Note to self ...
My thoughts leave in post-it notes
In trails behind me …
Stuck to walls, furniture,
Under shoes, on tables wherever
friction may find me ...
As I age, these after-thoughts make new places to reside. And one day in my distant distant future they’ll adorn my home, where I lay my head and her cradle will rock.
Thoughts of her, just now beginning to stick down the halls.
One day they will coat the walls--
These messages and reminders
These notes I keep, I save them so later
They can find her.
These sticky notes, really seem to stick
It’s a learning tick, something to carry with
Me and then to her...
Notes to myself become notes to my daughter …
I learn the swing of many things as I grow--you will too.
Itś the sway and swattle of life--and black girls tend to get rocked a little harder than most.
They kinda rock the boat -- but we don't jump off the ships in shackles anymore …
For a score and several years ago, we broke them.
But the weight of the iron is still in our blood--
Maybe thatś why when black blood falls on pavements the uproar is kind of heavy...
Makes a lot of people sick--we not anemic yet--but that's fine
We moved past it--thatś what we have to teach the next generation.
And that is just what I’ĺl teach my daughter.
How to learn to groove with the motion of the ocean--
How we are meant to be strong we were bred for this--
Black women--a marvel to be reckoned with
We still royalty itś more than meets the eye
The gold is abundant, we are sun-kissed skies
We absorb it, melanated brownie babies we are an ordinate
Africa was the center of the world once upon a time
Queens alike roamed way before kings did
And you know what they know, that we´ve forgotten,
It takes strength to be a woman--but a different kind of power to be a black one.
That’s why we call it magic.
I'll make sure my daughter learns this and learns it well.
That is a promise. A generational one.
Note to self … Black Girl Magic Is Real
And a force to be reckoned with
-- it is not dark or methodical or anything to be feared
And when itś time for mine to arrive I’ĺl make sure she knows. A black mother is a strong pursuit and itś not for everybody. To be a black woman is powerful, but to be a black mother is to be resilient and glorious and all that is good in the world.
I am nowhere near ready, but I know when the time comes I will be.
And that last note--that one is for me.
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