The Weapon That Is Us.
Between the Veils. Words, As Fruit #36
I have been feeling, the feeling of being between the veils for a few years now. The veils being that of life, and death.
This isn’t the first time I’ve experienced this feeling but each time it comes, its return adjusts me differently. The last time I felt attuned in this way was in 2017 after my Father passed. A few mornings ago, while speaking with the Mother of a friend, who just lost his father in November of last year, I shared that my Father has never been more present, and close, than he is now, now that he is no longer earthbound, now that his presence is no longer harnessed by the limitations of a physical body. Because his presence is unharnessed, so to is our relationship.
The first time I can recall experiencing this place between the veils was sometime in 2011 or 2012. My Grandpapa, my Mother’s Father, who passed in 2004, came to visit me in a dream. He came one early morning knocking on my apartment door at St. Johns Place in Crownheights, Brooklyn. Upon seeing him through the peep-hole, I stood staring at him through a barely cracked door, looking in disbelief, grief and awe, barely registering the words he was speaking. He was asking me to let him in so that we could talk about his leaving. I woke from that dream in hysterical tears. Angry with him for leaving (for passing), but more angry with myself for not allowing him in. My heart wanted to let the apartment door fly open, while I simultaneously flew into his arms, but I, through torrents of tears, stood and yelled at him, begging of him to tell me how, and why he could play such a trick on us.
How could he be gone, have died, and yet still be here?
If you aren’t someone who believes in alternate planes of existence, and esotericism, this might sound (read) strange. Insane even. But time/life/“reality” is strange. And what is happening, day in, and out, in the world right now is anything but sane.
This feeling of being between the veils, wakes me up at odd hours, usually between 3 and 5AM. Frequently, the waking comes via a voice heard in the depths of sleep, or a stirring presence felt in the room with me. While it is sometimes startling, I have never been fearful, but the feeling does always call me to attention.
Wednesday morning, April 17th, this feeling woke me sometime around 5AM, and I started writing. The day after, when I first began setting these words down, I wasn’t completely sure if me waking up, and writing, was a dream or reality. While I could remember writing, I couldn’t place where I’d written. After some searching and sifting through notes in my phone, and notes written in my notebooks and journal, I found the 5AM words on my computer. Those words, are weaved within what you are now reading here.
Deep contemplations, and tender considerations, are vital and necessary for the processing of these times.
A few weekends ago, I had the opportunity to spend some quality time with Judy (my Mother). Conversations with my Mother are rarely, if ever, surface level. She is not the type to spend too much time in the shallow end, of anything. Our series of conversations pushed me to deeply contemplate and consider my voice and role during these present times, these times of history repeating itself as we witness, in real time, and watch in “4K”, the unfolding of multiple genocides. These times of listening, and reading, as people justify the annihilation of entire populations, nations, families, and bloodlines. These times of listening, and reading, as both men, and women alike, reach to rationalize, defend and excuse the emotional, mental, and physical harm and abuse inflicted upon women behind closed doors and with doors wide open, for all to see.
These times where even as the truth stands in full view, we choose to declare the truth a lie.
These times of supreme denial, wherein we have taken up the belief that covering our ears and shutting our eyes will keep a world, already on fire, from continuing to be engulfed in flames.
Deep contemplations and tender considerations are vital, and necessary for the processing of these times. Deep contemplations and considerations, and the desire to share, in the event there is some value to be gleaned for others, beyond myself, is one of the reasons ‘Words, As Fruit’ came into being. These contemplations and considerations, along with the deliberate, and consistent reading of mental pourings from other writers, past and present — Hala Alyan, Fariha Róisín, Zeba Blay, Nadia Meli, Neema Githre Siphone, Priya Florence, Safia Elhillo — challenge, compel and push me to get, and remain clear on what role, place and responsibilities I am willing and able to hold.
To remain unclear of my position, intention(s) and role within the present resistance is likely to result in burn out, confusion, exhaustion and a state of hopelessness I may not be able to come back from. Hopelessness I am not willing to chance, and my hopefulness, along with my heart, are, right now, the strongest and most resilient facets of me, keeping me going.
I desire to be a part of these moving and growing pieces (and peaces) of revelation, revolution, and liberation, for the long run — for as long as my running legs are able, and needed. I want my already resilient heart, and relentless hopefulness, to flourish. This will be achieved through heart-full and tender consideration, and, sometimes brazen, clarification.
Illuminate. Communicate. Imagine. Invite.
I thought it an opportune time to use this space to reaffirm and declare, publicly, my positions and intentions.
I exist, always, within the intersections of multiplicity. I have been gifted the ability to cover across multiple Callings and Roles for Collective Liberation,. This ability is made possible through the work of feeling, and the craft of writing.
Through feeling, writing, and the sharing and archiving of other writers, my hope is to:
Illuminate and challenge us, myself included, to consider and think beyond taught limited views, beliefs, thoughts and perceptions;
Communicate and share truths, and varying perspectives that will compel and aid us in pushing toward more progressive and collectively fruitful thought and action;
Imagine and re-envision a world that coming generations can truly live freely within, thrive, and not just survive in;
Invite us to contemplate, and consider, the harmonies, and disharmonies, alignment, and incongruence, between what we say we value and what our intentions, choices, actions and decisions reveal about our true values and systems of belief.
“Intention never outweighs impact”.
If I’m being honest, I can say that I didn’t think I fully knew, or expected, that this would be the kind fruit bared here. This fruit that is a cross between bitter and sweet, and sour and supple, ripe and tender. And, it has taken me an entire month to decide to share this here because I questioned whether or not this was ‘too deep’ and/or ‘too much’ but, per Judy, “Can anything heavy ever be light?”
Judy says, “Intention never outweighs impact”.
My question for myself and others is: What is the impact of our intentions — our thoughts, mindset, beliefs, choices, actions and decisions?
My intention is to allow “Words, As Fruit” to continue to be a fruitful resting place for our eyes, ears, and heart’s mind. But within this rest there will also be stirrings, reckonings and wrestlings. I will continue to tell journey stories, mine, and ours, write out my thoughts, reflections, and healings. And I will continue to challenge us to think beyond ourselves, feel into our depths, and see, and consider, beyond the limits of our own lines of sight.
The impact is that I become an embodiment of all that I have intentioned. That I walk it, like I talk it.
There are these words from Nina Simone that I have been coming back to,
“What kept me sane was knowing that things would change, and it was a question of keeping myself together until they did.”
Knowing that transformation, both of myself and all that is around me, is necessary and possible, whether by natural occurrence, force, the force that is Love, or by sacrifice, is what keeps me sane, keeps me hopeful, demanding, believing, and trying.
I am willing to Love, and to sacrifice in order to let the lesser go so the greater can thrive.1 And, I am willing to expand my heart, and open my eyes so that I may be able to discern between the two — what is lesser, and what is greater, within me, and beyond me.
“You write in order to change the world, knowing perfectly well that you probably can't, but also knowing that literature is indispensable to the world. The world changes according to the way people see it, and if you alter, even but a millimeter the way people look at reality, then you can change it.”
— James Baldwin
BOSS The Movement: Discipline “Letting the lesser things die so that greater can live.”
Thank you for making space for contemplation. I’m so excited to be here.
This is convicting, yet enlightening. Subtle, yet ever so stirring. Thank you for sharing this. Saving so I can come back and sit with it a while longer, dive into some reflections of my own.