Epiphany of Self 365 Poems, 365 Days Sneak Peek

Last night I had the pleasure of performing a new spoken word piece for Sankofa Theatre Company's production of Same Difference. It was a great experience for many reasons:


1. My first time performing my work in Chicago


2. The play Same Difference is amazing! (Shoutout to Samuel Roberson)
 Honest, funny, and great acting by some talented black men Mr. Edgar Sanchez and Mr. Austin Talley


3. Sankofa Theatre Company = good people


4. My theatre brother Al Heartley directed the show! 


5. The company is called SANKOFA! (All my UGA AACC Fam knows why this is special to me) 


Below is the piece I did, but also folks check out the following link which talks about an upcoming event that Sankofa Theatre Company is hosting at the end of  the month called Fractured ID. It is a three day event that will include spoken word, plays, music and more. They have a kickstarter campaign and if you guys could support, it would be great. Here are some young artists doing what they love and I am honored to have been around the work that they are doing and I am excited to see what is to come.


Fractured ID


The spark for this piece began with trying to discover the journey of constructing identity. So on Twitter and Facebook I posted questions to get some inspiration. And of course there was some Wikipedia in there. Below are some things that popped out to me and are referenced in the piece.


Identity:
the formation of one’s identity occurs through one’s identifications with significant others (primarily with parents and other individuals during one’s biographical experiences)


Identity is thus best construed as being both relational and contextual


A person's identity is defined as the totality of one's self-construal, in which how one construes oneself in the present expresses the continuity between how one construes oneself as one was in the past and how one construes oneself as one aspires to be in the future


Enjoy


April 2


"River rise, carry me back home/ I cannot remember the way
River rise, carry me back home/ I surrender today"


Today it hit me
The epiphany I had been searching for
Hit me
I found the piece of me
I had lost
I discovered the treasure
That for years remained hidden
Forbidden I was from exploring
Since I was in the shadow of others
They would never lead me wrong..right?
Their hearts full of good intentions and motivations
Yet it was in their path 
I was creating
Bits and pieces
Untied chords
Fragments of self
Not complete for a whole
Not full enough to stop...the hunger
And while their footprints
Provided a blueprint
My steps became too big for their strides


So I had to provide my own
But...my own
What was that?
Was I ready to be...
On my own
To define my own
To create my own


Creating something
Beyond my race
This double entendre
Its beauty that I embrace
And its negative affiliations I curse
Cuz at its worst my beauty is..suspicious


Creating my own
Beyond my gender
Where I negotiate daily
My roles and expectations within society
Denying the
Superficial mandates that set what is right for a woman to be
The highest level she can achieve
The amount of emotion she can show
Yet still having to know and provide and nurture
Herself, her family,and her significant other
And don't she dare utter..she's a feminist


Creating my own
Beyond my faith
Questioned daily
By people so wrapped in details and rules
While I experience the truth in m spirit
Having to pick and choose my words 
As so not to offend
Yet shunned when I speak to defend


Creating my own
Beyond all those things and more
Yet including them all 
And not at the same time
Relating to them all 
And not at the same time
Embracing them all good and bad
And not at the same time


It hit me


That in creating my own
My greatest awareness of self
is within the relations to others
The context is clear
The individuality of me
Is because of the culmination of experiences of we
The piece of me
I found within us
Us navigating separate paths
Leading to a single destination


It hit me
Every season occurred not by chance
Just undiscovered reasons
Every lesson learned
Absorbed within every fiber
With the desire to understand more


Today it hit me
The epiphany I had been searching for
That I couldn't find in the shadows of others
It hit me
I couldn't find it in the the expectations of the world
It hit me
I couldn't find it in the labels placed upon me


The formation of self
Created in self-reflection
Embodying it all
It hit me


The epiphany 
of self