blackgirl on mars: notes on a life in copenhagen (or how my alienation brings me closer to people).

I just found out that my mother #1 has passed away. Ms. Willie Mae Walls was Sassy #1. She lived in apartment 104 and the door to that apartment was always open. I came to Willie Mae's EVERY DAY for 3 years, and she always greeted me with open arms and a flashy smile. Willie Mae made single motherhood shine. She gave us all duties and paid us in quarters. I rubbed her aching feet after a shift behind the bar while I helped her get pass her nursing exams. I was only 12 and she always believed me when I told her I would grow up to be rich and famous and that I would buy her a house Down South. Willie Mae would take her daughter India shopping, and I'd always tag along. She always bought me something. The first time I ate collard greens and smoked neck bones was with India and Willie Mae. She always called me her other daughter. But Willie Mae was like that--always taking care of other people's children. I have a hurt inside that I haven't felt in years. I always t...

Mommy why the sun so hot & the sky so blue mommy Tell me mommy Why am I me & mommy why are you you? Mommy why are you black & daddy white why is left called left and the right right? Mommy why Are you so mad Anyway When you’ve just been Given another day & Mommy are things In the movies real Or do those Characters actually Never feel Mommy Why is it people Die and fat bumblebees They can fly? Mommy Tell me once again What happens when You die? Mommy Are you going to die? Mommy? Mommy why can’t I hear so good Why do people Read newspapers Instead of books? Mommy why is America so big & Denmark so small, why do people fight they don’t get along atall why is money so hard to come by why do little babies sometimes die mommy why are baby swans brown and their mommy’s white why is it so hard for you to ride a bike mommy why do people kill animals & America got so many guns why do people make war that don’t sound like no fun! Mommy why are people Mean to other people ...

I took Kai and a friend of his to a basket making class today & it was fun. They did a good job, and it was our first time. I will definitely do it again. I love making things with my hands--such a great meditation. It speaks to something so ancient within & I feel as though the universe is lulling my soul to rest. Afterwards I took Kai over to his Grandmother, whom he calls Nana. We all played Twister and then ate dinner. Ben came over and it was nice spending time with the family. The weather has been rainy all day, with little bursts of sunshine, until at last, the grayness danced away and out came the Sun for a late evening shine. I decided to give my heart a gift and walk home, along the canals and the harbor and look at the buildings and the flowers and most of all the sky. I love the sky here--at this time of the year the sun hangs so high, almost as if it crowns the earth. I looked at flowers that resembled acorns as buds and then bursts of yellow sunshine when blos...

I just walked in on my 7 year-old son laying on the bed and reading my book of poetry. I enjoyed the moment for as long as I could, then I interrupted him to give him his desert of soya vanilla pudding (he LOVES the stuff--it was a surprise). He thanked me for it and then continued to read... I walked away and took up where I left off in cleaning up the kitchen. Suddenly Kai says, "Mommy!" "Yes Kai?" "I think your book is good." Wow. Peace, lab

And the first title on offer is "The Organist's Daughter". This book is a collection of poetry written in celebration and out of respect for my childhood. The other day I read the first poem, "The Organist's Daughter" for the first time to a live audience, and every one was in tears (including me!). I am really proud of this piece of work & plan to read from it in New York when I get there this Summer. Each copy is handmade, numbered and signed. I love to hold it. I have other collections to get out there, but for now, I must allow "The Organist's Daughter" to breathe and live a life of its own. Thank you to all of you who continue to support me and read my work. I feel really blessed. I also just checked out one of the blogs I have listed on the interesting links section of this blog--and a picture caught my eye. The blog is entitled Mother on the Gaza Strip, and there's a picture of a little boy braving the waves. How this little...

"Real writers learn you got to get your work done, hook or crook, no matter what-- feel good feel bad, don't matter, you sit down and you struggle to write -- everyday." So says Arthur Flowers and I say right on. How do I even describe Arthur Flowers? A mystic, writer, hoodoo man, carrier of traditions. I met him during my sojourn at Marie Brown Associates. He would come rolling in, his skin glowing with magic to drop off the load of manuscripts he had recently completed and pick up the new. See, Marie get's all these manuscripts to read, solicited and not, and it was our job to sift through them. It didn't matter what shape they were in, Marie rarely ever sent a manuscript back without some sort of evaluation, short or in-depth. There were first-time novelists, novelists who had been in the game for years, all sorts of folks and manuscripts. And many of them VERY good but alas--never made it past an editorial board... But anyway, Arthur Flowers was one of our...

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DIALOGUE: a journal for cultural literacy No. 2 / Vol. 3- SUMMER/WINTER 2007 CONVERSATIONS- WORLD MUSIC EDITION ISSN: 1024-0209 EDITOR- PUBLISHER: Roi Ankhkara Kwabena GUEST EDITOR Dr Mark Lockett(Ethnomusicologist) CONTRIBUTORS: Ishmael Reed, Dr.Ulrich Warnke , Lennox Raphael, Dr. Hakim Adi, Min.Paul Scott, BIAM, Prof. Timothy Ball, Tichaona Chinyelu, Sharon Bowie,Marcine Quenzer , Donald Hinds, Lesley-Ann Brown, Shani Burke, Brian Mitchell, Entiou Springer, George Fowokan Kelly, Mark Carroll, Felene Cayetano, Naa Ahinee Mensah, Rashana Shirley, Enocia Joseph, Lars Kræmmer , Patrick Githinji, Kokumo Noxid, LeRoy Clarke, Abysinnia Yohannes, Delia McKenzie, Efi Antoniou, Sahera Parveen, Omosun Sylvester, Ita Gordon & Marie Conte PHOTOGRAPHY: Brain Mitchell, Julianna Varnai, Izzy Mohammed, Lesley-Ann Brown, Fowokan Kelly, Richard Nagler, Risasi Dais & RK Formats available 140 pages, 8.25 " x 10.75", casewrap-hardcover binding, full-color interior ink 140 pages, 8.26 ...

What's up y'all? I remember when I was a kid and used to tag along with all my friends to these different types of churches, Seven Day Adventists, Lutheran, Baptists and how mesmerized I'd be when the Pastor or Preacher was really talking something good, spreading the good word on a human level, not just in a bible-thumping sense. It's a pity that we don't get together like that outside of a religious context. Wouldn't it just be cool to come together, hear someone who has something to say say something and raise our collective consciousness. Because I don't care how long you been going to church--if the preacher or pastor ain't challenging us, we gonna go right back to work and continue to conduct ourselves in that eh-hem, less than cool way that we tend to do. Anyway, last night I read the following poem at Women in Film & Television (WIFT) Award Ceremony: Tante Liv (The Ordinary is the Extraordinary) Your silver plastic clock still ticks beyond ...

I just came back from up North--spent the weekend with Ben & Kai. When I got back, found out that my Aunt on my father's side past away. It feels as though a petal falls to the ground for each family member who passes on to the other side, another portal inaccessible to the past. I always thought I would be able to sit and talk to her more and ask her questions about my father, her mother, her childhood in a Trinidad that is no longer there. I always thought that the moment would present itself in that magical time I must learn not to count on--you know, the time when everything is ok and there are no financial worries and no stress. But who am I kidding? So Aunty Audrey, my father's only sibling, has moved on. She was a sassy woman too--migrated to New York from Trinidad and hosted her own radio show for a while...boy, I really messed up this one. How am I ever going to fill in these blanks, these questions, that her existence answered? Family always think family is...