Blossom: Full Moon Finale

TW: mentions of mental health, xenophobia, 

domestic/sexual violence, and grey suicidality

    I remember watching the Korean Drama series "Hwang Ji-Yi" (2006) back in Taiwan and being obsessed with the story that's based on 황진이 c. 1506 - c. 1560 ("Hwang Jini" or "Hwang Ji-Yi"), also known by her gisaeng name 명월 ("Myeongwol" meaning "bright moon"). She was one of the most famous gisaengs in the Joseon Dynasty, and gisaengs (or "kisaengs") were girls and women from socio-politically outcast, lower class, or even slave families who were trained to be courtesans, providing artistic entertainment and conversation to men of the upper class... And though there were different periods, laws, and discourses on the relationships to prostitution as well as sexual exploitations and violence, they were carefully trained and frequently accomplished in the fine arts, poetry, and prose, and although they were of low social class, they were respected as educated artists. Hwang Ji-Yi was one of the most influential gisaengs that have inspired many modern medias of storytelling... It was said that Hwang Ji-Yi refused to follow social norms for women to marry and chose the life of a gisaeng, giving her the freedoms and access to learn not only dance and music, but also art, literature, and poetry - topics that were not normally taught to young women during that time. Copied below is one of the only preserved example of her sijo (traditional Korean poems/verses):

冬至 섯달 기나긴 밤을 한 허리를 잘라 내어

春風 이불 아래 서리서리 넣었다가

어론님 오신 날 밤이여든 구뷔구뷔 펴리라.

in loose poetic translations to...

I will divide this long November night

and coil by coil

lay it under a warm spring blanket

and roll by roll

when my frozen love returns

I will unfold it to the night.

    And I remember the last episode of the 2006 Korean drama series, where Hwang Ji-Yi asks a man who was a teacher/academic/philosopher in the community for answers to being an artist in grief; The man sits down with her to have tea, referring to the dried flowers and tea leaves as the teacher he seeks when faced with existential doubts. Thus before they drank the tea to end the night, Ji-Yi watched a decayed and dried chrysanthemum flower opens and blossoms once more... She left a note in the morning for the man to thank him for his teachings of ego-death, and unpacked the lesson of relearning/embracing ordinary life as art before understanding, practicing, and aiming for extraordinary performances or artistic crafts. I was watching/taking this in at age 7-9, and I still come back to this 2006 series for this moment/teaching... Why do we create when we’ve not blossomed ourselves ? I ask this more and more, now especially in these moments after dropping out of University, like how the final episode started with Ji-Yi leaving the giseangs' corridors and fences to first find inspirations for art, but then she found aspirations to find herself instead. I know that deinstitutionalization will always be part of my journey forward and beyond, even if they were ways I had learnt to survive. I now understand that perhaps having potentials in academia was really just potentials of being a model immigrant with the violent bonuses of tokenization, and I don’t want to assimilate any longer. I’ve always been the most good at feeling even if people reject or repress theirs. I want to be good at feeling again, I want to play and care again, I want to feel my body to love and embrace again. With no dissection but just empathy; with no analysis and just practice. I remind myself each day, as I do the bare minimum to get by, while still making time for things like community events, friends, and family - that caring for and growing relationships is indeed my work and my current practice of art/craft, as I remember my high school art teacher saying that “art is about relationships”. Thus I say blossom not bloom because it refers to the whole process of blooming, even after it’s peak, as well as a reference to more than just one flower blooming, especially flowers on a tree or bush... Art has been a way for me to blossom for the world even as I decay, and I used to create for release but now I create for grief. I dream of creating for joy, but often I don’t know how when I don’t feel it long enough to hold. And yet, I still breathe softer each night trying to hold the sky...

"you broke the ocean in

half to be here

only to find nothing that wants you"

- Immigrant by Nayyirah Waheed

    I remember sitting in front of the TV playing Disney Channel to repeat lines after lines, trying hard to soften my accent after people at school making fun of it. I remember being asked to eat outside the portable classroom because someone complained about the smell of my homemade dumplings. I remember the ways I distanced myself from my family, from food to language to spaces. I would do anything to rewind time to hug myself and them, to remind myself of how beautiful it is to be an immigrant, how humbling it is to be a guest, and how honouring it is to offer anew... Now like a seed dropped by a bird that flew across seas, I still sit in solitude with the ways my family are moving back to Taiwan for good during this pandemic. Not that I was ever close with my blood family, especially after I came out and moved to the city, but now I feel the need to hold onto my roots more than ever with being the only one here. I have been slowly trying to reroot and connect, but now it seems impossible stranded alone continents away... So I grieve, and I reroot here on stolen lands with many of my friends and chosen family still not knowing much about Taiwan, nor the original caretakers of this land. Thus we continue to un- and relearn in and from Tkaronto, I honour my mermaid journey from the island of Taiwan to Turtle Island, and I embrace the blossom of my time here even in grief. It's like after 10 years in Canada that people start to forget that I'm not from here, even if I belong, even if I start to learn the media and cultural references that I wasn't here to witness, even if I start to understand the meanings of slangs and local sayings, I still wonder if the same curiosity and understandings are offered to me... I remember during a drive back in high school with my mother that she asked me if I ever felt truly accepted by our white neighbours and peers, even my friends, and I understood why she would only make friends with other immigrant aunties and perhaps why she's deciding to move back home just a little bit more. I say my family love but don't like each other, it becomes bittersweet for me to accept the ways my family care for me without ever understanding, agreeing, nor aligning with me. And over the years I have learnt to celebrate and embrace our differences, as who better than immigrants, to identify and practice the love in-between the gaps of knowledge, the distance of borders, as well as the silences that come with a traveled and tired body... Thus I often lay my body to rest, for many would not understand the aches and longing I embody; I lay my body to rest on this sick and stolen land as I cry, hoping to water the cracks between concretes I still miss playing in the rivers back home. I say home is wherever water flows, but here I am with water as still as a mirror for me to only remember. So I will continue to weep, and remember...

"Immigrants came to these shores bearing a legacy of languages, all to be cherished. 

But to become native to this place, if we are to survive here, and our neighbours too, 

our work is to learn to speak the grammar of animacy, so that we truly be at home..."

- Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

    Animacy meaning alive, and to call this living place my home is a generous and comforting offer but also a violent one while Indigenous people still don't have sovereignty... As the moon softly fills that I shift my agency to gratitude, because it was Black/Indigenous, queer, and trans folks who have held me when I needed solidarity and chosen family the most. It is my responsibility to work towards contributing reparations as long as I occupy and breathe on Turtle Island. However it is not just gratitude but also still grief, as I feel my language, memories, and cultural knowledge slip out of my finger tips each day, I hope to make myself ideally helpful, but at least aware of the justice that's needed for Tkaronto and its first peoples. As Indigenous people have taught me love and elders have been ever more gracious in embracing newcomers, it is our duty to show up and give back, as reconciliation is dead without land back... So I grieve and give thanks, under this full blood moon in Taurus just after the lunar eclipse, I write this final blossom for this blog after 8 years. It has been the most humbling, messy, and honouring journey of storytelling. I look back and witness myself outgrowing myself: word after word and moons after moons; I remember the times I searched for myself through softer words and in hopes softening this world. Now like a dehydrated flower reblossoming in the waters of Scorpio sun, and under the full blood moon in Taurus, I grieve and I give thanks to the trees and land protectors, the wind and water walkers, the fire keepers, and the hearts in solidarity across all seas. And as we blossom again, we take soft care and rest, so we sustain, together beyond timelines of violence and uncertainties... We will blossom, again.

    I remember arriving in "Canada" on August 18th 2011, shivering and unused to the colder chills of a summer ending. I remember the 4 of us living in a motel room for 2 months, I remember not having an address to write down on the first day of school when they asked for my home. I remember this house for 10 years now, even though I moved to the city in August/September 2017 for university; I remember not being able to wake up from this bed, tears wetting my sheets every morning, I remember wanting to die. I remember not knowing myself, nor the world. I remember screams and shattered glass, I remember punched holes in my walls and steps on my chest, I remember crying myself to sleep every night... I remember the violence around and within this house, now almost empty, but I can still hear the walls weep. I remember leaving in the nights only to come back bruised and used, I remember my virginity lost somewhere along the suburban curbs, I remember surviving violence in cars after cars, moons after moons... I remember surviving violence in this house, within myself, and out in this world. Yet still I remember an abundance of unconditional love, community care, and mutual-aid. I hope we don't just remember, but continue to dream of the possibilities that we deserve, because that's how I've lived beyond survival. And even if I still cry, I don't want to cry alone anymore... I want to grow and blossom with the world once more, again and again, moons after moons. And tonight with this full moon finale, I dream for us to stay soft, as "love is a moontime teaching" (Billy Ray-Belcourt). 

Suicidal in Solitude: How To Be Alone

 

(by Nayyirah Waheed)

TW: mental health, grey-suicidality, and mentions of trauma-specific memories...etc.

    6 days after the Full Moon in Virgo I left the city for a break, desperate for rest and a peace of mind I prepare to return after 6 nights for the New Moon in Pisces. Feeling suicidal in solitude I tried escaping, but no where to run from my own mind I thought a change of scenery would save me; I tried dreaming but fell restless with the moon still changing... I tried crying my loneliness away as I confront my lack of loveliness - how to be alone when my head and my heart tire and tear each other apart.

"even if you are a small forest surviving off of moon alone,

your light is extraordinary." - reminder by Nayyirah Waheed

    Fishes swimming in circular conjunctions as I search for balance in the dark, the yin and yangs of memories I remember and feel at the intersections of trauma, growth, and grief... I remember wanting and planning to die at 18 and how it is community work that helped stop me. Ever since, I've been feeling grey-suicidal while often having anxiety/panic attacks or depressive episodes about visualizing death of loved ones and myself. My mind has always had a good imagination as the moon influences my creatives, but when it comes to the deaths of both myself and those I care for - I find myself more and more dissociating from life as death becomes dreams... Thus I ask how to be alone when I dissociate from my own breath ?

"tonight, under the moon:

choose you." - Nayyirah Waheed

    No matter how lonely and no matter the loss, I choose myself. I still wonder of love and if anyone would love a sad girl searching for softness like this, but I realize that I must be the world's teacher and peer to keep loving by example, despite such grief. How to be alone is exploring what beauty comes when embracing solitude. Thus no matter the breath, we are full - unlearning how to be alone through refilling ourselves... If only I could feel satisfied of worth by being instead of becoming while reminding myself to embody love. In life I've learned to grieve but through love I'm ready to heal. I still cry myself to sleep dancing with sunsets' dying rays of gold, and I still stay up with the moon whispering in stardust... Maybe the peace of being alone is the pace of becoming - slowing down a breath for a break thus becoming alone in growth and grace. I don't know how to be alone in solitude because I have allowed shame to consume space, and I come to practice embracing solitude as forgiving myself in full humanity. I need to forgive myself for hurting even in ways I thought I had healed, I must forgive myself for the ways that my body, soul, and mind feel... Thus how to be alone while suicidal in solitude, is to become softer.

    6 days/nights for a break from the city, with lessons of flighting from crisis is me becoming crisis itself after the family home triggers my fights within. So under the moon I meditate - in hopes for higher vibrations of emotional stability and maturity. Thus living grief and loving solitude we ask how to be alone, even when we are free to take another breath, despite it all. 

Love & Grief: How To Be Single

 

(by Nayyirah Waheed)

    Passing the Full Moon in Virgo I loved in freedom. Drowning in tears I bathed in my own blood for rebirth, like daughters of the moon I grieve in love as I give birth to myself once more. Belly-button bleeding with femininity transcending a mother and newborn in one - holding a breath and waiting to cry. I give thanks to honour the grandmother moon, as "love is moontime teaching" (Billy-Ray Belcourt).

"I'm trying to remember you and

let you go at the same time."

- the mourn by Nayyirah Waheed

    How does one grieve over love ? Especially in such isolations during the pandemic... I was supposed to let go last Spring but since quarantine and city lockdowns I found myself holding on, still reaching out and texting back, afraid of loneliness when it already feels like my depression is killing me slowly. Throughout 2020, we went through another year of what it seems of us versus the world, which is a clear red flag of co-independence that I've trying to change in connection from romance to friendship. Yet sometimes, what's meant to end will change its course accordingly, unbothered by my own logical timeline of closure attempts... Let's not pretend that softness survives in concrete wastelands like these, as its not the substance of my love changed but the softness of my love disappointed. I become angry but so helpless to witness a loved one being chased by anti-Black violence and capitalism to the point of no peace - in spirals of social paranoia/distrust/isolation and mental/emotional restlessness. It's extra difficult when I believe in, work with, and have survived through anti-capitalist ideals of community grassroots and mutual-aid practices/politics/poetics... I ask again and again of how to breathe softer so we don't break yet the truth is, some can not afford to breathe deep, or to rest without stress and plan without panic. So how does one love through grief ? How does one really let go when becoming so good at understanding/empathizing ? How does one still believe in the healing of love ?

