A farewell (Nov. 30 2018)

Eggbert Missa B, Prince, Bertie, Uncle Bertie, Tibby, Ol' Man, Stick Man, (No sir, sorry I wont call yuh stick man again *rubs arm, pink from slap*)

I still remember growing up, sitting with you, squinting at the small screen of the coloured TV when WIndies had a cricket match, you at the edge of your seat, me barely following the action but excited something was happening (years later it was discovered my squinting was not intense focus, but astigmatism). Everyone would know if they did you proud (which was not always that they won) when you would then spend the rest of that day/week humming Rudder's "Rally Round The West Indies" in the sweetest warmest tenor voice I have heard on a Jamaican. it drove several persons crazy. it made me want to learn songs that meant I was happy so I could drive people crazy too - but more importantly, so I didn't have to tell them how I was feeling, but show/ sing it. this man smoked every day God send him sun when I was younger. and STILL voice was sweet and resonant, like a sunbeam touching your face with blessed heat as you sat in an air conditioned office shivering.

you were the archetype of the masculinity I hoped to personify:

- you would get up every day without fail, and take on the tasks you set yourself, with no complaint and no need for acknowledgement.

- it began with a slow, meticulous sweep of the yard. Alternating with a push broom, and coconut brush while singing, with pauses to "run" us from underfoot as we would play around you.

- Then came my favourite part: you would lay out your woodworking tools to continue whatever job you had in progress.
 I was proud my Grandpa was a Carpenter, and took pride when you would carve a bed-head or make a "chester draws" (Chest of Drawers was reserved for adulthood). I especially loved when it was a bed. when still in early stages, not yet with outfitted with lathes, I would love to sit in the open box that was the frame and read or imagine myself as a pilot, ship captain or teacher in a classroom (this last one only ever in private, as my sister had a total monopoly on being 'teacher,' a game she relished in large part for the strop with which she would discipline students, and the red pen to "mark" work). you made my "big boy" bed, a sturdy no nonsense affair, made from hard wood and unadorned. That bed has seen me through moving from place to place, become awkward teen, to a mostly good man, and has supported me in many a quiet hour in reading, laughing, loss, pain, and in loving.

Then there's those things that just added to your awesomeness

- You never waited on Grandma to fix you a plate, and though rarely ever having to, you could Bubble a pot! (sometimes these forays were traumatic - watching the process of making Manish water is a standout here - but you cooking was always a fun affair...until the teasing resulted in an invented nickname - always hotter than a slap)
- You always romantic in private! Poor grandma here telling us how tender you are with her, describing your earnest proposal to her, ring-less but determined to keep her...and us seeing you with your grumpy one liners and "kissin' teet" whenever she would start to retell the story. I realised, after we found the picture of you two kissing for some anniversary, that we had never seen you refuse to kiss grandma when she would try to wrestle public sweetness out of you. your resistance was always for show, and short-lived, because a peck was sure to soften the moment before you walked off.

- Your use of a nickname was a level of savagery that had us always on our toes...and rolling with laughter when not the target. I remember a step-sister once came to stay over with us, and after an hour of her incessant chatter (which had also got on our nerves by then) you gave out:
"Zazu, yuh beak nuh tired fi clap?" Fresh from the Lion King VHS obsession, the rest of us were giggling up a storm, poor Dex- I mean, Zazu. Mid smile, dazed and not knowing what had just happened. Of course, our laughter further got you annoyed, and we scattered at the shout of "Kibba unnu mout!" knowing as we did that the fresh laughter that this would bring would end in some slaps. she was truly one of us that day, Zazu, Carl-Jackass-teet'-fuss-one, Duck-head, Donna-Pretty-Cross-yeye-Duppy, Dutty-Neck, Sandy-Yellow-one-him, and Ashia (who you gave her pet name and was never given another name by you).

- YOU COULD DRESS!!! Grandpa, bar none, was the most put together, handsome, carefully organised man about the town. Listen! de man starch even his jeans! I think watching him dress and take care of his clothes and Clarks had more of an impact on me in my formative years than even having both my parents being in fashion design. from early years of trying to iron my primary school uniform (and creating triple and quadruple creases) to tucking my shirts into my pants (before growing older and becoming aware that where Missa B had a muscled flat stomach I had a round pot), "Uncle Bertie" was the very image of style and clean-cut dapper-osity!

Then you both moved "To Country," a whole other series of misadventures, "Grandpa-isms" and surly mask hiding warm-heartedness continued.

