what I’m making. Ignorance, show me the way. “What does it mean to be an artist (in America) today?” Pope L. laughs, “I think it’s to enter the difficulty of the questions of our time, and to enter these questions - these problematics - and to commit yourself to the difficulty. And one of the primary commitments when you enter these questions is not knowing what your entering into the question is going to bare for you. So you have to go in with ignorance.”
It’s clear when a note needs to go. I can feel the potency shift in my body, or I look at it and cock my head, wondering how or why I wrote that thing down. It’s done it’s good work and can move on to the recycling bin or to the inside cover of a notebook. Some stick around for months.
Thank you, Asha Frost, for the most recent affirmation that greets my morning reflection, and bids me sweet dreams.
February’s five things
Reading: Audre Lorde’s The Uses of the Erotic: the Erotic as Power (for the twentieth time).
Attending: From Turtle Island to Palestine: A Theatre Action on March 18th, at 7:30 p.m. at Theatre Passe Muraille. A curated night of Palestinian/Indigenous solidarity through performances, readings, and music raising funds and awareness for the iconic Freedom Theatre from Jenin Refugee Camp.
Sharing: I’m excited to facilitate two workshops in March: Arise, a day-long, in-person 5Rhythms and Writing Workshop on Saturday March 9th that I am co-facilitating with my sister Layah; and Let’s Write: Spring Equinox on Sunday, March 17th, 1 - 3 p.m. EST on Zoom. Both have scholarships spots available if finances are a barrier.
Listening: to Mk.gee’s new album.
Learning: What are the Impacts of Concern about Climate Change on the Emotional Dimensions of Parents’ Mental Health? A Literature Review
by Elizabeth Bechard, Jennifer Silverstein and Jennifer Walke.
Thank you for reading, and for being here. If you enjoy five things, drop a heart or comment, or share it with a post-it loving pal! Your texts, emails and messages bring my little dinghy back to shore. Your support really makes a difference. 🥰
Once again, you bring forward the humble post-it, the mundane, and raise the vehicle for remembering to its' rightful, sacred place. You highlight the significance of the question versus the answer, which is a turn-around right for the times, and I think of Donna Haraway's words in Staying With the Trouble: "staying withe the trouble does not require such a relationship to times called the future. In fact, staying with the trouble requires learning to be truly present, not as a vanishing pivot between awful or edenic pasts and apocalyptic or salvic futures, but as mortal critters entwined in myriad unfinished configurations of places, times, matters, meanings." "Unfinished configurations...". Post-it power. Long may you run, Sash.
Thank you for reading with such attentiveness and heart. We can “stay with the trouble” together. ❤️