Him: "sometimes I feel like being a Black man in Canada,

you gotta be a superhero you know ? you have to dodge all the bullets, 

even the invisible ones, and those are the worst ones too 

- they get into your head and makes you think its you.,,"

    Loving has taught me so much, maybe too much that it feels heavy in the heart but I have to believe that its worth the grief to love better, even at times when I forget how to dream with tears flooding my bedsheets. I try to ease my heartache by looking to the Black/Indigenous/trans women/femmes that have came and loved before, as grieving/loving masculinity and healing/rehabilitating colonial-patriarchal violences have been such transcendent teachings of us femmes surviving/navigating relations... Thus I must not give up on love, and I shall prepare and work harder to love ever softer. I need to un/relearn more, and to contribute this energy back into my community efforts. As I've learnt that my love is not a haven for the hurt but can be such raw materials to build and cultivate safer spaces. Perhaps the most honourable and humbling lesson of love is to know its shifting power of being everything and nothing at the same times... When I say I love him but his stomach growls back in answer. When I can't love or pray someone out of police custody, when I can't convince him to stop working and sleep more, when I can't love him out of debts or the demons in his head... How does one keep loving without crying myself out of breath ?

Him: "one day you're gonna find someone soft and relaxed,

not pressured like an animal towards their goals..."

    Sometimes we don't even know of our own softness/magic. As I remembered one night he asked why I say that I'm searching for softness when it's already in me, I come to understand bell hook's notions of "soul-murder" being similar to the violent disconnections from our softness within. I hope he can slow down and listen to the softer voices - a sound I wish to continue amplify so we no longer come to conversations with ourselves in desperation of worth or validation. I wish him a break to breathe without rushing air or swallowing regrets... I hope him well, and over the Full Moon first I hold him in memories of gratitude. He is my first love and by far one of the greatest lessons of my life, one that will continue in my life in different ways/forms. He has taught me to be loved and I only wish that I have shared my softness enough and well. I love him, and I know that I will always love him til the ends of space/time as he has embodied a safe space for me also. He doesn't know how special and capable of love he is with the possibilities/seeds of love and change already in him just waiting for him to water/grow... We have loved, and that’s the most beautiful thing a human can ever do. It breaks my heart and shatters my heart at times when I won’t be able to save him from systematic violence, when I don’t know how to help other than easing stresses by some contributions here and there, and I just hope that someday he can really dream and imagine beyond survival... I believe that we can return in the future with deeper loving relations but for our growing pains now I'm thankful for being so loved and held softly through. Thank you my love, for holding space for my moon even if I'm filled with sadness and when I feel less than full.

    Thus how to be single is learning to breathe when heartbreak. Perhaps soul shattering but beautiful in ways we fall, deep, then finally back to ourselves. As empty and lonely I feel, I am hopeful as I have been loved and I will continue to love, fuller... How to be single is a lesson in-between love poems; How to love and grief is to embrace myself fully once again holding the moon. 

Full Moon Fatigues: How To Be Human

(by Nayyirah Waheed)

    Under the Full Moon in Virgo I meditate on humanity, I pray for softness, and I dream of community... Every time I go out on walks I feel as if I'm learning how to walk again - unlearning stillness and relearning a breath in motion: I look to the trees for teachings on how to be human, I listen to the wind and how the moon whispers as we come to the waters for life while wandering in love - I replant and water my seeds in wishes of blossoming again.

"sometimes the night wakes in the middle of me,

and I can do nothing but

become the moon." - Nayyirah Waheed

    How to be human as how to be myself when I love hating myself, when I amplify others humanities through empathy but dehumanize my own self ? How to be human when I have yet to embrace all that makes me human ? How to be myself in full when humanities are stripped away from the people who live/feel/look like me ? How to be human, when being tires and becoming hurts ? I look to the sky's changing colours as encouragement, I look to the trees changing seasons for lessons of letting go then to the waters for returning back... Home, is of the waves and wherever they flow; Home becomes not the where or what but the how and who we are... How to be human and to be home, to be at home, to be a house they call home but in a house becoming human, while being swallowed and becoming still, I still ask of how to be human... 

"even if you are a small forest surviving off of moon alone,

your light is extraordinary." - reminder by Nayyirah Waheed

    I give thanks to the grandmother moon, as we are full no matter the phase. I honour the full moon in hopes of community reflection and compassion. I witness love as moon ceremony and wish for softness across skies and seas. I have faith in the light but I dare to lean into the shadows, to reseed and reroot intimately within. I explore the depths of my humanity in hopes of humility despite uncertainty, as being human becomes a breath to a word, then finally a feeling we can hold... How to be human is to be love and loved, deep, to be held by yourself and those that came before, to be human is to hold those after you and beyond.

New Year New Moon

TW/CW: future-fatigues, mental health,

eating disorder, and grey-suicidality 

    Sometimes, i don't know how to feel alive: I try holding on to the moments of love, yet still I forget how to feel a breath... Days blending with purpose blurring - tears brewing on sheets with body aching in my sleep. Exhausted; suicidal unrest in house arrest, i try walking to the waters to stay alive... to remember that at last and least there's still the moon, no matter if my heart is far from full: the moon reminds us that we are whole...

"That's all anybody can do right now. Live. Hold out. Survive. 

I don't know whether good times are coming back again... 

But I know that won't matter if we don't survive these times."

- Octavia E. Butler

    Future-fatigue is a term I've been using a lot in my writings both academically and poetically, as in times like these I still search for the softness within to reimagine and dream. Such worldly violences and instabilities urge for re-imagination and organization, first with rest and recovery of course but where do we begin ? It is time that we move forward while re-examining the ways we exploit and claim justice and healing without actually committing. I believe that it must start with brutal reflections thus reseeding empathies in our humanities. And if only I could believe that I'll be here to witness it all too, but I'm tired, and my hope within has been so burnt out that I can not believe in anything but this moment of a breath. I don't know how to believe in a freedom that I often can not feel; I can only dream that those beyond will bask in the glory that my mothers and sisters before had birthed... Thus this breath is for all of those after. Perhaps not living for myself is just another dance with my imposter syndromes, as it still contributes to the self-loathing narratives of not feeling/being enough, thus again neglecting my own needs of survival justice and healing... This pandemic has really forced my psyche into shadow work, into ruthless reflections and analysis of myself as well as my relations with the world. I miss the sun, as at times I feel so intensely and internally that I don't know how to feel light anymore. I couldn't help but wonder of ways to love the moon without being the moon...

