I had three other blogs prepared to reopen my website activity. And then t George Floyd was murdered and filmed so we could see his pain, of bystanders yelling for the police to get off of him until he passed out and died. The video was shown again and again […]
Had my father continued to age in his body of flesh and bones, he would be 93 today. His spirit continues to nourish me and lift me when I face mountains that seem too steep to climb. I love the legacy he left me and take great joy in the […]
Mesotic for Kiilu freedom taKen by storm she Is graceful panther determIned to struggle revoLution the air she breathed Love her most Useful tool Kiilu was so much, so large, so vital, my words evade me. I cannot begin to describe my respect and love for this woman. Our friendship […]
I am almost always reading three books at a time, usually spread across genres, poetry, fiction and non-fiction, as essays, memoir or history. Right now on my bedside table these three are among the offerings. Chris Abani has a way with words, his prose has the music and richness of […]
Transcribing and redacting the tapes has given me a more nuanced sense of not only who my father was but of who I am as a second-generation immigrant of West Indian heritage, as a breed, as a black woman, and as an offspring of artist parents. Of course, my father […]
This Sunday I had the pleasure of participating in a mini-writer’s retreat presented by the wonderful Poets and Writers organization. At one point we had to tell the group something about ourselves. One of the writers said that she had no community. Later on talking with her about what it […]
My father was born February 8, 1926. He, but not his presence, left this planet June 19, 2011. Of the many things I love and admire about my father is the fact that he was the definition of what I consider a man. His manhood was not a […]
When my father was a child he gave his Kingston, Jamaica born mother the title of duchess. He told me it was because of the stately way she walked down Harlem avenues, the sharp way she dressed and one particular hat she wore which was like a hat that Grace […]
Music was a foundation of growing up. I remember my father building a speaker when I was quite young and then taking me to the Sea of Music record store to buy (used) records. He bought a musical for me (I think it was West Side Story) and some jazz […]
My father returned to Africa for a third time in 1979. This time he was the director and one of the writers in a team of people making a documentary about the liberation struggles in Southern Africa. They started out at the Organization of African Unity (OAU) Summit which was […]