To the person who I am sure I in large part got my ability to find humour in the folly that causes frustration:

I miss you more than I can say, and will take a while to get used to the idea that you are no longer here. no longer a hurried phone call away in between classes when I would call your number to "speak to grandma" (when really I just wanted to hear you shout "Shirley, Tasito pon de phone," probably with a mumbled cuss that she going to done your battery now, and when you coming back down here again?), no more hurried 1-2 day visits to Manchester to reset while watching you move about tending goats, chickens and crops, humming snatches of melodies and wishing you would sing louder so I could harmonise, now older and FINALLY knowing the songs you always sang - Thanks Mr D for at least three of these - and able to join in.

"Sing Christmas Green, Poinsettia red,
for in a lowly manger bed,
a Little child was born."

short check in

Ever lay in bed and miss someone?

I do not mean the kind of 'miss' that people fleetingly claim when their minds happens to wander to someone (yet mysteriously stops shy of actually sending a message/calling), but an ache for their presence.

I feel it at some points during my day and night.
for him.
and it's mostly okay, an acceptance that I have allowed someone into my personal sphere in a space that family and friends cannot fill. I hope the homesickness is not for naught.

til then:

Please Don't...

there is a way that people will hold you to the mold that they envisaged for your life. Sometimes, this is a good thing - they keep you in line, on track to being the best self you can be. but other times, please, just don't

DON'T:

 - exclaim that you thought I'd be half way to PhD now. it is clear I am not there, and not yet close if ever to it

 - ask me if your suggestion of praying the gay/ the depression/ the dark thoughts/ the PHYSICAL situation away worked, or worse yet, come with a gloating air when I have (probably with help of meds and a therapist) made it to the other side, assuming Jesus, your last minute suggestion was the answer all along.

 - come around me with an air of condescension for others expecting to find a kindred spirit. I have no patience for those who hinge their self worth on the devaluing of another's self esteem.

 - try to stop me crying when it happens. life has been pretty shitty, let my soul acknowledge it for a bit. it is very hard for me to cry in the first place; if you witness it, just leave. you will likely know if you should stay. if you do not know, succinctly ask.

 - Advance toward me with conquest in mind, hiding behind courtship or gallantry. you're getting blanked anyway, practice candor.

 - compare me to younger relatives/ childhood friends. yes he is now a lecturer, yes she is now a chemist. I am not. I am a disappointment in so many more ways than you can imagine, leave me in peace.

Life has been such a painful, Topsy-Turvy experience. while not without it's happy instances of light, it is a hard road to travel. Not every observation shared is helpful, not every jibe is seized as an opportunity to show strength, and I am tired.

So...

So here you are. 

You're awake again, full consciousness blossoming as you open your eyes to take in the sight of your space. Another day. Another long stretch of disjoint interactions and the feeling of being isolated. But you're aware of that. You are actively cordoning off your emotional response and perception of reality. You can't possibly afford the humanity you crave. You tell yourself the time is not right to be vulnerable - that it isn't yet the right moment - but you know better. You feel the real reason. You can feel the helplessness deepening, taking up your consciousness and crippling you slowly as your body fights to move normally, to do normally. You project blithe fortitude as your reality. But you're falling apart. Again. And you fear you are irreparable. 

None of this is okay. 

You are at a place where you try your best, while aware that it is not at all your "best" but that you have no access to your optimum. You can't manage this on your own, but opening up to any one involves admitting just how much of this internal dialogue of resentment you've been hiding. And they have their own issues. 

And you refuse to cry.

And you refuse to feel.

And you refuse to submit. 

You know this is all foolish, so you strike deals with your trauma. 

"Let me get through this semester/concert/year/month/week/day" 

Because you know.

You KNOW 

The doors and locks that hold back the full effect of all you can't address... they are insufficient protection and you do not know when but you know each day brings you closer to being face to face with its unfettered ferocious devastation.

And that feat

You feel it 

And you know it to be real, where even love from others is mired in the doubt you know is baseless - 

But...."what if" 

The chain rattles. 

Roving with TonyC... from the back seat of a Trinidadian Taxi

I enter the car, there's another passenger seated at the front.

Front passenger: i don't have any issue with them you know, as long as they [insert stricture on self expression or identity].

Driver: Yeah partner, I don't mind them either - I lived in Europe for almost a decade, they were everywhere, some things though, just don't need to be public... *sound of assent and short laugh* i dont even kiss my girl in public - but to stand up by traffic light in the middle of town and suck another man tongue out he head?

