cycle, circle, closed.

"You see dat ting you do? you gwine have to stop it and LISTEN TO YOUR HEAD ... from you little mi a tell you say people a people, and dem not always ready like you fi 'see full picture' - sometimes dem nuh even ready fi more dan one line at a time... and you always know when enuh, you always know when, but you just stubborn. anyway, as usual mi bet yuh tiyad now an' ready fi finally listen. clear out and go again. an' dis time, don't call me when is prayer time (the only woman I know who from 4 am to 7 is prayer time) to ask what you already know. mi love you. take care a yuhself, and God have it - even when yuh nuh feel it."

My Grandmother has a pertinent and present voice in my head, and almost none of our talks are new - for some reason I keep heading to the same spiral.

...maybe the book everyone claims to want to live by is secondary to the egos everyone wants to nurture and I'm behind on truly believing that. well, this rubber duck has left the gyre

A Lament

A Lament


With eyes that once
Held the spark of suns
And lips that spilled
Gems from unspoilt gums
I watched in proud fascination
Your growth
Your passion…

O wayward child, 
O wilful babe!
Weaned from milk -
now venom you crave.

I must say that
And it is true
Your change it did 
Stem from me too
And thusly I present of myself 
My back
For lashing

O wayward child
O wilful babe
weaned from milk
now venom you crave

I sit and watch,
I stand and gape;
And worried, I,
Myself did hate
Until I did with clarity
See you
And not me 

O wayward child
O wilful babe
you chose your ilk…
You, I cannot save

Saying Goodbye to 2013...

So here, I sit at my desk at work, dimly aware of life around me (groggy as I am from lack of sleep) and I pause...I am at my desk...on the last day of the year 2013. its over. another year: an eventful, interesting, depressing, joyous, life changing, painful, beautiful year is at its close...I'm awed...as I go through captured moments, a lot come to mind, and many un - captured...but lets attempt a quick photoreview...

FrenchMan's Cove, January 2013

I had the pleasure of beginning the year with fellowship, as some of my closest friends all piled up into a car and we were off, to one of the most pristine beaches on our little Isle of Jamaica...it was lovely, and the memory of that day warms me.

Tenors of JYC (Not pictured: D. Hamilton, P. Dawes and D. Bailey)

Had the first official photo-shoot and concert Season of the Jamaica Youth Chorale, here I am with my fellow tenors. I Love these guys like family, and I am heartened to know they feel the same 

Diocesan Festival Choir Beach Trip (James Bond Beach)

My sister paid me a visit for the summer. It was glorious having her back with me, and sharing the life I had carved for myself in Jamaica with her. Here we are on a choir beach trip, and about to attend a street session with my/our father (lol), and, as usual, It became like we were kids again lyming and skipping, sighting, water war...I miss her much, and as I may not see her for another 2 years, this vacation was immensely memorable

The real glue that keeps this Trio running 

Post performance, Music in the Hills, the Ambrosian Ensemble

I was a Part of an octet for a concert recital of Operatic Choruses and Quartets, Broadway standards and Sacred works...I sang In German, Latin and Italian...Loved every second of the experience, and I hope I am called upon again to sing with these awesomely talented people

My most emotionally charged role to date, I was a dance soloist to spoken word at the year's "Gungo Walk" and "Tallawah" arts festivals. I played Dwayne Jones, A young Gender non-conforming boy who had got beaten to death by a mob of intolerant Jamaicans. I was scared, I was saddened...and I cried. It will be a role and piece that remains with me forever, and I am glad I could do something in tribute to a life cut too short 

Kinesio taped and ordered a month of no activity

 THIS WAS HARD...while dancing, I got a sprained back and slightly dislocated a vertebra, and jarred them. I got my first immensely debilitating injury since mountain- biking as a kid (I biked off a cliff and landed right into a concussion, lol), and it was very eye opening... it hurt...deeply, as it made me aware of just.how.dangerous.dance. is. It was and is a task acclimatising to this weakness, and I hope as I learn to live with it (the effects are somewhat permanent) and to regain strength, I will keep the lesson of safety and moderation forefront in mind. Another effect it had was the revelation that not all is as it seems, and an olive branch can pose as hemlock and vice versa..

