fotos.

these fotos warm mah he(ART) and spirit. they is a set of images from a collaboration between mahself- moon (she who takes the fotos and made the jewelry featured in it.) and a new friend tasha (who loves to beat a face.) they is pretty fierce to me and their work deserves some showing. ah am happy to be able to help showcase it. if you’d lak to get in contact with these two for anythang (make up: help/ advise/ work, handmade jewelry, or some professional images taken) you can reach them here:

fotos by:
(http://fotosrevolutioninmotion.tumblr.com/)

accessories by “lunar hustle”
( http://www.etsy.com/shop/LunarHustle )

make up by:

http://www.facebook.com/makeupbytasha10?fref=ts

confessions and guarantees

i can confess to movings made in lust 

and weakness.

i can say that i 

have been apart of the sea of silhouettes in longing

and that i’ve been one, under the moon, with loneliness in my eyes.

him is someone distant

someone who may not come through at all

show up at all…

what has been given to me is myself 

and so, with moon water made, im finding pieces left throughout boulevards

and i ain’t as well put together as i used to be

and thats colored in some small kind of sadness

but i can barely notice in moonlight cause it colors different.

im finding pieces left throughout boulevards 

that is new.

 

 

 

3 Reasons Why Im Not About These Equal Signs.

. . . this is not meant to be written from a place of anger or judgement- just love. i want to love, to understand and to be able to move through life in a way that is most pleasing and healthy for me. And i believe that we should all be able to do that. this is why i critique. because i want to understand how all the movings around us inform our lives and whether they push us towards self determination.

- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – -

marriage is not love. 

 

love has a vast meaning. it applies to many different kinds and formations. for example: i love nature, i love my mother, i love my partner(s), i love my best friends, i love days off, i love my cats.  the weight, that all these hold in my heart, may be different but, in general, there are feelings of warmth, comfort, compassion, joy, and light found in these relations. 

 

marriage is a social contract- it is a legal arrangement that sometimes springs from a place of love. Under capitalism, under our current social order, marriage is propaganda. it is billed as being the final manifestation of romantic relations. marriage holds over 100 extra rights given to those in that legal bond. marriage is seen as “moral”. marriage does not apply to all romantic couplings- people in polyamorous relationships cannot be married, same sex couples in most states cannot be married. thus, marriage, through the state, is not a manifestation of love. it’s another tool of the state to divide and police. During the developing stages of capitalism, in Europe, “marriage” was a means of accumulating wealth amongst the upper classes. Families of high status would only marry into one another in order to secure/ increase their wealth. In the past, many attacks on the morality of womyn in general, and poor womyn of color specifically, involved the word “unwed”. This was used in conjunction with other attacks to invalidate the voices of womyn who sought help from the society or who critiqued the neglect of the state.

 

it then makes perfect sense to me that marriage, under the state, is not a manifestation of love but instead another capitalist divide- another class. 

 

 

marriage ain’t gonna save us.

 

If you are a queer who’s main issue is marriage then you are privileged and actually in the minority. Esp when we are still poor, not given any of the vital resources needed to survive, homeless, victims of racism, sick, criminalized (trans folk are being banned from restrooms in some states while in others there are serious legislative pushes to quarantine HIV positive folk), etc. . . this is real. Seeking straight privilege that gives approval because of the zeros on your check, skin color, possession of a penis, etc . . means than it doesn’t get better for those of us who don’t identify or who aren’t apart of those groups. Normalizing this privilege will only result in the cementing of a gay bourgeoisie and i really don’t have time for imperialism with a rainbow flag. Gaining access to marriage licenses will place an end to/ or even begin to place an end to the destruction this society is bringing to us. It will benefit those who have the privilege of accessing it. Ask yourself, “if these rights are so vital, then why are we having to beg for them? Why are they not afforded to every being possible? Are there folk not deserving of these rights?”