    I cry and try to write, trying to feel alive. Yet it's different now than before when I wanted to die, where I was grieving again and again. Now I feel more numb but anxious, maybe more hopeful, but still unsure, like walking through a tunnel I feel as if I'm close to something but I don't know what is. It feels like a moment of decisions, of planning and preparing, even if I'm uncertain of what for. I've been reading more, which on one hand fills me with resonance and empathy, especially when I'm reading other trans Black, Indigenous, and people of colour's words through survival and healing, but on the other hand I feel overwhelmed with thoughts/triggers and often discouraged to write my own words/stories/response down. Perhaps my story isn't needed/wanted when there's already so many out there, and maybe I'm not needed/wanted to be a storyteller... Yet I must try to remind myself that there must be a space for all of us, and that hierarchal or exclusive ideals/structures are violent legacies of the colonial-patriarchy and capitalism in which interrupts/disrupts our social-empathies to rise up together as a community/collective. I am a storyteller through softness, and no matter if I drown or breathe, may my words be the evidence of my growth, my fight, and my love... 

    There are days when I cannot eat, and nights where I cannot sleep. It's times like these that I feel like I am indeed alive but not living. My thoughts start consuming me as I lose appetite and sleep; force-feeding myself and smoking til I pass out, I have impulses of deleting traces and data to just disappear, to erase all my writings and offerings for the public, to just finally sleep and start over. That's it. Maybe I'm not trying to actively die anymore - I'm trying to start over. I want to feel better, I want to love better, I want us to breathe better, and softer... Thus I meditate and pray for us to breathe softer and softer so we don't break. As newness requires softer practices with harder commitments, perhaps it all begins like planting a seed. Even in 2021 I still am a flower asking why I deserve to bloom, and when unanswered by the world now I must search for purpose within. First by seeding then watering, softly waiting through each phase of rebirth and regrowth as we re/unlearn again through circumstances that call for greater love and care for each other. 

On Accountability & 'Cancel Culture'

    I've found myself having to apologize a lot in my life, and it's not because of always hurting/harming people but a trauma response for often not feeling enough... Yet I've really taken this opportunity to examine/reflect/study accountability, anatomies of an apology, guilt, and ethical responsibilities to each other within/across/between communities, as well as the feelings/healing that fuels such emotional phenomenon of (re/un)learning, calling-in/out, diverse definitions/demands of duties/ideals within/across/between relationships, and forgiveness as well as reparations/restorations after impact... Thus how do we even begin with the guilt of being, when my existence/presence on stolen land contributes directly to the violence and continuance of settler-colonialism ? I've come to learn to use my guilt as drive, as basis of my passion and will for Indigenous sovereignty, as my being would be nothing without the resilient becomings of the elders, youths, and the water/land protectors across Turtle Island... 

    But verbal/emotional/mental acknowledgement is far from enough, as it takes practice to relearn languages, to unlearn mindsets/impulses/behaviours, to understand/learn how to make space, what it means to create softness/safety, to invest in mutual-aid and more meaningful connections, to buy/purchase Black/Indigenous-owned services as well as to always give back/thanks/credit. I remind myself that there is no 'enough' when it comes to allyhood for all livelihoods, as there's always room to love, care, and learn better/more. And I often think about the differences between interpersonal and socio-political accountabilities, how they intersect and how each serves differently in diverse circumstances... I've had the honour to (un/re)learn thus humbly reference Rania El Mugammar's teachings/work: The Anatomy of An Apology for better understandings/reflections upon accountability. One thing I've also learned over the years is that if we're truly sorry and remorseful about our faults/harmful impact, we should not even be seeking forgiveness at all - we should we seeking and working towards reconciliation through harm reduction with minimal feedings/centerings of our feelings. It is to understand that the relief to our guilt is not being given forgiveness necessarily but to be a worthy and useful contribution to their healing by duty/responsibility/care. Thus to be accountable, is to reconciliACT in changed behaviours/ideals for the betterment of those impacted/harmed/exploited/neglected. Even if that looks like leaving them alone, to give space for process/healing, and to honour the boundaries needed when they are impacted no matter the state/excuse. One of the most important lessons of mine is also to understand that not all can be fixed or forgiven, thus our guilts/regrets really are just fixations on our feelings without clear conscious of what is needed for reconciliation and justice. I remembered years ago being compassionately called-in with words/labels like "savage"/"spirit animals" that I've learnt from mainstream/pop culture, and til today I am thankful for those reminders/teachings thus knowing how to navigate/serve better within/between/through interpersonal relations and for the defence/honour of Indigenous presence/history/resilience. One of the lessons I'm also grateful for was from a virtual and meditative conversation/smoking session with someone I consider a great friend/femme-fam/ally and mentor over the years, and we spoke about our crafts, poetry, and words... also how we can easily find anti-Blackness even in the romanticizations of healing through words - comparing lightness and darkness, using words like the shadows in relation to trauma... How can we write and heal without historical/cultural measures/norms of negativity surrounding darkness ? What about weight and heaviness ? As a writer/poet and emotional being I confess of using language like "feeling heavy", and I now know that contributes to the mindset of heaviness/fatness = negativity. I believe that all is connected and influenced thus a sort of responsibility to analyze and reflect in every circumstance/interaction/sentence/conversation/incidence to truly hold ourselves accountable to our ideas/speech/actions/impact. Yet aside from being accountable to both ourselves and others through interpersonal/socio-psychological relations, what about our commitments to community as a collective ? And how we navigate/serve personal relations/responsibilities while through community guidelines/duties remain a lesson/journey/test of our fair support/solidarity for justice.