Here pushing through pain during a work break

Company Dance Theatre In McDaniel's Reggae piece SESSION. 

I Performed in my fourth season of dance with the Company Dance Theatre, a great task and undertaking with a career - ending injury (that demanded rest that I wasn't willing to take). while it was not a particularly happy time of it, I have grown as a performer, and tested in great discomfort as I sought not to let the experience of the audience be marred by my handicap.




While there are many more eventful photos and experiences, I chose to try and highlight those I was a bit more "comfortable" sharing...for now...
It was great having you 2013, I definitely gained strength; even at the expense of the physical, courage and no shortage of opportunities to glean wisdom. I have, lived, laughed, loved and made bonds that I hope will last a lifetime, and memories that will last until the end of all time.

Une Si Longue Lettre...from an Island boy who has ceased to dream

Aïssatou,
 It seems so fitting that I use this name and style with all that sits on this heavy heart...and yet I find the words will not come with the ease my tears do...appreciate my disjoint words and deep grief...may Ms Mariama Ba not look unfavourably on my doing from her resting place... semblance of composure regained, I begin


It seems Hestia really does not get the credit she so greatly deserves...

I see the slow trickle, a hellish descent, and all I can do is weep in my forced sequestration...I guess this talk was bound to happen, and sadly while the voice began in concern, its amplification rang a bit vitriolic in my ears... I guess this is a bad time to stop being the eternal advocate. so you were questioned, and you laid bare what was never hidden, and made light shine on things held only away from those who would not ask... you were already steadily losing faith in the institution to which you played the anchor, the last standing pillar in a glorious temple worn down by so many things, a restoration proving merely an excavation; in your eyes slowly growing dim and immune to hope's feeble illumination... "They've moved on, found other friends...I'm alone" you are not alone, but It always happens that the skeptic and the untrusting find it hard to invest further where no easy trail lie...We shared a lot, and bonded intensely, so it is no wonder that after resuscitation the things that caused its premature cardiac arrest, untended, should reclaim death's victim, a sacrifice for a sacrifice is needed to complete any circle...you were not put on the pyre, no matter how it may feel so, because what was done to you is what needs doing for all, and after this laying bare do we then decide to move forward together...or dissemble and in factions part ways... I will venture to say this, you were more centred in the resurrection than any would give credit for...you've sacrificed- stubbornly?yes unwisely? maybe- and now we draw ragged breaths because the whole body does not believe it lives truly...the heart can do nothing more than ferry blood, the brain must re-alert itself to its state as living, blood must re-absorb oxygen and nourishment and disseminate it to the other parts of the body, to renew them from a spell of deep grey otherworldliness...the process of resurrection so easily sours and makes a zombie out of a body that should either be a person or a corpse...but we have all lived too much in the "zombified" un-reality...lulled ourselves into strained embittered silence... when truly those save the heart who remained seemingly fully invested were in fact failing to launch from safe port from fear of stormy seas...I am not one to find a reason to question men's motives with a light as would give the unknown a negative light, in fact I eternally believe in the goodness of all people (much to the chagrin of several persons)...but it seems time for me to grow up, to open my eyes yet again to the world...and rip open wounds that have festered to the light of day... and try healing them the right way. I am misconstrued, misinterpreted as I myself misinterpret and I have unwittingly misled...but in their cessation may I begin to make penance... and you...you who sit and read with the lenses of many and the vision of none, who should peruse this letter written and shared with you... for YOU...you who have been loved and loved fiercely, you have been coddled and you have been given so much, such trust, affection, opportunity, and yet in respite for those things you repay with...your meagre and reluctant offering...Mene Tekel... but as yet...[Upharsin]?