 

What this argument for “equality” sounds like to me is assimilation. That means that there is a belief that morphing ourselves to reflect the larger society will put an end to the trauma we face in that society.  If history has taught us anything, it’s that assimilation is a failed strategy. Black folk, and other marginalized peoples, won many rights at the end of what is known as the “Civil Rights Movement”. 40 years later, however, we see segregation, the incarceration of bodies of color, de-funding of social services (which support many poor folk and folk of color), police brutality, etc. . . at an all time high. In fact, many of the rights won during the Civil Rights Movement are almost gone. The modern “Gay Rights Movement” spends a lot of time invoking the Civil Rights Struggle. Gay folk would do well to note the complete play out of that movement and question whether or not it is something worth the time. 

 

The sad truth under capitalism is that there is a need for a class system. There cannot be privilege if there isn’t suffering and this is a system of privilege. That privilege is defined and given to certain individuals (the faces of which may change slowly and periodically but ultimately the structure remains.) Grabbing that privilege means being seen as one of the people who is worth state in society and part of that includes being seen as “moral”. Gays, historically have not been seen as “moral”. Recently, as some gay folk have begun to become successful capitalists (or businesspeople) and as parts of gay cultures have been successfully commodified, we have seen a larger acceptance of gay folk. However, it isn’t all gays. Images coming from the Gay Rights Movement rarely include womyn,  disabled gays, homeless gays, poor gays, gays of color, trans-folk etc. . . and this is because assimilation means that only those closest to being what is “acceptable” or “presentable” can be included. All others are left behind. Thats because the argument about the value of everyone’s life and love but instead, it’s really a plea, the the straights in power, to be seen as “just like you”.

 

Take San Francisco, the “Gay Homeland” for example. The city is seen as a safe space for gays- as a place where we are welcomed and no where else have I, as a queer Black male, ever felt more out of place. In the Castro District, the residents (who have a decent amount of coins- enough to be considered a worthwhile audience during elections) voted against the building of a youth center. Most of them citing the fact that homeless youth being that close to their homes would bring down the property value. Also in the Castro, the only times I have ever seen images of folk who look like me have been on porn ads, HIV prevention work, and drug addiction support ads. Lesbians and Trans folk are rare. (period, in person and in image). What I do see and hear in the Castro is the affirmation of Gay white men- both in image and in presence. The HRC, which is situated in the Castro District, claims that one of the benefits that marriage will bring to gay couples is that it will allow those couples, in which one doesn’t have citizenship standing, to stay united. However, the HRC never mobilizes to counter the I.C.E. raids in the mission district, which is just blocks away. Where is the care for “illegal immigrants”? If we can take SF as a model of what gay assimilation looks like then i think the horrors are very evident. 

 

 

Marriage ain’t moral and i ain’t decent. 

 

Often times “marriage” is seen as something “moral”. Something that is pure and right. And so, the thoughts around marriage include: “it being the right thing to do”, it having a “sanctity” that we need to protect. 

 

First off, if marriage was moral then it wouldn’t be exclusive and given by the state. “Morality” is a concept- meaning that it is inherently subjective means only as much as the person using it believes. 

 

This is the same state that: 

 

- founded itself on the corpses of native folk

- that became what it is using the blood and labor of enslaved Africans 

- that involuntarily sterilized womyn of color 

- that continues to invade country after country in search of natural resources that will bring profit 

- that, to this day, is the only nation on this planet to use a weapon of mass destruction

- that spends more money annually on incarcerating Black and Brown bodies than it spends educating this. 

- made gay sex illegal

- legally protects companies that create food so destructive and unnatural that they erode soil, pollute air, and contribute to in development of cancer.

-arrests Black womyn for lying about which county she lives in so that her child can go to a safe school while it does nothing to White men who shoot defenseless Black boys who are tied up and laying face down.

- that uses Islamphobia and zenophobia as launching points for a war on an entire region of the world.    