*I fall asleep in the taxi*

*re-awakens* 

Passenger: it have plenty of them in the government, even that big Rasta one [name redacted] yeah, he, I know for a fact that him is one of the worst kind, he's a receiver. I know that for a fact because Is one of my friends from over [community redacted] him go to and get dig out. *All out laughter.* But seriously, big man like that. But I have no problem with them y'know. 

Driver: in truth? I thinking is only "the Chief" that would be rejoicing. Y'know  he had a fella up by me, up by where I living, we would see him round there.

Passenger: true yes, I never understand why he go for public office with those ways, yes. But as I say, let them live. The law changing for them. But...how that work? The law in the bible says *driver dismisses the reference with a "everybody not Christian" - himself a rastafarian* hear me out nah, the bible that outlaw dem ting, is the same thing they swearing in on at court and ting? So how you can swear over a book you not following? 

*I am self aware enough to not bother engaging, the driver keeps checking rear view to look at my expression. My face is schooled into a bored expression*

Driver: well, I don't think everyone swear over that, but how many people really living like that book ask for? Anyway, I don't have a problem with them. As I say, if I have a child or relative who find that them is that way, I won't kick them out, I won't hate them. But the public ting...

Passenger: so you would want your boy child bringing home a man? In your house? 

*driver is silent, as he considers. Passenger laughs mutely*

See dem ting? Not happening in Jamaica 

Driver: how you mean? Of course it happen. You don't hear about them ones in that place there [name redacted]? The ones living in the gully,  robbing people and hoe-ing.

Passenger: so they stop killing them? 

Driver: no, of course not *they both laugh* but that ain't stopping them anymore. 

Passenger: I hope they ain't looking to come here then. Stay and fight for themselves over there, and dead [at] home.

*driver allows silence to build at that comment. Checks mirror. Eyes making contact with mine, he looks out the window at others stuck in standstill traffic.*

Well, as I say, I have no problem with them. Man does choose his own hell or heaven. It just have some tings I don't like or appreciate. 

Driver: well, as I say, it real different in Europe, them free up and everywhere. But gay or straight, some things just not for public. 

*I sit up and pay fare, preparing to leave vehicle, as the topic evolves into a discussion on "Them trans people there, and that one that call herself [redacted] and use to work in Red House."*

Invocation as rejection...et cetera [with much perspective jumping]

"Ah prayin' for yuh."

I used to take great comfort in receiving lines like this. Even at my moments of religious ambivalence, I'd be warmed. The thought that someone would intercede with their supreme being for my benefit often made me speechless with gratitude. 

 - not everyone is quite so kind-minded. 

As I got older, i came to appreciate the line, and some of its other iterations. The inflections that "mean more than they mean - y'know whaddamean?" 

Sitting in church right with you, I am in the mid region pew. You know, the 'not-so-much-a-saint-I-can-pull-off-the-front-row-but-certainly-not-to-be-in-the-back? Yeah. There. Minding my business, dropping two or three harmony lines in the hymns, praising just like you came to do (ha). End of service and sermon comes, and just before I awkward side step to my house (or, to be real, to head to a performance), you corral me into conversation. It often happens that you are right in front of me at church. No morning greeting did I warrant, no sign of peace at mass. But here you are. Post church and just before you slip off the pious face for something more...comfortable? Roadworthy? Real? 

"How you doing? How is *insert grandmother, father, uncle, aunty, cousin, sister...personal favourite: Girlfriend* ?"

Like a dog whistle, the saccharine voice has triggered me, and I shake off my distracted attempts to leave. Your smile widens. I respond politely, and I calm down; maybe you are simply asking after them. 

You are never simply asking after them. 

"So why you not looking to carry her to meet your church family?" My mind reels from the open blow of the question. In the silence that you ensured with my surprise, you press on. " Or she in here already and the two of you hiding the dealings?" Your smile is simply feral now. Your glare is predatory, sure that you have caught me out. 

Unfortunately for you, Sister, I stopped playing this game long, long time. 

"I am gay. By the look on your face, you know that I am gay. You are aware I am not single. He is not a member of this church, but I will certainly take him along one day when we are both in town." I now smile. "You would like him." I watch you all but sputter. You never thought I would be so blatant. 

"Oh yes, well you should bring him." Then, to reclaim the situation: "I will keep praying for you." Of course you will. But right now another church sister/the pastor/Father/ brother/Elder and you need a word. 

Bye.

Now a friend of mine once said she felt her urges to be petty or dismissive were because somewhere in her DNA is a 'Steups' (a kiss teet; a caribbean/African gesture of impatience, upset or annoyance). I can confirm that this "gene" is probably Caribbean region universal. I feel it every time I have to jump out of my mild mannered self to address the particular brand of foolishness (read: fuckery) that is Caribbean people of a certain generation and/or "(non)sensibility." 

