infinity of limbs

denim and brown

i sit on your shoulders

you clasp my hands in yours

denim and brown

an open field of spring

you clasp my hands in yours

as if for warmth

an open field of spring

trees branch

as if for warmth

reach for the sun between clouds

trees branch

and come together at the root

reach for the sun on cloudy days

while intertwining underground

our hands together at your chin

infinite loops of legs and arms

tangled like life loves life itself

i sit on your shoulders

In her poem “Father Son and Holy Ghost” Audre Lorde writes about why she has not yet gone to her father’s grave. In the poem, published in her first collection “The First Cities” she mourns and remembers her father, but most of all she reveals her fear of how death has made him “changeless.” It is that changelessness that terrifies her. She finds it incompatible with her own existence.

One of the blessings of these four years of grief since my father’s death is that in fact our relationship continues to grow and change daily. A transformation I attend to and observe closely through a number of practices and through the hundreds of poems I have written about, for, to and with my father in the intervening time. Time is not as much of an intervention as I thought it was in the infinity of love. While with every new accomplishment I feel the longing for his witness, the sound of his voice in celebration, the hug, the words of pride and affirmation, I am grateful for the undeniable presence of his energy with me and in the world through those same moments. This poem, the first of a series based on photos of me and my father together, mostly taken by my mother Pauline McKenzie is part of my acknowledgement that I am participating in the elevation of his spirit daily and that he has always and still now make my elevation possible in this world and beyond. Thank you. I love you.

P.S. My every day writing practice shapes my days into vessels for generations of love. If you want support with your own daily creative practice, I’d love to be part of your journey. This is the Stardust and Salt Daily Creative Practice Intensive.

Photo by Sed Miles

areito[1] for audre lorde

“I am going to write fire until it comes out of my ears, my eyes, my noseholes--everywhere. Until it's every breath I breathe. I'm going to go out like a fucking meteor!” -Audre Lorde

you take

my hands

in your hands

spin me around

the universe

round one

the world is full of stars

round two

i realize the stars

are coming out

our eyes ears noses

mouths

*

there is a cord

sometimes

you call it language

sometimes

you call it gut

you string

your shells

and stones

through it

necklaced

by salt

*

a meteor

is a world

on fire

a star

out of place

light rushing

through

the medium

of your face

[1] The name of a Taino dance of healing that continues in Cuban spiritismo communities to this day as the Cordon.  It is a dance comprised by a group of people holding hands.  The healing blessing component of the dance ceremony seeks to harness the cosmic power of the meteor and the storm, spinning participants in a circle counter-clockwise.

This is also your annual reminder that in 1985 Audre Lorde wrote “I’m going to go out like a f**king meteor” in her journal in response to a liver cancer diagnosis. Her doctors gave her 6 months. Instead she died on this day. In 1992. At the peak of the Leonids meteor shower.

Today I woke up at 2am to start Audre Lorde’s ascension day with sacred observation of the Leonids meteor shower on Saponi lands tended by enslaved African geniuses. Thank you Audre Lorde for your blessed example. This salt-water writing feels like fire coming through. It is that cleansing. Today is the birthdate of my 5th book, Undrowned: Black Feminist Lessons from Marine Mammals. This love. Yes. It does rush through every pore. It is every blessed breath.

https://www.akpress.org/undrowned.html

#pubday #praisethelorde

photo by adrienne maree brown

Yesterday while I was still reeling from the fact that George Floyd, yet another loved one , has been taken by an act of police cruelty, my soul brother Eric Darnell Pritchard began sharing this poem as a resource. I wrote this poem in 2014 and first shared it at the BOLD national gathering as part of a Black Feminist Breathing activity to center us and bring us back to our breathing in the aftermath of our collective witnessing of a police officer choking Eric Garner to death while he cried out for help. I don’t want us to need this ceremony anymore, but we still do. This is a poem to bring you back to your breathing, to remind us all of the sacredness of breathing. I recommend listening to the audio version and breathing along at the stanza breaks. Your breathing is sacred. Our breathing is sacred. I love you.

Alexis Pauline Gumbs · C(h)ant. Breathe.: Returning to Breath for Eric Garner and Many More

Dedicated to Eric Garner

And to Margaret Garner’s Daughter

*take a deep breath everywhere you see a star

i.