    Then we have what's known as "cancel culture" - which I believe to be rooted in notions of community safety/care but often polluted with social media performativity/spectacality, and false/tainted intentions/presentations of politics... The possibilities of being canceled has been a common joke/punchline from certain peers surrounding my work and social profile. It still brings me great discomfort when joked about being "canceled"/"exposed" in the future as it makes me question if people my age actually believe in my/my work's genuineness/values at all, but also a reminder of the realities of serving/organizing communities publicly. At the end of the day, my name is not mine when I've chosen to work for/towards community, and I believe it to be an honour even if it becomes a trigger of anxiety/panic over how others view/think/speak of me. Yet I stand softly and strong in my essence as I hope for my character to be firm, foundational, and transparent enough to not have to explain/defend myself when times come controversies. And though I've learned to stay away from drama and often keeping my full opinion/analysis/understanding to myself, recently I was still forced into the spotlight as a target of being canceled/unfollowed on Instagram... It all surrounds me being approached by a local organization/team of queer/trans Asians who posts/organizes/hosts campaigns as well as events centering Queer/Trans Black, Indigenous, and People of Colour narratives. They reached out back in the Summer to include me in a photoshoot which I was honoured/humbled to accept, however the concept was to have me wear a t-shirt with words of "Jolliqueen" while eating Jollibees fried chicken. I knew that Jollibees from the Philippines and had checked in with their team as well as a close Filipino friend/sister at the time, and was explained that their whole team/organization involved were Filipino and they were okay/wanted to cast me even though I'm Taiwanese. I was also encouraged/supported by my sister/friend back then and had a fairly pleasant time participating in the campaign - but now a few months later before the photos even came out, I was now called to be cultural appropriating and racist of/towards Filipino culture... Thus now I know in my deepest apologies/regrets that I should have never agreed to appear in a campaign when another trans Filipino person would have been the perfect fit. It was never my intention to take up space where it's not appropriate and maybe the flatter/vanity got to my ego before my conscious could be clear. There's no excuse or forgiveness needed as I should have been smarter and questioned myself more. Though I'm glad to have the organizers/team respond so professionally/compassionately as we all agreed that the photos just won't be used/posted when time comes. And I'm only thankful that this was dragged out with intentions to cancel my name by a hurting friend instead of community outrage/disapproval/responses that could come after posting... Maybe it's a sign for me to never model seriously/professionally, or just a reminder to trust my initial questions/doubts - if I needed to check-in with their team on their casting decision and creative directions, then having to double-check/unpack with a community member, then I probably shouldn't have accepted the gig (not that I was compensated/profited in any way). I'm not perfect, and I know I must do better and hold myself more transparent/accountable to each person/community I interact, encounter, and collaborate if I dare claim to love/care/honour.

    Also not to use such (un/re)learning experience to critique/debunk cancel culture, but an example of the usage/exploitations of social media and politics as intentional tactics/tools to hurt/harm/slender/call-out someone's public name/presence unforgivingly... I believe in community accountability and canceling/calling-out publicly as tools of harm reduction and announcements of safety measures. I believe in calling-out predators and abusers for the safety/care of victims/survivors within communities, I believe in publicly shaming and dishonouring discriminative/violent practices/services across communities. I believe in the need for being accountable, honest, and true to ourselves - but not like this, not how names are thrown without decency and respect, not when shared traumas in private are used so ruthlessly without empathy, not virtually online where compassion is already fatigued. I become so sad and disappointed of how many chooses to follow/unfollow without further investigation/understanding, thus I come to realize that the internet public is often more interested in a gasp then in whole truths. And I must remind myself of softness, of standing in my vulnerability against judgement and accusations, I must again remind myself of true allyship and accountabilities. I remind myself to stay myself, as I've learned that realness will always be questioned and tested... 

    I call on us to invest into community healing, into what comes next after calling-in/out, into learning what it takes for reparative/restorative justice. I wish we can grief softly over the love and fights we've lost, and to remain respectful through circumstances/complications. I pray for us to heal, as I demand for empathy and more compassion even in socio-political analysis/reflections... I believe in our growth, as even a survivor I call for abolishing the prisons - I believe in humanity and healing. I believe in holding truth and our communities even safer, closer, and softer.

Growth & Grief

    Sometimes I dream of a death-like sleep, an escape, a safe hideaway to be without dissection, without needing to prove my existence or worth, without care or contributions to be deserving of my next breath... Sometimes I become so exhausted I only wish to disappear, forever, to forgive myself of all the ways I've failed at love, at teaching life thus barely surviving, at grace and compassion as it seems not enough, as it feels not enough to be offering my heart... Sometimes, I feel not enough.

"You are allowed to heal toward a future version of yourself 

without hating who you are right now. 

You have the option to love yourself to new levels."

- Rachel Elizabeth Cargle

    And then I remember of how a therapist once told me at 16 that it's okay to let go in order to grow, to thank the people who's no longer in your journey towards healing, to wish them well and forgive myself too. As at the end of the day I hold no guilt or regrets for the ways I had loved and shared, even if misunderstood and antagonized, my love and care remains sacred and true to its time - I must believe that, I must remind myself that, in order to stay alive I must believe that my love, compassion, and patience worth something, that no time was wasted, that all is honoured and deserving even through torturing heartbreak/betrayal... Thus grief, as it seems a reoccurring thesis/lesson of this year when we've been grieving all year in midst of such violent calls for transformation, for restorative and reparative justice. I've been crying from the Blue Full Moon to the Beaver Full Moon - surviving threats, weaponized politics and twisted words, I struggle to mourn in peace while social medias drained with compassion-fatigued dramas and an audience-filled spectacality. No mediation or explanation needed as my last conversations were simply a call for consideration, a realization for boundaries and self-preservation - as sharing my feelings in vulnerability and truth still stands no conflict in my mind but an unfortunate subject to public projections and assumptions. I only pray/hope for the healing of all, meditating for growth through grief as I attempt to find softness again in cruelty and hurt... 

"Grief can be a garden of compassion.

If you can keep your heart open through everything, 

your pain can become your greatest ally in your life's search for love and wisdom."

- Rumi

    Virgo in mutable Earth - characterized and rooted in changeability: I remembered losing friends/allies and being villianized in high school after coming out, still I look back in truth of queer/transphobic/ableist layers within mistreatments and misunderstandings but also I come to understand/realize one's need/relief through calling-out instead of calling-in. I was so hurt and desperate to call out the injustices to my feelings/identity/being that I didn't know how to call-in through grace/softness. And maybe if I had called into reflections instead of outing behaviours with socio-political theories of violence/hierarchies that people would have responded with less denial and defensiveness. Yet I must forgive myself for the ways I thought I needed to fight in defence when already exhausted from daily discriminations and micro-aggressions. I understand the need to fight, but over the years I've become too tired, thus mostly in flight. And when later awakened to published comments of my body as a candidate/competition for some university-student-elections drama, I come to learn again the balance between silence and vocalizing a stance through both being villianized/victimized so publicly and powerlessly to my control... I come to realize from all these internet incidences of slandering, call-outs, and misunderstandings/accusations/questions of who I am and how I live, that I have to stand soft in my character/essence and believe in the ways I have loved. Thus I know as a writer/poet/speaker that it is not the words of others or even myself that gets the honour of being remembered, but the ways we have made others feel and the spaces/stories we have shared in vulnerability/truth. I begin to understand through healing of how love/care without boundaries are self-destructive and unproductive to the healing of others/myself, as I'm also not responsible for how others react to my boundaries especially when my softness had already been extended, exhausted, and exploited - I must remind myself that my feelings and needs are honourable before pleasing/responding to others' traumas and forgiving for the ways their projections hurt me... From trees wilting that I learn to grief in grace and peace, waiting for new greens and blossoms in the love of growth/rebirth.