A similar kind of invocation occurs when they are trying to assure you they are ameliorating the blight that surrounds you from being related to someone who offends their or the community's (still their, but with an invisi-majority backing them) sense of decency/morality. 

Church fully forgotten, and the mid-week is upon us. Enter another well meaning neighbour. 

"Hey, how you doing?" You are disarmed. She living right down the road, and everyone knows her daughter have 3 children with 2 awarded (but 3 - 5 potential) last names. You engage in some small talk. You laugh a bit. There is an undercurrent of the yet-to-be-said, but you assume it's something inane, like a concern that your father taking too long to deliver something, or at most, borrowing money. 

And then she drops it.

"Careful how them see you in the road with *insert name here.* we might know him and you is relative,  but we know you not playing them things, and we don't want you going down with him." Now, the person discussed is a relative. One with whom you are not only closely related, but genuinely close to. You are confused as to what could warrant the warning. Then you remember the current neighbourhood scandal: cuzzo has decided to move in with his partner, and they are raising his child in their un-holy, un-recognised union. You are unsure how to process the judgement that is coming from she of the flexi-morals. Responding with amicable rejection of the notion of anything wrong, you begin to part ways as warmly as you met - if a little off kilter. 

"Well you just be careful. You soft hearted 'bout these things. I hope it don't burn you. I praying for you, that him judgement don't fall on you too." 

You swallow back the DeoxyriboNucleic-STEUPS response that bubbling and waiting to jump out. Nah. She can't be real. 

The last one I will touch on, is the summons of revenge and retribution. 

We are all raised, for the most part, with the mantra "God not sleeping." Every perceived slight or injustice is postluded  with this phrase. This weaponising of the otherwise all benevolent God can strike in the most arbitrary situations.

"Ah going to take you to God in prayer!" Is the shouted parry of a church sister who was glaringly cut off by another driver at an intersection.

And we celebrate her restraint. How, you ask, has she shown such? Why, she avoided curse words! She refused to cuss out the other driver, and instead (with her spectacularly triggered Steups gene) put him before her Lord to mete out judgement (the "as she the victim sees fit" is as silent as the 'k' in knight).  

I have more I could say, but I am here triggering my own kiss teet' response

Selah, til' we chat again, 

Carl-Anthony 

as I reflect

"Yuh tek drunkard 'tick fi guh lick mawga dawg,

when mawga dawg dead a weh yuh a guh do?"

(You take drunkard's stick to abuse the meagre/malnourished/ailing dog, when the dog dies, what will you do?)

 - Jamaican proverb an folk song lyrics 

This song keeps re-visiting my mind lately, and I suspect the reason needs exorcising. I see so very often people try to obfuscate truth - and truth here in its many forms. People hide the truth of their convictions, the truth of their feelings, the truth of their hopes, their goals, their abilities. for what? Why on earth do we play this game of hide the real self? and then the more baffling aspect that these lines speak to: we highlight the plight and misperceived (often deliberate) weak points and 'villainy' of others. to what end? why do we put each other down? is there some point to this? crabs in a barrel will climb over each other to escape - BUT THE BARREL IS NOT A CRAB'S NATURAL HABITAT! we are not in a barrel...in fact, often we are experiencing pressure in a unique way, and the lessening of that pressure often has very little to do with the person who we drag into our situations.

NOTE: drunkard stick... the song notes that we are not "ourselves" in this moment. we are removed from sensibility and for whatever reason we in that state of weakness - react in outward destruction.

So... when that blame causes the person, the system of support, the group - whatever - to disperse, disappear, no longer function or be a point of escaping scrutiny...What will we/you/he/she/they do? are we even thinking of that time to come?

...Weh we a guh do?

streams...

Maybe I'm tired.

Maybe I really cannot deal with the madness that others stir up,
Maybe I cannot hold my tongue further for sake of cohesion
Maybe I can't stand and watch the dementia take root
Maybe I can't breathe and this is getting too much to handle

and I am not there to deal with it, process it.
I am not here to fix it when I was made to deliver it just as it began healing
but the universe never allows a vacuum
and divine action is slow but sure
and we reap what we sow
- except when we reap our brothers and sister fields  -
and we are so full of empathy
and Hollowed of our caring
so soulful
 - having lost our souls

And he looked and saw the centuries before him, millennia of strife and bloodshed in his name
wars launched by his people against his people in a name he will in time possibly resent
and still
knowing he could give up at any time
sighed, and hung there
and...
 died

Haiku for you...never in vain

you know I return
to those letters that you wrote,
and have a long cry

Surface thoughts as I breathe ...