 

This state is most definitely not defining what the word “moral” means. And if giving these acts my support, through patriotism, means that i am a “decent” member of the society then i’m good. I ain’t never liked how being a “moral” or “decent” person sounded no ways. 

Not Fade Away

Not Fade Away.

selflessness

ah desire to
speak in the language of flowers
to know what soft kisses in wind are
and what it means to give pollen to the world
and never once ask for things in return.

and in that selflessness

ah desire for something to hold on to
made of labor and spirit
and something sweet too. 
opening every so often with light 
and love.

other rememberings.

i must remember how holding myself feels
if for nothing more than this sensation
of a thousand tickling suns laying down on me
in places that is low and touched
and endless and beautiful
and opening and gay

i must remember to only know skies
dark and holding of the bluer notes
mooning at night
becoming undone for those who have proven dedicated enough to to see our shame.
and loving enough to kiss it delicately, turn it over, open it and kiss it again until there be tears.
and in light- endlessness.
something vast and mine
and on and on
giving imagination
and i want that.
That kind of freedom that grants me sky.

i must remember to take note of how i hold myself around other men.
cause there is realer danger
than what was seen reflected
and cause i need to hug them something serious
and lay with them
be something i can and desire
and i must remember to do all that in my skin.

The Trap.

i want to speak one day

from a place that is not colored in the fear

of generations of boulders sitting

on shoulders

and not have to hustle with words

what should be given- according to the laws of what is natural.

as the sun rounds

and i moon

holding a limp sex, i wish to kiss deeper.

so that we are one day felt past

the ruins of Southeast, South Central, East Oakland, the Carolinas and Shanty towns

and free of this substance of misery-

the trappings of Babylon.

Stones.

“They been hurtin’ for some months now, doc.” He said talking outside of himself the way that folks can sometimes do when pain and time force us to be away from our bodies. Red didn’t like this- none of it- not the pain, not the possible problem, not the god awful lights that seemed to burn away any conviction held, not the doctor and her cold tongue. That’s why he smoked before coming.

“Your kidneys?”

“Is that what’s back here? I never knew where they was or what they did for real. I just knew that they was somewhere in myself- doing something.” He smiled out of nervousness. In the past it had been a ticket to bliss- someone’s bedroom, a cheat out of penalties, a free pass to lie- something, but now it was a plea for mercy. I spell he wish to cast over reality and make what he desired happen. He wanted to be free of the constant problems.

“Your kidneys help to clean out the waste in your system, like a filter.” The doctor continued almost unmoved by whatever Red was attempting. “If we are experiencing pain or problems there it could mean several things, including stones or failure, which is important to monitor because of the vital work that they do. A lot of times disease or poison can sit for years and finally appear, very suddenly, attacking both kidneys and their capacity to help your body. “

He heard about all of half of the warning and tried repeating it to himself while he pissed in a cup the doctor gave. Red hoped this didn’t end in more pills. Something particular did flash back brightly in his head- something bout how men in the United States had higher rates of kidney failure than almost anyone else and how African American men who were on medication were likely to suffer this problem more that most because of the fact that pills taken over time actually weakened kidney strength.

“People under constant medication have to be very conscious of their kidneys. Meds taken over long periods of time may cause kidney stones or failure. Black men taking HIV medication are especially vulnerable which is why I as you to pee in this cup every time we have a check up. I want to make sure you’re doing alright in there.”

“shit” he sighed while holding his softening sex. He held onto the wall and exhaled the stress once more. In these moments, bad memories, from all over, found theyselves flooding all over and his body felt pulled down by its own heaviness. Parts of his fleshy self began to fall off shelves he put them for safe keepin’ – he was loosin’ it. And he cried.

When Anthony was here he at least had another pot to put his misery in – another to blame for the infinite wrongs happening. And part of him knew that wasn’t right, but it felt nice- to just for a small bit of time loose any personal accountability in the matter.  Blame and notions of bein’ a victim washed over him and found all the feelin’s that was hurt and stepped on or left for dead on the stand next to unused condoms.