"I think it is healing behaviour

to look at something so broken and

see the possibility and wholeness in it."

- Adrienne Maree Brown 

    Sometimes I grief for the love never returned, for the love I served on silver platters but stepped on like street puddles, and for the love I desperately felt/gave for hopes of healing. Sometimes I still doubt my purpose of being here - a wilting flower asking why she deserves to blossom... And perhaps the remedy is to understand that my love is not the answer nor solution, that its been an honour and enough to contribute and care for our collective traumas/pains, that it has been and will be enough through softness and truth. As even though we are dying too we still dance, wilting in grace as we continue to plant the seeds of rebirth thus harvesting for the ingredients to our future...

On Feelings & Judgement/Justice (TDOR 2020)

    I am an emotional being and I must honour that - as softness brings strength and as we've survived by becoming soft so we don't break...

    Being a person/femme of feelings for healing is often not understood with dominant societal performative behaviours/attitudes of niceness and "wokeness" displayed/emerging/practiced. However, I am not interested nor invested in niceness but kindness, as being "nice" interpersonally and socio-politically has proven itself to be more of a submissive people-pleasing trait for survival, as well as a navigation of conflict avoidance without mutual accountabilities. All my life I have been shamed/misunderstood for my ocean of emotions, for diving into sensuality, and for my strive of justice through empathy. Many would say I'm less of an intellectual or logical thinker/decision-maker when I'm so emotionally driven but I whole heartedly disagree, as my feelings are indeed research for a clearer and more compassionate judgement of collective considerations. I don't aim to feel for myself but to feel for the world: for the trees, for the clouds and the sky, for the flowers and rain, for those feeling never enough and those searching to feel whole.

    I am firm, in the reminders of softness that we are full no matter the phase. Yet through hyper-awareness and constant reflections for change I come to understand, that it is cruel to force feelings upon those who are not ready - as who am I to unpack traumas when all I can offer is a soft/safe space for a revolution we still have to dream of... Sometimes, I don't know how to preach healing when the pains of living become greater than our desires for medicine and my humble words of support/solidarity. How does a tired/sad one prove and explain to a colonial-capitalistic society that softness is worth it ? How can I convince a starving Black queer man that mutual-aid is enough, how do I promise a homeless trans refugee that it gets better ? What can I do but to be there - to cry and starve but rejoice for the ways we survive together, only to grief of the abundance that we deserve... As feeling it all does not bring justice but sets a foundation for transformative justice, for collective healing with the empathy of no one being left behind. I've come to realized that when I center/honour my feelings, boundaries, and emotional capacities while embodying the future I dream of, I find myself breathing beyond survival but within an abundance of grace and worth by community. Thus the justices we seek around us and socio-politically need to be led by the justices we demand internally/interpersonally...

    Especially after trans day of remembrance/resistance/resilience while surviving a year full of grief in solitude (quarantine/lockdown), the urgency of self-preservation and care is crucial in honouring our feelings no matter the weight/ways of process. It is (un/re)learning to be soft with ourselves that we can offer the same for others, and it is affirming our diverse and complexed emotions that we honour our humanities as divine and deserving. When we must demand for our roses while alive and pray to rest/sleep in peace, where we grow our own flowers tired of waiting - there becomes a softness goldenly brewed and patiently breaking.

    I write poems just to feel alive: waiting on cheques via mail wasting on delivered meals while waking up to cold fries for lunch and crying for dinner. I lie anxiously between bedsheets and blankets lying to myself of how a body can sustain without food, I scream into pillows with how a mind suffocates. I try to work without becoming cold, I stay soft so I can stay alive as I meditate for another breath...

bodies and earth as one:
i dare to dream of freedom - of feelings
to believe in a liberation through softness
i dare to dream of abolishing the police and state
to rejoice in community in reparations and justice
i dare to dream of
remembering as resistance
in healing and sustaining our resilience

On Racial Belonging & Solidarity

    Home is wherever water flows - as being immigrant and trans have layered my experiences, feelings, and navigations around/to the concepts of home and belonging...

    I remembered at the age of 11 turning 12 - moving countries again and again before settling in 'Canada', across the globe and far away from my East-Asian Island home. It was a contrast compared to living in Singapore and Malaysia as well, where flights to/from Taiwan were only 4-5 hours long. Yet I remembered being excited to leave and begin again despite the uncertainties of distance and language/cultural barriers... I wanted to start over and do/be better, socially as a feminine "boy" tired of being bullied at every school I went to. I told myself that I must learn to fit in and make friends, forcing myself to be more masculine and thus why I tried hanging out with many cis-guy classmates in grade 7 when I first came. And fast-forward to failed attempts of learning cis-masculinity, repressing queerness/trans-femininity, and toughing out against endless gay/fat jokes, which resulted in me finally coming out as a queer teen. However, the lessons and trials of assimilation for socio-political survival doesn't end there as traumas of being asked to eat dumplings outside a portable classroom also made me stopped eating Chinese food at middle-school and fighting with my mom weekly about what to bring as lunch... Coming to what we know now as 'Canada' as a child who already was marginalized socially in different Asian countries/cities/schools, was a violent game of cultural-assimilation and self-whitewashing with my deep desires to being understood/loved/accepted to be exploited as drive for mental submission. I still think of young times of solitude as a child growing up and playing alone, without trying to be anybody else or ever compromising my identity/expressions for others' understandings nor validations. I remembered not having any words/analysis/reflections nor explanations of why other boys and girls wouldn't play with me or laughed at me; I remembered crying about people not being nice but sometimes being okay with it as well... I softly remember and gently treasure those innocent and youthful memories of enjoying/embodying/embracing myself - memories I miss/grief/recall for our hurting humanity. 