Your Ramatoulaye,
gender time and country made irrelevant by our circumstance

...and with No one to say "weep not, child" but the urge of disillusionment for constant company...

Ever just feel like your life took a turn and you've become a textbook example of nihilism? I've found that mine seems to take that turn a little more than every so often...usually carving a deep swathe into my happiness, leaving almost no joy in its wake. I cryptically told my aunt of a major problem that always sends me spiralling into deep depression whenever it comes up; she looked at me and said (translated to English) "You have yet to make the connection  between being nice and caring and taking the persons weight on your own shoulders, whether or not you think it is your fault, you in reality help no one when you yourself respond to it the way you do...look at you at nights sighing into pillow and looking like when  your mother just died, you cant keep doing this to yourself...its not healthy, and it is upsetting." and yet I retreat to same form..I cant deal, I have tried very hard to make amends, tried very hard to not further be a cause of pain or discomfiture to anyone and yet I keep finding myself here...keep finding myself...here...why do I keep going back to this place? why...I am so tired...so very tired...some days I do not even want to move, and this is after more than eight hours of sleep, as opposed to my usual four, after which I would usually be sprightly and awake...I often contemplate the world sans my existence...and in my estimation, if they can survive without my sainted mother...why then would they need me? me the source of pain and a monument to bad memories...

I feel like all I push most times is "down"

The Sharing and Navigating of our "Personal Darknesses"

Today's emotion cannot be processed, user is tired and quite annoyed with the world at the moment, but will explore their feelings...Eventually

       A friend of mine was sharing some difficulty they faced going through a bad breakup...the hardest part for them was not simply that they weren't over the person...it was the spaces that they shared with them...he referred to his personal space as his darkness...heartbroken, he says he now has no peace because he made "my" (his) darkness "our" (their) darkness...and it got me thinking (of course, AFTER we talked and he was comforted while we ate and laughed) of personal space and our own each of us "Darkness", the forms they take and the effect they have on us...as well as the gravity of what happens when we share these things.
     I can relate and I am sure we all can, with the reality of each of us having personal "darkness", whether it take the form of a place, activity, object or an amalgam or several of the former; it is this "thing/group of things" which "centres" us, makes us able to survive the world, to face the madness around us with relative calm and bravery. For me the primary one of my seemingly numerous is the solace of reading alone at home, for you doubtless it will be otherwise. I now imagine how much it takes many of us to share this personal space with someone...here I do not mean "tell" someone about it, though it my take that form as well...but to have them engage in it with you or even be present while you enact this process (be it so) . this is tantamount to letting them have an unfettered view of your essence, often see directly into your soul (hmm, feels like over-romanticism? maybe, maybe not), and this delicate moment is one that can make you or infinitely break you (and to the rare few, it will not phase you, and in that instance, was it really ever that important to you?)...now imagine that person/those persons disregarding the gravity of being "let in" or even worse know the importance and ignore it in a fit of neglect, anger, antipathy or just.plain.stupid.? if you're like me or my friend, your response is unease or despair, a gloominess or heaviness fills you at the thought of the activity/thing now, often so much so that it makes you avoid it altogether. others however, lash out, they make the person (or often everyone-the rest of the world) pay for this crime, this invasion and infringement...I warn us all to not take the communion of  private worlds lightly; yes we are human and there will be times we "mess up" but we should as much as possible be vigilant, because we never know when in our moments of humanity we may damage a soul beyond recognition and often beyond repair

Untitled...

As I stand before you,

the spindly glass of my world trembling

facade of stone shaken...

I reach to you-

then see the recoil-

that instant of rejection

that green tint

of an aura's retreat

and you maintain the distance

and why not?

after all, clearly its my fault

nothing of me

naught of me at all

well...

I'll stay in my corner

til my corner evaporates

with the morning sun

night's crimson death...

-Carl-Anthony