*

return to the place

where you learned

how to breathe

*

where night washed itself

into your dreams

*

return

to the place

where you learned

*

breathing was bigger

than you

or your fears of

dogs bats and sea creatures

*

and would continue

all night long

without you trying

to keep it going

*

human freedom is like that

unstoppable

as the ocean at night

sometimes the crashing is just louder

like right now

*

ii.

*

we are feeling it in our chests

right now

the underwater knowing

of upside down justice

that has to right itself

that hasn’t righted itself

*

the sinking feeling

that the chokehold of the state

is more persistent than the ocean

*

it is not

*

iii.

*

if I could

I would bring all our people

right next to the ocean

to just sit

and breathe with the ancestors

*

just listen

knowing all this sand

was bone

and the stars

are just us

reflected

across the black history

of the universe

*

iv.

*

i want every last breath

to be a tide going out

so we can imagine

some baby somewhere

gasping into time

with an unbroken custody

of air

*

i don’t want the choking struggle

the staccato of bullets

shattering the song

of what we know

*

but sometimes

even as the ocean

slaps the sand

it sounds shocked to me

shoreline shaping impact

this is happening

again

*

v.

*

I imagine

Eric Garner

becoming the ocean

like Margaret Garner’s baby

awakening stream

how all blood flows back

to the salt in this water

how something

unstoppable

screams

*

*

Learn more about Black Feminist Breathing.

listen

with salt and fresh renewal

in the miracle of time

the same world

to be sung

the open mouth

my hands your hands

mother god

the source of poems

and look to the sky

coral bone

give me a way

rustic ceremony

study of brown

and remind you

the red line

and remind you

skin your teeth

and remind you

the difference between

a yawn and a smile

the tenacity of sand

the love within

the crown of your hands

(I am closing this series with a poem comprised of the titles of all the poems that came before. In a heroic crown of sonnets, the last poem is made up from the first/last lines of the 14 poems that precede it. But I wrote 21 poems and though some of them were sonnets, most of them were pantoums and a couple were neither. And 8 is my divine number. So I have a poem here of eight stanzas here embracing all of what I found. It is time for me to move on to another part of my archive, another ceremony. But I am so grateful for this experience which I ultimately dedicate to my parents. It has been a blessing to return to this day that was truly a community blessing of, for and by them. This visual document of the people who gathered with them to say YES we will be part of the sacred life of this child was a rite of passage for them as much as it was for me. Their youth, their watchfulness, their open mouths. Their love for me and all the love they called into my life that day and every day after. I am so grateful. And renewed. May you and all who love you live forever in the light of love.)

maybe they are laughing

i turn my head

in the crown of my grandfather’s hand

the cradle of my godmother’s arm

i turn my head

attune my ears

antennae of my godmother’s arm

bends around me

attune my ears

that i might hear

time bend around me

toward another breath

that i might hear

the voice of angels

breathing eternity

never let me go

oh voice of angels

maybe they are laughing

please never release me

from the crown of your hands

(I have been working with this photo album for a while. I wrote over 35 pantoums. I wrote my first heroic crown of sonnets. I returned for the blessings of this day over and over for more than two months as a daily practice. What became visible to me was my longing, some of my old stories, some new revelations and most of all love. This album documents the day of my christening ceremony and I have been sharing and revising it during the corona virus crisis. But this place where my grandfather’s hand touches my head is the true blessing, the real crown. This poem is an acknowledgement and a prayer of what it is to be held and held well, blessed and blessed beyond. Infinite gratitude, infinite love, reclaim your crown.)

do you see the red line in the trees

the hint of falling

do you hear a future calling

when you watch me sleep

the hint of falling

into place

when you watch me sleep

you wonder what of this is dream

get in place

take the picture

you wonder what of this is dream

and what is memory

take the picture

come arrange yourselves

you memorized

what sisters do

come arrange yourselves

to hear the future calling

do what sisters do

you, see?