His throat closed up, as it did before and he shook all over. Red saw mortality and the thousands of lives he hadn’t a chance to live. He rolled through sheets and stood at the mouth of Golgotha. You must come in at the door. There were witches living on sad times and doctors casting death with their instruments. He’d been infected and used. It all fell away- all the innocence held in high places and he felt used- pulling himself back into his pants, and collecting what could be .

Only when there was a knock at the door did he realize how much time had passed.

“Give me a sec.” he called, not even listening for a response, over the sound of flushing water and moving paper.

The quiet came in more new and menacing than it ever had.  He saw his mother standing over an empty bed and she was crying and carrying a Bible. He has made a home for me over there. Jesus has prepared for me a home over there. She sang something blue for them and Red knew what she meant. So he went to her- his hands like the very cup of trembling.

“I tried mama. So hard.” he spoke low into her breast.

“Dance with me please, Emmanuel.”

Their hands held one another, one over another, for the first time in a long while. Music played and it was as if the river welling inside of him was held at the gates of his eyes. There was another knock.

“She ain’t really here, Emmanuel. Its just us, lets finish this dance. You and me like when you was small.”

“mama…”

“shhh. Step up on the stool.”

He was small again- in a suit and standing on the stool mama used to let him climb when she taught him how to move. And there was warmth.

Like when you was small.

And there was a low hum that brought him round to himself in that cramped room of beginnings.

“You are a child of God. Just like me and all other moving things. He make the sun move on us and blesses us with its kisses. At night when the moon makes out to see the world, he holds us close and sings something sweet to us. Sometimes I can feel you doubt that. But please know this now, more than anything else that was ever true. I love you.”

The final knock ejected imagination and Red stood in front of his wet face in the washroom mirror again- this time smiling.

And we get up bit slower and lot more deadly. 

Not Fade Away

 

His name was Ujima. And he was something beautiful. My first thoughts of him sat somewhere between heartache and jubilee. Had our fates not been decided, and the world been a bit kinder- he’d have been a known face. There was light in that smile, enough to charm millions and lead them off into somewhere dangerous, or maybe some place magical. It would be known everywhere because of how it held you and made you believe. I saw him sitting there and I believed- I believed enough to dream up big promises for us- like hope and forever. But I couldn’t believe in truth enough to save him so I made weightless promises on that autumn bench.

“My friends call me ‘Jima’ for short even though it’s just one letter off.” He smiled. “I let it go- folks is all over the place these days and as long as they calling me ‘friend’ im pretty much cool with whatever. I used to stay in these projects before my ma kicked me out.”

“She kicked you out?! Boy how old is you?”

“I’ll be 17 in two months, maybe. October coming in two months right?”

“How long you been out here?”

“This bench or just outside, period?” he teased. “close to a year.” And then after a violent cough. “She put me out close to a year ago. It was round my birthday. I remember not really celebrating it.”

I couldn’t tell the difference between his weak laughing and the wheezing that was coming from his throat. A more genuine laugh came about after clearing what was caught in there, but I couldn’t tell what he found funny. Something in it was dark and made me think he was amused by his own misery. The smile confused it and then he shook. I took a moment to exhale worry, compose my thoughts and decide what was in proceeding with this boy.

The breeze was becoming cool. That summer had started with us begging for rain and a month later I felt like Noah, beseeched with forty days and forty nights- a flood was damn near upon us. I had been sick twice- took an awful amount of time to get well and the thought was coming in that this boy may have not had the chance to recover from the storms had he really been on the street.

“How long you been on this bench?”

“ . . . long enough. I figured she’d see me and let me in if she saw me here.”

“Your mother?”