I have never been one for comparison; you're doing a job, do it the best you can. that is it really, no depth of mantra or seeking to outshine another. Certainly awareness of the ways to an end result are best studied - one needn't re-invent a wheel to add it to another system - but this has never stopped me from going after or doing something with my perspective in mind (I take a moment here to say that this process is unrelated to when I choose to NOT engage in invention or innovation simply because what exists is sublime as is).
there is a lot I want to do and be, and a lot I have been and have done. has it all gone to plan? no. Has it hurt? most definitely. Yet i press. but it is hard.

It is hard to say "I want to be comforted" in the face of effort that, while not by any means small, does not total my best effort. I know in my mind that I try my best but there is always something that to varying degrees stops the undertaking from BEING the best I can do. how do I, knowing this, turn to someone and say "I am tired, I am broken, hold me together while I mend"? I do not. I hold the strain to me in the private recesses of myself. and while some have access to this place, I rarely allow for comfort in the face of my deeming myself unworthy.

It is hard to open myself to people. It is sort of a strange thing that, for someone who tries to be open with my desires, motivations, perspective, my reality, that I do not recover as readily from the rejection of negligent dismissal. I believe, like any other person I would be hurt if one simply rejects the counsel/gift/gesture, but would appreciate the honest turndown. We all want to feel valued and our insight worthwhile...but then there is the way of the non-confrontational passive aggressive, of exercisers of negligent dismissal: an act of rejection through accepting terms or promising to act on advice, with no intention of the action fitting more than the barest modicum of effort, and often just enough to make the failure seem not to stem from disinterest. you do no one favours by feigning investment in something.


I'd like to say I am determined to work on and heal "me" this year... but knowing me, I will shelve any personal project to help another be actualised. I can always get back to "me" ...after all, I am, to me, a hobby, not a passion.

what even is this?

I am hard to love.

that is not a statement of self-deprecation...at least not actively so. it is a statement of fact.

I am hard to love.

I was not raised in houses of duality and double-entendre. I was weaned from flights of ideal origin quite early.

I am hard to love.

I grew up observing what often turned out to be conditional affection, simmering as a thick layer over the sweet flame of unconditional love. it masked that flame, and for years I choked on the sickly sweet aroma that filled the room of my life experiences, at turns sweet, then bitter depending on things as arbitrary as the shift of wind. trust should have been hard...but it was affection that was impossible

I have been hard to love.

for as long as memory serves, I have been othered for one thing or other, til when time came to join the wider world, I had such great practice that I would actively other myself - by presenting all the deepest aspects of my true self to repel those who would after time have got used to my quirks. I made it hard by showing myself at the onset.

I can be hard to love

and yet I love easily. I respect all life, and honour the value of the autonomy of thought and deed of all, so long as they do not exercise it to the destruction of others. it is sad, then, that I am so hard to get to know - and even harder to want to be known

and yet you see me

you are uniquely placed, perfect and lovely. daily is my reality's negative dwarfed by you. may you not one day wake up, disillusioned with me - and to find
 - disappointedly -

that all I am...


...is hard to love

about that place/state of being

There is a place.
a place we all may one day reach, where the hurt is so constant that you are inured, immune to the power of it. this place is a settling of the spirit I like to term"Meh."

Meh is not a place to be dignified with the term limbo. it is not some place of balance and expectation. it is a place of negligent torment and wasted feeling. it is...meh

it is a place to which we are consigned, but make no mistake - we are consigned to it by virtue of our choice. we choose to accept the treatment meted out to us that ensures our spot in Meh' purgatory.

why?
it is the easiest thing to abandon the world of Meh, to break free and banish the heart fractures of expectations and promises, to not live in the realm of hope in the face of sustained disappointment.

but we will not.

that one time out of a thousand is just behind the next meh episode. that one time that makes it worth it, that makes you for even a minute feel the warmth of affection and desire...

may your moment not be of steadily diminishing returns.

meanwhile, you have the meh for company.

Musings

Boris Vallejo's "Prometheus"

There is a titan who it was said, was eternally damned for his daring to bring fire to the world of man. He was berated and punished by his equals for giving the gift of progress,  of warmth, of LIGHT to a dark cold and forbidding world. While the mortals who before him knew only cold and darkness praised him, he hung physically on the altar of his peers disdain and alienation for his compassion. This tale takes shape every time we as a Caribbean people are gifted with a luminary who also has a soul.