the red line

in the trees

(This is another poem for my mama and her sister-friends from college. The first photo is the one in the photo album my mother gave me full of photos at the celebration after my christening. It is clearly a few moments before the second photo, which my Auntie Veronica —pictured here with the beautiful cornrows— sent to me recently. Everyone is in formation and smiling in the second photo, the intended result. But I am grateful to also have the first photo, a vision of Black women, chosen sisters, in the process of arranging themselves in relationship to each other. As Audre Lorde teaches us, it may be natural for Black women to love their sisters, other Black women, but in a society that teaches hatred of everything dark and feminine it is also a practice, an intention, a labor-of-love improvisation. Or as Toni Cade Bambara teaches us, via Aishah Shahidah Simmons “sister is a verb.” Yes, something to be studied and celebrated, never to be taken for granted. These sisters are still holding each other, even though two have taken to the sky. I have been observing this miracle whole life and am still internalizing the choreography, improvising across distance and death. The poem questions what is the background and what is the foreground, what is the memory and what is the dream. Most of all I am grateful to be held in the divine light of sistering past, present and future. So this poem is also for you, studying now how to relate, not by default but through intention. What is in the background, what is in the foreground for you now?)

as if i could stand in your arms

white dress longer than my legs will be

marrying me to god

my arm becomes a part of your arm

long white dress of Christian naming

you look at me

my reach becomes a part of your armament

i look somewhere beyond you

you look at me

as if i might tell you something

i look somewhere beyond

as if i hear a voice

and i might tell you something

about miracles and time

another voice will speak to you

through me

in the miracle of time

i will stand one day even taller

through you

through me

through us

you meet again the infinite

(This poem is for my dear Aunt Carol, the epicenter of joy in our family. Aunt Carol fills our lives with laughter and care. It is impossible to spend more than a moment in her presence and not know what it is to be profoundly loved. Aunt Carol you have taught me what it means to live with an abundant heart, and that home is something we make by sharing love. There is a brilliance to that rivaling the brilliance you brought to your career that has shaped our family for the better. In fact before I had the language for it, you were my touchstone. Looking back I see many friendships and mentorships that I nurtured in my life because intuitively I saw an aspect of you, felt an aspect of what I feel when I am with you: safe, seen, held, loved, happy. And this picture may have been one of the first times that I got to internalize that knowing. This poem comes not exactly from that knowing, but from a question that I see in this picture, a wonder. For me this picture, after a traditional christening ceremony, approaches the infinite. There is something beyond what we see here. And it is that beyond that I offer you today Aunt Carol as you engage the mysteries of this phase of your life in a new community, after retirement, with new generations and meanings of family to bless. I want you to know how your love has become my theology, a generous approach to infinity as we find it in each other. I love you always Aunt Carol. And for everyone who is contemplating the beyond, beyond this moment, beyond even life itself, may you remember what you know of love, and who taught you.)

listen uncle

the plant

above your head

knows you better

than your hair do

and though i am small

in your hands

your hands know

each other

better than your mouth

knows what

to say

and mama

the gold you wear

is delicate

and light

it cannot break you

you will break

through it

and

i love you beyond the strength of your hands

i love you more than the glint of your rings

i love you beyond what i can see in blurry daylight

i love you more than anything

and i remember

(I love that in this picture I look like I am making a considered response to something my Uncle Duane is saying. What would that be? The poem imagines it. Ultimately everything becomes I love you. And I am still held in the loose prayer of my uncle’s hands and my mama’s hands in this photo. May we consider our words at this time. May they all be words of love. May we remember that we are all babies, new to this moment without the language to truly hold it. May we remember what this baby knew, we can’t live without each other. Love to each of you and all of us. )

from Boda who survived the middle passage

look

the white dress is a signal

i am back to love you and to breathe

this time the depth is fabric

you will not drown

i am back to love you and to breathe

secrets into your infant ears

you will not drown

this rebirth is for everyone

stories in your infant ears

about whale kin and coral bone

rebirth for everyone

i am home

with your whale skin and coral poems

breath flowing long remember

i am home

a place where we survive

breath flowing long girl, train

this time. depth. fabric.

a place where we survive

take the white dress

as a sign

(Ancestral mother Boda, known in our family’s oral history as an Ashanti woman who survived the middle passage and was enslaved in Anguilla has been coming to me in dreams of wedding dresses for more than 5 years. A signal tapping in to my association of “boda” with the word wedding in spanish. The language of our first captors in the Caribbean. But I recently learned thanks to Katherine Agyemaa Agard that in twi “bota” is is the name of a yellow species of coral. This time I am in the white dress, sewn by my grandmother Lydia, long and layered oceans of fabric. The train of this dress, which my mother playfully holds up, is part of my oceanic training. This is poem is for those of us seeking a sign. And for all of us who need a reminder of what we been training for.)

