Midnight wisdom...

"...The easiest thing is to die and give in to sadness. stop taking the easy road. you deserve a good cry, I know, but you gotta dust off and keep it moving. once you're done, whatever you feel you did or didn't do forgive yourself and whatever we've done to you (the people in your life and out ) forgive us, but release that negative energy. I love you. Good night"

I read this, a collection of messages a close friend sent when I communicated that I was in the slump and stupor of another failing. I hope I can do that, I shall try...but..am I able? seems only yesterday the year brimmed with opportunity happiness and promise...

I Saw Her Break...

I saw her break...
In the light of dying day
from desperate hope
dashed to a slow burn of despair
how will she cope?

I saw her break...
as the lights dimmed
her eyes red rimmed
from her compulsive rubbing
dry rivulets she forced not to swell

I saw her break...
as I itemised, stacked
made real her isolation
as I swallowed the bile
salting my own March to damnation

I saw her break...
as the room became the cell
cold and austere, her haven a hell
and for a moment I felt it
I acknowledged my fractures...

I saw her break...
and I lost my indignation
lost all reason for upset
I...lost, and yet never knew
that there was reason for "winning"

I saw break...
as the minutes ticked by
a lonely little girl who never dreamed
she could feel so alone...
and I broke with her
...as did the seemingly shatterproof universe that ensconced us...

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.

Needed release...and words I cannot un-write

I have been at myself since Sunday evening (today being Tuesday) to have a listen to Celtic Woman's "The Voice". I had a talk with my best friend, and before I could even explain the compulsion to find this song, he gave the answer I myself was unable to give name to...
I was missing home...
I was missing home...and in agreeing I also added, for it felt I needed to ..."I was missing"...
A lightning bolt was sent searing a hot trail into my brain and shooting into my heart.
I have not been home in over a month, not slept in my own bed, carved lovingly by the hands of my grandfather, not been in my room, the layout decided on and implemented by me to reflect my tastes, my personality, me...I had not gazed at nor updated my arts wall, no new posters adorning my space...I have not sat, ravenous at my aunt's table for Sunday dinner, leaving feeling for all the world like my stomach was stretched to thrice its mass...and then I thought of my aunts, of my family...and I wept, a silent storm of bitter tears in the stillness of night, as the space I held, adjacent yet separated by leagues as you lay thinking me asleep and go about your activity, forfeiting yourself good rest, and by doing so me of the same. I miss moments when the cold of the bed surrounding me was an absence I was accustomed to, when my bed was shared by my Grams on visits and bad days, and by my sister when her mask of invulnerability disappeared before the waxing of the moon; before life became complicated and I hung by my collar, servant to love.
And it is that love that tempers the bile of loss. On good days I accept all; I see where I am happy and make happy, where moments pass of such unbridled bliss...but days like today, a low day, a day when it feels like I need that assurance I'm not a hamster on a treadmill going nowhere, when I need that word, that hug, that gesture...It is, like in others, absent...And it is absent because of my silence, yet my words don't and never have banished it...I am with you to be happy, I am not happy unless you are happy, you are not happy because of instability, I am on this wheel to combat that which would usurp your stability... I only ask that I be made aware I am remembered. Thoughts are unseen, and welcome, but not enough...

"Lonely" by Frozen Stardust

and still, come morrow, I greet the day and smile, and hope that today I am moored to land, not bobbing out to sea so close to harbour...please...

...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"

A little nostalgia

He sits by the window, and stares out onto the sweeping lawns, his house an island in the lush and perfectly manicured expanse of green, waves of crimson and pink breaking at the front and back porches. in his hand he fingers a ring absently. it is an intricately decorated ring, a golden band on which is overlaid a silver rose, its leaves diamonds encrusted within the gold band. A tear falls as he remembers the small of fresh pudding, the air thick with the scent of baking, and the atmosphere full of the warmth that had nothing to do with the oven and all to do with the love so tangible as to incite pinpricks of Goosebumps and stir a contented excitement to overcome anyone within the house's confines...