You would think we would learn to love and share freely; that resentment and divisiveness serve no one; that the only prestige worth having is the peace of mind that acknowledging and loving your fellow man brings...but no.

We live, aggrandising our efforts, deigning to  consider the work of those less than our opinion of ourselves as worthwhile - worse yet on par in importance as ours. We create colonies of exclusion,  we seek out superiority.

We have put ego above community.

We have put self above family.

We have put pride before service

And, fools that we are, we believe that we all each are immune to these - even judging others for their levels of self indulgence.

Who have we become? Who have some of us always been?

What qualifies us to cast nets of negativity and dissent? From what pedestal of righteous indignation do we feel justified in causing division and discord? 

We live in an age where information and wisdom are mistaken for each other;  an age where same wisdom can no longer be counted in years lived,  and authority a construct to be questioned and daily revised under the scrutiny it has needed for evolution.  This is a glorious time to be alive, a fantastic time and opportunity to bridge the gap.

But we are not bridging the gap. We are creating walls of transparent titanium metres thick, and digging trenches of separation miles wide and deep.

And it is a problem that will destroy us.

The aging cling to the legacies and advancements of the present, happy to receive the work of the young, and jealously guarding their birthright in their unwillingness to risk irrelevance. 

The young, now no longer constrained to wait for this (in their mind) unnecessarily rigorous baton passing, have already lost mass interest in their heritage.

And why wouldn't they? So many other cultures are there for the choosing - and all readily available and packaged to look like everything they ever desired.

There is much to reckon for, and you on your various mounts Olympus are sadly first to blame.

There have been too few Prometheans and far too many incensed gods.

You cannot hold welcome and inclusion into community as tools for manipulation when to survive you need their presence and interest. You curse yourself to the bitterest of damnatio memoriae - and the world is poorer for it.

The young...oh that I could lay all the ills at the feet of those charged to tend us; to blame the society that failed to make us confident of her embrace. But I cannot. We have allowed the privilege of birth to become shadowed by the spirit of entitlement. We seek belonging through demands, ourselves needing to be handled carefully.

And so we create, not a subculture,  but remove ourselves from the well of inherited and inherent to sip from the meagre canteen of self. 

We have struck valiantly out on our own, to commit the sins errors and evils that generations before should have inoculated us against but were too busy carving themselves into the now, marginally concerned for the tomorrow that they know they will not be part of.

And it is STUPID.

And it hurts us

But you do not truly care

And to the few that do, they are shamed before they can turn the lens of your petty self absorption on you.

No one is free from Sin,  but the stones have been cast in blind fury so wide that the village is in ruins. And now, I finally see why hermits are content by their streams of solitude.

It is said God is dead, and that we killed him. Community's soul lies bleeding out,  and, but for the odd gasp and grimace fading out in the shamefully 'indignifiable' death to which we have consigned it.

And....I am tired

Tired of false "we," people containing themselves into an invisible multitude, invoking narcissism too great for one body.

Tired of empty empathy that fails to even be sympathy

Tired of underhanded schemes and barefaced manipulation when the honesty of admission of a sense of disconnect would solve the loneliness.

EGO,  that ruins the "we" only when it is given full autonomy over not only the self but the selves of others... an interpersonal colonisation of toxic result.

And we make it hard to love us

So very hard

And yet we demand it. That which we won't selflessly give for fear of being in a position of vulnerability. How foolish! 

Even this letter and it's hubris in supposing it will change anything hurts.

But it can't not exist. 

And I can't stop believing in a world where Prometheus is all of us, and so celebrated is the act of freely sharing and loving that it is impossible to consider the warmth as not eternal. Maybe I will awake to the reality that my hope is not a fantasy. 

Til then, the queue for a slab altar and the removal of regenerative livers is thinning...and not because love granted the foolish Pardon ego and selfishness demanded.

Sin Cera,

Carl Anthony Hines

Why do I keep Venting? On Self Worth

We are told everywhere we go, all we do "let no one dictate your worth." But do we truly know what that means?  And  can we ever escape it?
Self worth has always been a bit of a recurring theme for me. Those readers and friends (and here that may as well be a synonym) who follow this blog have seen me constantly navigating that minefield of identity,  worth and belief. sadly, I come away with the same conclusion most days: the unsettling realisation that all men dictate our worth. Men here may be misconstrued as the male of the species... I do not mean them (or rather us) specifically,  but mankind on a whole.
Now...when you think of yourself,  when you truly consider yourself, what do you picture? For many the mental mirror comes out and we appraise and present our physical self. Eyes that may or may not be aligned with our concept of beauty, a nose that may be too wide or narrow, ears to big/small/pixie like for our faces. We may think of our ill health, of lack of musculature,  of disease and dis - ease. Then slowly if at all we come round to the positives, and we begrudgingly admit our face isn't quite so wonky, our smile a likeable thing, our bodies graceful enough.