“Yea she stay up there.” He lifted a thin arm to the air and pointed at one of the windows on the tenth floor of the building in front of us. The Sursum Corda projects stood like a monument of times spent screaming and better left forgotten about. I was ten when my family moved in there and was eighteen when I managed to escape. By that time the security guards had begun to rob residents and the bodies in the laundry room were appearing more and more by the day. The halls were a foul green and the whole building brought an awful chill to the most sanctified. The walls were almost giving in on themselves and the memory of crack pipes threatened to overshadow any good. I didn’t want to think of what depths he grew in while he stayed there.

But it was in his eyes- every disappointment- every day spent running up the walls was present. The lines that outlined his frail face seemed to be trails where tears had continuously moved, like rivers and he began to look more tired to me.

“She kicked me out when I got sick. She said she didn’t have anything for me- that the world had spit on me and used me like a whore and that whatever son she had died in the streets. She didn’t want to know me anymore.” He began to himself. “She was screaming and crying at the same time.- speaking in some voice that id never heard before and when I didn’t move she picked up a knife- called me a ‘sad creature’.”

 

He choked on his own sadness and began to cough again- his small body shaking all over. The boy’s whole body looked in pain and he doubled over, resting his head on my lap. I removed my coat and wrapped it around him- partially to keep him warm and partially to try to ease him into any kind of comfort. He was in several places of pain. Around us the breeze began to kick up all the filth people had left. The leaves danced and all of it made a bizarre symphony. It all moved around us, occasionally crashing violently against skin- reminding us of what the world was.

“I thought you was a John at first.” He laughed, this time looking at me and not down at the shifting garbage.

“You get that a lot in this park?”

“ . . . enough to eat.”

“Does she see you sometimes?”

“Yeah. That’s part of the reason I do it here. She looks long enough to see me walk off with them and then she goes back into her world to do whatever will make her comfortable, I suppose.” He stopped to cough and wipe his face.

“I want her to see me.” That sweet voice now hardening under the weight of anger- like coal pressed- becoming a diamond of hard bitterness. “I want her to see what kind of faggot I am, let the bitch be really ashamed. I’m dying anyway.” his gaze now cold and focused on the window. He was looking for her.

“She kicked you out cause you were gay?”

“Nah, I have AIDS. You listening, pa? I would’ve liked to take a moment to understand all of what was being dropped on me more fully but he continued, despite his own tears. “They all saw. The whole Corda- saw the faggot get chased into the courtyard.”

I wrapped my arm around him more deliberately. It seemed to be the closest thing I could do to healing the boy.

“Is this ok?” I asked.

He smiled towards me. “They don’t usually ask about touching . . . I should be asking you that. You sure you want to be seen holding a whore?”

“I grew up here too. I don’t stunt none of what these folk might have to say or think. If it is anything fowl then its cause they are too small themselves to have any humanity. That’s the conclusion I came to a while back.”

“Yeah? You got out of the Corda? Why you come back?”

“My sister and her kids stay here. I come to visit them.”

I felt Jima sink a bit deeper. My lap was becoming more wet- tears, sweat and spit. I thought about this gem I found an about how the world had thrown him out before he had had a chance to find light and really shine. He was left to be forgotten and I thought about how easily that could have been me or my nephews who stayed in this nightmare. The ceiling was built low above us off of expectations not had and we all sand blue notes to one another through the thin Corda walls. This place ain’t one where Black boys can spread they-selves. Act like this. walk like this. fuck harder. cry over there. . .

I wanted to tell him about my leaving and how that felt. That freedom was somewhere. I found my place, a man to love on real hard and a life to fight for, but I couldn’t find a way to place that words that didn’t sound too cruel or insulting. He needed comfort, not mockery.

“Ujima”

He shook awake and it was then that I realized how deeply I feel into my own thoughts. He coughed for minutes in place of answering so I continued. “Im sorry that this has not been fair for you. I wish it had.” Now my face was wet. “I want to help.”