yetunde returns to touch the cheek of her great great granddaughter

i will need the power in my legs

when i return to earth

i will smile and remember

i am free

when i return to earth

i will see the love i made

unshackled

and remind you

i will see the love i made

from the inside out

i will remind you who you are

i will be the best love possible

from the inside out

i will grow this life

i will be the best love possible

i made it

i will grow this life

i will smile and remember

i made it

with these free fat legs and fists

(This poem is in the voice of my Nana’s great great grandmother. We don’t know her name. Yetunde means “ancestor returned” in Yoruba. So this poem is about what that ancestor, who lived in Jamaica at the time of enslavement would say to her great great grandchild (my Nana) if she came back in the form of a grandchild (me!) The multiple directions of mothering, the embodied memories of freedom, the reflection and the time travel. All of it. This is how we reach each other across seven generations and answer for the world we have left, the world we have made. Remember how free you are.)

three chosen sisters smile

in the foreground

in the background

awning. trees.

in the foreground

their smiles are what they can stand on

gaping branches

undetermined fruit

their smiles are what they can stand on

their arms around each other

everything is possible

they are yet holding and held

their arms around each other

they make a bright study of brown

they are yet holding held

and still alive

they make a bright study of brown

three

chosen 

sisters 

smiling

still

alive

in the back 

ground

(This poem is for three of my brilliant beautiful Aunties. Aunt Andie, Aunt Carol and Aunt Mary are three of my mama’s closest sister-friend from college. Aunt Mary is actually the person who introduced my parents to each other while she was in law school with my dad. There are a lot of meanings of “brown” in this poem. A supreme court decision. My Aunties, Andria Hall—noted writer and journalist, Carol Black-Lemon—award-winning visual artist and Mary Butler—accomplished lawyer are brilliant Black women born in the 1950s who achieved their dreams with greater access than their parents to educational opportunities and support. The ground of my existence. These three women are part of the foundation of my life as a person with the benefit of always being surrounded by Black women who gracefully lived into their creative, intellectual and professional talents. The ground itself. Both my Aunt Andie and my Aunt Mary are ancestors now and the pantoum form I use here falls apart as I witness the joy and possibility of these three young women against a background that also includes death and my longing for their presence. So this poem is also for anyone holding both grief and gratitude for the folks who have made our lives possible.)

i cross my arms

your shadowed eyes

your skin your teeth

and i arise

your shadowed eyes

look down at me

and i arise

but sleepily

look down at me

and find my face

but sleepily

i cradle grace

i cradle grace

you cradle me

and find my face

delightful

you cradle me

and skin your teeth

the light

reaches across

(This pantoum is for my Nana who is the secret star of this christening photo album. She is in so many of the pictures. Even in pictures I thought she wasn’t in I find her earring, one eye, a wisp of hair. She is also the only person other than me who has a complete costume change somewhere in the midst of the day. This poem is a celebration of what it is to be held and smiled upon. I am. We are. Like my ongoing conversations with my Nana this poem also plays with a poetic relationship between Jamaican and American englishes. I love you Nana Nana. Always.)

communion with the earth offers no gloves

the father of the mother knows his place

study the man and notice what he does

outside the light of any smiling face

he clarifies his three piece suit to two

leaving the jacket sitting on a chair

and walks through grass in fine Italian shoes

investigates the fruit trees that yet bear

and places golden apples (i count eight)

into the background of the celebration

the rustic ceremony of his fate

born in an orchard in another nation

and thus the child is blessed beyond her knowing

the weight of golden orbs already growing

(This sonnet is for my Grandpa Joe. Grandpa Joe is a shadowy figure in my memory. A quiet person who spoke in proverbs. A person who, even when he was present, wasn’t necessarily social. It makes sense then, that I learn more about my Grandpa Joe studying the background of pictures of other people the day of my christening than I do from the picture of us together, his face obscured by the shadows of the trees. It turns out, that while other people were posing and smiling, my maternal grandfather, born on a citrus farm in rural Jamaica, performed his own ceremony: harvesting fruit from the wild apple trees in the yard. In this poem I imagine that moment, the ancestral presence he made space for by turning to a practice that may have felt more resonant for him than standing and talking with people. And for all the tiny ceremonies that we do or do not notice. And for all the necessary work happening right now that sustains me, though it may be in the background almost beyond recognition. I see you. I love you. I thank you.)