Why is it that many of us precede this list of the physical traits with the faulty aspects of our being? Why do we even think of the outside first?

Then there are those who go abstract in their search - abstract here not a term for offense but a lumping term for the intangible aspects of self, such as personality - coming up with traits that define them "I am reflective/peaceful/passionate."

And here we present them first as flaws and not as value free aspects of out makeup.

Everything, even the vocabulary we use to evaluate our worth were things observed and legitimised through collective experience. We define our worth and feelings and experiences on the index of human collective experience and expression.

And here's the thing: we don't get freed from it.

The true sociopaths among us navigate life free from it while manipulating others with the knowledge of it, yes but think of all you have lived as units across the index.

- a sticker for a well done school project
- positive words to a baby on an achieved milestone
- a cheer when an athlete performs spectacularly

Though only one of those instances directly affect fiscal value (itself a whole other system of self valuation and its own Pandora's box), all of them contribute to both our individual sense of worth and the collective appraisal of our worth.

So are we...free?

More time,

Carl.

I release you...and ask your forgiveness as I freely give mine

I refer here to my true self, the one unafraid to live, laugh, love...to be, do and help


It has always served me well to be myself. Even in such moments where I pay the price of ostracism and loneliness, it has been as a refusal to lose myself at the gain of hollow offerings of companionship or material gain. What need have I of the company of those who sought to remove aspects of me that denied my right to personhood? There is a line between those changes that may enrich or otherwise benefit an individual or society, and the changing of a person to have them simply aligned with your view of them - usually an abasement to serve your ego. This interpersonal colonisation is often not readily recognised for what it is, and indeed can be enacted without even being seen as such by the perpetrator.
I previously wrote about treading softly around the dreams of others. I expand that thought to the treatment of the sanctity of personhood and individual choice: insomuch as a defining trait does not infringe on the rights and freedoms of another, it may be taken value-free as is.
THIS DOES NOT MEAN ONE SHOULD TOLERATE THOSE WHO ABUSE THIS ARGUMENT.
it also does not excuse one from being beholden to ones thoughts feelings and most importantly, the consequences of one's actions and opinions. My generation has taken to feeling their words and deeds, flung carelessly into the ether are at once ex cathedra as well as free of ramifications so long as they bear the "It's my opinion"/"it's who i am" cadence...no

BECAUSE they are YOUR thoughts
BECAUSE they are YOUR deeds
they WILL be used to come to a conclusion about YOU
THEY WILL NOT always be aligned with your true self or even your self-concept
they will sometimes be ordinarily abhorrent to you
but honour the realisation that they will be all persons observing will have to go on
UNTIL they are greeted with the true you through interaction.
It would be lovely if we all waited until we had full pictures before we judged...but the world is not such a place.


So...this rant may be foolish, may be disjoint...even pointless.

I accept all of those likely definitions, as well as the truth that it is simply a rant. it is a manifestation in cyberspace of my current mental ruminations.

All my Mind
CH

 it deepens. I do not know what pockets of myself I can trust to remain intact anymore. I was once a meticulous and ordered soul, if not the most detail oriented then in my own way systematic. and yet...I find myself with a floor strewn with the paraphernalia of my life here that I have absolutely no drive to remedy. and I should be terrified. I should be upset. I should be many things, but catatonically going along should not be one of them. Do I dare ride this out til I can remedy it? will it come any time soon? will it even be worth it? I don't know that the fight now does not seem pyrrhic. Yet, push on as I must, I wake each morning, after nights of little sleep. what works? what helps? why can't I just get up already? I wish pray and hope...as I wait. with optimism? hope?... they taste bitter in my mouth, like lies. and to all other words I am apathetic.

It Feels like...

It feels like being out of sync with one's own pulse.
It feels like a soul in shards .
It feels like time moved on, and you are forever Rip Van Winkle- and yet worse,
you never had belonging and welcome the drink and sleep of oblivion,
what's more... you wished it had lasted longer; that it was all that was.

I know...the atelophobic search for a place and feeling you may never feel you deserve or have earned

there is only this,
and death.

hmm...an observation or mindless rant?