    And then one night in the last year of high school on our way home, my mother asked in conversation if I think I'll ever and fully be seen/treated as white Canadian after years of cultural-abandonment and conditioned self-assimilation... I responded no while remembering the stares of cis white parents, the betrayals/neglect/misunderstandings/tokenizations from cis white peers, and even if queer but cis + whiteness: the normality of privilege and ego comfort. Looking back: from sitting in front of the TV repeating sentences in practice to soften my accent to me being the only trans person of colour in social-circles to me pleased to be a cis white girl's "gay best friend" to how no one cared for a trans friend at the end - I understand that it was all but a game of trying to be seen, felt, and wanted while navigating character/identity realizations/development/actualizations. Many other Asian/immigrant peers called me "banana" and joked about my whitewashing back then as well, but I forgive and hold myself dearly for the ways I had learned for survival. Especially as a queer/trans person in a suburban town like Waterloo, I now understand how my lightskin and me speaking the colonizer's language was what had saved me from further social-antagonization/alienation and extreme/violent discriminations/marginalization... Yet I remember not long after, it was a friendly stranger's kindness/softness: an older non-binary Black femme, who's an immigrant-islander as well who sent me money after hearing stories of transphobia at school. It was also around when I started attending community poetry slams after losing most friends at school, thus again a new beginning of social-searching for belonging. Though this time, it was of queer/trans Black, Indigenous, and people of colour who were artists as well. I remembered being in awe of coloured femme bodies together, in support and solidarity, being unapologetically ethnic and feminine on their own terms. I remembered feeling free, and accepted, even when I've just met those people yet now I understand that its the linage and connections that we have as femmes of feelings for healing...

    Black people have taught me love as Indigenous people have taught me life. I have painted myself as a lost/abandoned mermaid at shore for a self-portrait before as I've often referred to my journey of interpersonal/socio-political belonging to being a mermaid. Thus through growth and reflections, I really believe that my blossom here as a settler-immigrant in Turtle Island (North America) could not have been if I didn't cross paths with certain mentors, chosen-families, and community members - if it weren't for the teachings, generosity/grace, and specific moments of reaching out/empathy - I would not be the flower I am today. It is from Black/Indigenous women/femmes that I relearn how to grow a home internally while communities externally; and it is with Black/Indigenous queer/trans folks that I unlearn for collective rest, self-preservation, and intercommunal joy: like an adopted mermaid at shore, I will forever hold gratitude and give back for the ways this land and its land/water protectors have helped me breathe.

    Though I was also afraid of repeating same mistakes - of mistaking bodies as homes, as belongings and acceptance my inner child still craves... As domestic violence and physical abuse was the normal exchange between families of blood that I still seek of chosen-families by waters for cleanse. Yet I must belong deeply to myself, like waves extending/embracing out and back to themselves; I must feel safe with the rivers within even if I become/represent the in-betweens of belonging - perhaps both, perhaps none, perhaps all but still one and at peace. I must cry oceans wondering of home, to wander across seas for blood just to drink and cry more... So I understand, that there needs to be no belonging for solidarity as empathy is not required for support either. We don't need to be included to love and care, to re/unlearn and to do/be better. I am a Taiwanese lightskin immigrant, an East-Asian islander, and a transgender-woman/femme always in support/solidarity while searching for softness and belonging. Though no matter my positionalities of "home" or belonging, I shall defend the homes of others as well as the homes of our collective future. 

On Fetishization (Sexualities & Fears)

fetish (noun.) : "a form of sexual desire in which gratification is linked to an abnormal degree to a particular object, item of clothing, part of the body, etc."

    As a transgender woman/femme of colour navigating this patriarchal society: I have interpersonally and socio-politically understood fetishization through experiences of exploitive intimacy as well as conditions of always being desired sexually but never loved physically/mentally. Yet also as a body/sex-positive/affirmative assault-survivor in processes of healing, I not only wish to understand the violences of fetishization but the roots of such drive for dehumanization as well as the complicities among us all who are impacted by the colonial constructions of sexual/physical values of exchange... I often wonder of the differences between 'kink' and 'fetish', of how they intersect and challenge each other's ideals and notions of sexual/physical norms as well as their relations to our diverse roots/triggers of pleasure/desire. From reading, communicating, and reflecting: I have understood kinks to be "abnormal/non-conventional" physical/sexual practices/concepts/fantasies, while fetishes are usually described as sexual fixations and psychological needs for a specific/certain object/act. Some explains it in simple yet confusing matters that "all fetishes are kinks but not all kinks are fetishes"... And such conversations first bring me to the needs of discussing our understandings of kinks as a colonial impact, as some would have suggested that intersex/queer/trans bodies and sexualities are kinks by historical/cultural/educational marginalization. Especially when we know that "kinky" hair have also been used to describe coily/twisted/curly hair often with Black/Afro-Indigenous hair as abnormal, non-conventional, or a social spectacle in hierarchal comparisons to settler-European standards and norms of non-textured/straight/wavy hair. So with hair as an introductory, layered, and intersecting matter between both understandings of 'kink' and 'fetish', I wonder what the differences between having a "hair kink" and having a "hair fetish"... Through analysis and thought I come to realize that perhaps having a hair kink is of being physically/sexually/mentally hyper-aroused/attracted to the visuals/concepts of certain/specific hair, while having a hair fetish requires certain/specific hair to be physically/sexually/mentally satisfied. Even with the example subject/object changing, ie. feet kinks vs feet fetishes, the analysis remains sound and I can understand how partnerships of safe kink/fetish play can work out in both favours with one having kinks of hair being gripped/pulled and another having hair fetishes (ie. sensory fixations of touching/grabbing/smelling/licking hair). While one could have roleplaying kinks of being worshipped/served with another having the feet fetish to focus on and be at one's feet... Kinks are interpersonally and socio-politically shaped by what we have been taught, considered, and understood to be non-conventional intimate practices/concepts/fantasies between bodies, which is heavily historically/culturally based in the normality of perceiving sexuality as purposes of human reproduction. And embracing open/diverse sexualities and intimate physical expressions/practices/desires is decolonizing our perceptions of what is sensually/sexually "normal". Yet while I can be easily kink-positive and accepting, it takes more to unpack fetishization as it also often feeds into the colonial-patriarchal notions of physical/sexual normality with slippery slopes to hyper-sexualization, objectification, and dehumanization.