the love within him infinite and free

my uncle ties his tie and suits his suit

godfather though the sharp young man may be

his life had not yet borne religious fruit

one day he will stand up and lead a church

heart big enough to hold a million souls

but now he is still leaning in the lurch

he’s barely more than twenty-five years old

did he decide on this bright sacred day

to make a wry commitment though divine

to practice play as love and love as play

both god and father claimed and redefined

yet who can tell the meaning of his smirk

all I know is I’m grateful and it worked

(This sonnet is for my Uncle Duane. Daddy’s younger brother, and cherished confidante and my beloved wise and playful godfather. The one who used to get me in trouble in church on Sunday morning making funny faces and then quickly shifting back into a serious mode. Other people in the congregation must have imagined I was laughing in the face of God. Uncle Duane, you have always been there for me and for my Dad and for our family. I could not ask for a more loving, honest, joyful and compassionate godfather. It seems to come naturally to you. But studying your face in these after-christening photos, two very different countenances, I wonder what it meant to you that day, as such a young man to take on the name of “godfather.” So this is a poem of gratitude and wonder, honoring your journey to become the person you are, exactly who I needed you to be, while still protecting the youthful playful spirit that we love! And I know that the love within you has always been divine, and open to a great purpose. Within and beyond form and structure. )

already i must clutch my own heart

and look to the sky

the door to the house is open

behind us

and look to the sky

remembering what is

behind us

a dream i am writing you into

remembering what is

before all of this

a dream i am writing you into

with my eyes

before all of this

you traveled the ocean

with my eyes

and by hand you made family

you traveled the ocean

the door to the house is open

you made family already

by hand

my hands clutch at my heart

(This poem is really for my Nana, Joyce McKenzie who is—always—in the process of telling me her life story, but now I am recording and transcribing it. One of the beautiful things about Nana’s life is that she made it by hand. She created family by choice and care and need as an orphaned child who didn’t have access to safety or home in Jamaica after her grandmother passed away. My Aunt Bunny and my Aunt Jenny, pictured here are two of the many people who became her family through the process of migrating together and keeping each other alive. They became kindred in and across the ocean. My grandmother’s migration story has profoundly shaped my life and our family and I also dedicate this poem to all those who are loving each other across oceans and other borders and for those who have usually been able to traverse borders freely who are now learning what it means to have to do your caring long distance, not by choice, but by necessity. And what will be the evidence one day in the future of the families we are creating and nurturing now. Of the ways we kept each other alive.)

grandma made this dress with her hands

made the baby indirect by salt and stay

pop-pop grows his beard to match

the length of grace the lace of claim

made the baby indirect by salt and stay

made the brown in sun and softness over days

the length of grace the lace of claim

the strange perpetuation of a name

made the brown in sun and softness over days

to come to borrow and believe in both

the strange perpetuation of a name

that doesn’t claim them either

to come to borrow and believe in both

the breathing and the thickness of the blood

the wild unclaimed

tenacity of sand

the breathing and the thickness of the blood

pop-pop grows his beard into

tenacity of sand

grandma made this dress with both her hands

(This poem is for my paternal grandparents and yet it is also against normative ideas about paternity. My grandmother designed and made this christening gown for me and it has also been worn by my sister, by cousins, and other babies in our family. As a grown queer rebel who now knows more about my paternal grandparents fathers and their harm, and also the limits of patriarchy that left my grandfather unclaimed even though he used and passed on the name of his father, I focus on the gown as a handmade claim. Another way of holding. And look at my grandmothers hands. Yes. They have made worlds. So this is for Lydia and Jeremiah. And also for you, relearning how to make the world by hand right now. For all of you discovering which claims are in name only and which ones come with care, that can actually clothe you, shelter you, hold you in this moment. With love and tenacity.)