"The road to hell is paved with good intentions...and I'm the chief brick lay-er"

I found myself making this observation as I sat in transit to the University campus for my customary Thursday night chorale rehearsal. So often do ill sentiment and malfeasance become the end result of a well meaning thought or action (while I readily admit that in many instances this is brought on by the part motivators of fear or ignorance); usually festering into malice and disillusionment because of misinterpretation.
There was a comic I had read a little while ago that dealt with the artist's opinion of heaven: "...Imagine normal life, but where everyone understands what your intentions were when you screwed up..." (link to comic here: SMBC Comics). I saw it and I thought, isn't this what real life could have been if we all took the time to practice what we preach in moments of non-conflict ?
we never take the time anymore to simply understand someone, to get to walk around from their perspective. I do not look at this through a rose coloured lens - evil exists and persons take joy in personifying it - but so many moments would not become shaded with negativity and ill humour if we simply let go. but then...who's to say we aren't all just paving the expansive walkway to our destruction? Sadly, persons like me do so merrily, unwilling to allow dark things external and internal to corrupt their intent. And then there are others: those only dimly aware if what they're doing is the best choice for all, and willing it to be so, as in the moment it seems like the best choice for them.

But I, being poor, have only my dreams;

I have spread my dreams under your feet;

Tread softly because you tread on my dreams
(W. B. Yeats)

we forgot to tread softly...we forgot we walk among each others dreams.

I weep for wand'ring far...alone?

Recently, I had decided to risk taking a break from studies and go back home (Jamaica) for a weekend to attend a funeral, a concert and to see my family and taste 'our' food; to sort of reconnect and refresh myself from a debilitating case of homesickness. I was walking to the Taxi stand to get home, having lost track of time liming at a friend's place catching up on all I had missed with them, while being a student abroad for the past 6 months. The driver who stopped for me, impatient as the light had changed beeped to hurry us along (what transpired after could only be because he had thought he was waiting for two customers not one). I headed into the car and after I said morning, he [driver] proceeded to ask why it was that he [my friend] had to walk me to the bus stop. I responded with "because we were still in a conversation"- or at least I began to, as in true ignorant fashion, he did not allow me to finish before repeating the question twice, coming to a halt at the bus stop below the light, at which point for brevity let's just say he asked me to leave his car, all the while stating his hate for "people like you and him". I left his car, almost responding in kind and closed his door... He was about to and did drive off, before his apparent crony in the front seat convinced him that "is really slam di batty boy slam yuh car door" whereupon he came to a halt yet again, now in the middle of the road, venting his upset at my disrespect of him. When I responded that I did no such thing he came out and around to me, brandishing a sharpened screw driver. He then, while continuing his soliloquy came into my space and hit me in the face, sending my glasses flying to land in the grass behind me. It was open handed, and it did not really hurt, in fact it convinced me that if it were a fair fight I could have trounced him with energy to spare; he was an unhealthy man, whose bulk is more attributable to food and alcohol as opposed to brawn. I'm sure he realised this in the same instant I did; because he again brought attention to his screw driver and his friend, holding the front door, at the ready to jump in. It set my teeth on edge to let it go, but I stood there. I stood there as he shouted to other taxis heading in opposite direction to turn and come down the route, that he had just expelled this "Batty man" from his vehicle and encouraged them to do the same. He then, vindicated in his self-righteousness, swaggered to his seat and drove off. A taxi man behind him, who had stopped to witness the event, and looking at me with the unmistakable stare of pity asked if I was headed on his route. I wasn't, but I put all my gratitude at his quiet support in my decline and thanked him. Shortly after I had got into another cab, and a quarter of the way home I realised my vision was blurred and my eyes stung. I knew I had no urge to cry and checked my face... my glasses were not there! Jolted, I asked the driver if I came in wearing them.  He said no, and I begged him and other passengers to turn back, as I needed them - stressing that they were not style accessories, and it was beginning to hurt. The other travellers, no doubt high from their weekly obeisance of church and likely feeling magnanimous, allowed for the return.  I found my lenses in the low grass, unscathed, a few inches from a steaming pile of animal excrement. Thankful for that small mercy, I took them, cleaning the lenses in my shirt as I returned to my seat to the applause of my fellow passengers who considered it lucky that though I was careless, the Lord made my glasses stay unmolested so I could come back and find it; especially as they "looked so stylish and expensive." I didn't answer, and beyond a hushed 'thank you' when I exited said not another word until I was in my room telling my father good morning

I am tired...and despairing of finding any place in my own mind to retreat to from the lashes of a cruel reality. It is not that my experience caused some immense awakening; I had seen abuses: prevented a few, had to sit through some, and some are so gruesome that they leave a stain on my soul that no amount of prayer has or will be able to exorcise from me - but the question remains... how does one even find strength to breathe anymore?

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