“Its alright pa, im guessing that the time I have left to kick it isn’t much. Them folk over at the clinic wanted me to start popping these pills and have all this shit done. That’s too many needles and too much stress for me. I figure, now is a good time to be out. Not many people will miss me, maybe just you.”

I sank into myself. I’d never heard someone come to this much ease with their undoing. It felt odd and mostly sad.

“I’m not going to let you just fade away.” He laughed again which brought on more coughing. His body was becoming heavier- he was going.

“I’m serious, you’re important.”

“To who?” a small mumble.

“To me.” And I heard a small moan. Like a part of him was touched- that small part that was still fighting for consciousness and he shifted his head towards me so that we could slightly see one another. When he coughed this time there was a little blood on my coat. A couple of men near us bawled up their faces and remarked something heavy to one another. They knew he was a trick. And were probably disgusted by both my kindness and his illness

“Maybe you can make me important to her again.” He sighed turning his gaze to the tenth floor. There was a small figure in the window- as small as the space in her heart musta been.

Ujima shook violently and barked more blood- almost purposefully. He was trying to speak. His mother looked on. I laid him gently on the bench and stood to see her more clearly. I searched for what felt like forever- I searched her face for any emotion- coming to find what I hoped to be remorse.

“COME DOWN HERE! BE WITH YOUR SON! HE’S DYING!” I screamed. I could hear the coughing escalate behind me and all that was in me said go back to the boy. “COME ON!” I repeated. The figure n the window disappeared behind blinds and curtains. And I was still- part of me wishing she was tripping over herself to get down those ten damn flights. The darker part of me knew that this wasn’t true- that she like our other on lookers had forever turned her head. Some others observed- most too paralyzed to act or too stuck under the weight of what this moment meant.

I went back to Ujima and held him, let him rest in my lap. Not much else was said, save a few sweet words.

“Maybe faggots is sad creatures. We get born this way and is forced to make something good with it- or try. And that don’t happen for everybody. I spent a lot of time trying to cry all of it out- force it away so I could be a different kind. And I spent a lot of time trying to find somebody who was gonna love and help me become worthy of things. But that ain’t nothing.” He smiled a shaky smile and then. “nothing at all. I ain’t learn much or do much cause I was stuck.”

I cried again, desperately trying to wipe the water from my tears off of his face.

“We ain’t sad, Ujima. We might be stuck but we ain’t got to be sad.” Those were the only words formed with enough honesty that could escape me. He smiled . . . barely, but still . . .

it was beautiful.

I held him until they took what was left out of my hands- throwing it into one of those bags and I thought on how that shroud wasn’t anywhere as magnificent as he. I thought on the shell I found on that bench- used, cried through, beaten, fragile, honest, joyful, and beautiful. I thought on it becoming apart of the earth and fading away into that embrace years after years from now- like we all will, returning to the place we got such wrappings from and I went to a bar. I called my man and cried to him. He came and we had a drink and a dance for Ujima and it was some sad kind of beautiful.

 

fella. (a little poem about emancipation)

i saw him

drumming sweet on the same day i wanted to end my life

and he smiled

small to himself.

probably no bigger than was meant to be

it was after all, a smile he held for himself

i thought aloud

what is freedom in Black skin?

and how can i be it?

is that possible?

to be both Black and at ease in Babylon?

and so i approached

had tea

and smiled hoping he could teach me.

hip me to that which he had.

“you and i is different, pa. And what is free for you may not be the same for me. But i know this- free is not like grief. it ain’t similar to appearal ready to wear and throw aside. you can’t move free- no more than you can move cool. and you can’t find it in the killing fields. Free is something born inside and made to be found at our cores and held tightly.”

some strange clouds made us friends.

and the gesture of hands held made us intimate in a way that fucking couldn’t.

i felt it there-

a river of arousal and hope rise in me

and sought to stop it at the gates of my eyes because i was taught not to cry before other men.

he kissed my cheek

“we almost there.”