if your sleeve were the ocean carrying me to sleep

would i dream myself your smile

if the waves of fabric woke me

i would be dressed in love

would i dream myself your smile

your beard the cleansing cloud above me

would i be dressed in love

your raining joy

your beard the cleansing cloud above me

your smile the source of poems

your raining joy

the soon and coming words

your smile the source of poems

your face the welcoming earth

the soon and coming words

my head upon your shoulder

your face the welcoming earth

the waves of fabric waking

i float upon your shoulders

ocean carry me to sleep

and never leave

(This poem is for the sweet trinity of my godmother Auntie Jennifer, my father’s godmother Cousin Floss and my Pop-pop and the renewing resource of their smiles. For me this picture is evidence to dismantle my internalized capitalism, the individualist mythology that life is a struggle and I am in it by myself. But look. I am held and supported, not by one, but by many. Not only by the living but also by those who lived before. Not only within the nuclear model of family, but within chosen and extended networks of care. Looking at the photo today I notice that the trinity of adoration and care holding me in this picture are wearing red, white and blue, like that opening scene of Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon. And actually all three of these angels in my life chose to leave the United States and lived in other jurisdictions for most of my life. I accept the necessary reminder in this moment that though this country does not support life in general and also does not support my life or the lives of those I love in particular, that reality cannot override the fact that the universe does and has and will support us through each other. I love you. I gotta let myself be the baby in this picture, held, supported loved. I want to invite you to be the baby in this picture. Rest. You are loved.)

thank you

for the small god of sleep

for the trickster god of dreaming

for the slow and yet resplendent god of sunrise

for the warmth

thank you

for the longing god of comfort

for the easy god of beauty

for the glamour god of style

for the altar of this outfit

thank you

for the growing god of food

for the working god of hands prepared

for the moving god of transport and of share

for the nourishment i find

thank you

for the waiting god of work

for the coy goddess of poetry

for the ample god of purpose

for this labored life of love

thank you

for the sweetest god of song

for the heartbeat god of rhythm

for the sweating god of dance

for this body

thank you

for the changing god of every face

for the sometimes god of smiling

for the pulling god of need

for my community

thank you

for the slick god of reflection

for the plodding god of duty

for the craving god of kinship

for my family

thank you

for the purple god of sunset

for the cooling god of evening

for the blinged out god of nightsky

for the moon

thank you

for the lingering god of light

for the soft goddess of rest

for the salt god of satisfaction

for my best

god

mother

thank you

(This poem is for my divine godmother Aunt Rashmi. We lost contact with Aunt Rashmi many years ago, so if anyone here has seen her and would like to be part of the miracle of our reconnection, my mama and I are so open to that miracle. My memories of Aunt Rashmi are vague, but I have a birthday card from her on my first birthday where she wrote the words “God Bless You.” This poem honors all the ways that I fully receive that blessing in its many forms. And this is for all of us who are remembering exactly what we are grateful for right now.)

we could be singing

a duet in a forgotten language

i look into your open mouth

and know

a duet in a forgotten language

remembered ancestral face

i know you

i have known you before

remembered ancestral face

tell me how i got here

i have known you before

what are the passkeys to this time

tell me how i got here

and who brought you

what are the passkeys to this time

what is this place

and who brought you

this open mouth

what is this place

come let us sing it

into life

(This poem is for my fabulous Aunt Lorraine, my grandmother’s sister, lover of all beautiful things and laughter, lifetime member of the NAACP and YWCA. Can you see her halo? Thank you Aunt Lorraine for teaching me to dance by living your life as an opening for joy. This is for everyone who is looking for the song right now, learning how to harmonize across distance and lifetimes. Love teaches us the frequency we need. )

only one of us has teeth

but you could say

we see the same world

looking forward

and you could say

our fates are intertwined

forward facing

and bright

our fates are intertwined

your hair is cornrowed

and bright

with gold

your hair is braided

and mine is wispy

with gold

with bright and waking thoughts

my mind is one with thee

with teeth of us

with bright and waking thoughts

see? the same world.

(This poem is for my sweet Auntie Veronica and our alignment of spirit which is already evident in these pictures. Aunt Veronica your hopeful loving energy is exactly what I am inviting into my life right now. And always. Thank you for holding a place in your heart for me as pure potential, as bright and possible love. And I also dedicate this to everyone who is reaching to be their best selves at this time of change and adaptation. Remember? This is what it feels like.)