    Fetishes still can be expressed and practiced healthily with the focus to be objective and direct. And while I think it is dehumanizing to the root of objectifying certain body parts or requiring specific features to be satisfied sexually to the sight/mind/touch, I still have witnessed and heard community testimonials of healthy practices/expressions of fetishes of hair/feet/toes/armpit/nipples/anus...etc. Though what causes the red flags for me is the slippery slope of giving into colonial-hierarchal categories of exotic/forbidden desires and the fetishization of identities. When the focus is no longer objective and direct, it places the subject in a dehumanizing position during such exchanges/shares of physical/sensual intimacy while the fetishizer focuses and emphasizes on their sexual satisfaction/release. Thus I come to understand that kinks are rooted in sub-cultural, anti-conditioning desires/fantasies while fetishization is deeply rooted in psychological repressed attractions/needs for a physical/sexual relief... And when transferring realizations to the lived aggressions/experiences/violences of being fetishized, I console myself on the fact that I will never escape the socio-political/sexual realities of fetishization when the slur "tranny"'s history begins as a porn category of sub-dehumanization. Even now in 2020, people still ask what "transgender" means and if a trans woman means to have boobs and a dick at the same time, because that's what most have seen/witnessed/understood through mis-notions/representations of an entire group of people through fetishizing media like main-stream pornography. And while the situation can still be non-violent and sensually/sexually safe if the fetish focus is on "the feminine penis" as many cis-men are attracted to women/femmes with dicks and it all works out fine, but when such mental fixation conflicts with one's colonial-patriarchal cis-heteronormative constructions/definitions/understandings of being, then it often leads into violence towards others and internal struggles within the self/ego... As kinky concepts and fantasies (should) have consent and consistent communications between participating partners, many hold fetishes as psychologically personal and private thus not unpacked and often acted upon urges or intended self-serving satisfactory. Needlessly to say/state that all is but our humanities navigating through sensuality, intimacy, and sexuality, and though both kinks and fetish are socio-psychological evidences of colonial-hierarchies of the body, fetishization remains deeply in relations with repressed fixations, control, and fears.

    As an immigrant and East-Asian islander, I have also felt the racial fetishizations forced upon me physically/sexually as focuses of exoticism as eroticism in degrading positionalities. From men guessing my ethnicity as ways of flirting to non-consensual nicknames/catcalls of "Ling Ling"/"Panda"/"Fortune Cookie"...etc. and while I'm still trying to settle my feelings around being called "Bubble Tea", many still don't know that bubble tea is Taiwanese or where Taiwan even is. Though such experiences only has led to more socio-political analysis and reflections for collective accountability, as I have noticed my own attractions/interactions with men of colour to be even more critical in understanding intersections of raciality and sexuality. Despite growing up queer/trans and learning how to repress interpersonal truths/desires/pleasures, I began practicing/expressing sexuality/sensuality after coming out and coming to what we know as Canada. And such journey of a trans-woman/femme being exploited/fetishized for her body in discretion began with white men as I navigated through Kitchener-Waterloo as a queer teenager. Yet along the way and after moving to Tkaronto (Toronto), I not only have found belonging to queer/trans racialized chosen-familites/social groups/communities, I also find myself less sensually/sexually attracted to white/European-descent peoples/features. I've often joked about "decolonizing my pussy" and decentering from our attractions to whiteness especially as an immigrant who knows/understands the powers/corruptions/violences of both white supremacy and settler-colonialism, but I've also wondered privately about my sudden increase of interests after being rap*d twice with both times encountering men of colour... I find myself to be the best investigator for my own feelings/behaviours, thus it's also part of my psychological responsibility to constantly unpack and unlearn while calling for socio-political accountabilities. I often question my own complicities within discourses of anti-Black racism and racial fetishization even as a POC who experiences racism, xenophobia, and racial fetishization as well, but I must align myself with such constructions of violent hierarchies due to my lightskin and participating on settling on stolen lands. It is continuing difficult conversations within and around that pushes us to do/be better. And I couldn't help but wonder if my preferences of raciality can be a form of fetishization instead of realizations/growth away from the colonial-patriarchal whiteness... From talks with another trans sister/femme of colour on our lives being fetishized on a daily, we critiqued of how such attractions based from internal conflicts/fears only feed the egos of normality; while some searches/obtains empowerment from participating hyper-sexualization, some finds empowerment/healing from desexualization (especially after sexual violences). I personally know many fabulous queer/trans racialized sex workers who can testify to their challenges against femme/trans/fat/racial fetishization/dehumanization by turning the table and still profiting/monetizing as reclaiming power. However for myself, I ask if I can build my own tables and grow intimacies on my own terms of balancing between sensuality/sexuality through softness... And when asked about removing/detaching myself completely from such societal-obsessed sexualization and hierarchies of fetishization, my friend suggested that I dedicate myself to demisexuality -

    So there it is, not demisexuality to be exact but empathy: my weapon/shield against the violences of such fetishization both within and around, is hyper-humanization. Which is also what I believe in when we speak of decolonizing human intimacies and relations, as not exchanges of power but a sharing of powers. I dare to dream of loving/caring for each others bodies/minds while exploring/honouring our pleasures. I can only dream of a world without hyper-sexualization/fetishization as representations in media with understandings of consent blurred and cheated on. I dream of un/relearning sensual and emotional intimacy, by hyper-humanizing and empathizing with all bodies/identities/expressions that we encounter, interact, and access. I want to not only combat our fears with compassion, but filling the gaps of difference by creating safer spaces of intercommunal desires/pleasures as well... On the socio-psychological and political spectacles of fetishization/sex/fear, it is through a collective effort of transforming mindsets/relations to honour our bodies, humanities, and souls for freedom. As my powers birth from growing gardens of revolutionary justice, not from the games of colonial-patriarachy and its tools of desirability as poetics of hierarchal violence.

Disease & Death

 

(by Nayyirah Waheed)

TW/CW: Disease/Death & Mental Health

          I’ve realized that what kills me more than death is to become death itself, to host/carry a disease and to embody as a death device... I’ve realized that no one will save us when we’re categorized as a condition, as othered, as sub or less human. I’ve realized that I’ve been called both AIDs and Corona for just breathing as an East-Asian tranny on the streets. I’ve realized, that if this disease does fall upon me then there’s still a chance of being misgendered during and after death... I’ve realized that this colonial-capitalist system is a disease of itself working us to a slow death of delusion but I promise, that my death shall devour itself with the system and offer perhaps a humbling story of honouring our breath.

          No sympathy for the sick: they ask why the rejected go reckless without questioning their own rejection and our ways of marginalization... Since when have we gotten so comfortable to label humans as statistics or percentages/chances of exposure/risk ? How did we become so justified in such apathy ? Why are we okay with prioritizing our own wellness over others ? How is it okay to fit moral hierarchies into matters of health and death, when we already know of the inequities/injustices embedded in our medical institutions ? Why have we gotten so good at cruelty ? Who are we to decide of the deserving and why do we assume ourselves to be deserving ? It's weird having suicidal-grey episodes spiralling while waiting for test results, only as if our society doesn't hold enough stigmas causing anxieties brewing within... Over the years of being a past sex worker, a survivor, as well as a sexually positive community member, I have really emphasized on the work of destigmatizing conversations/commonalities of sexual health and testing. Yet even with all that, it didn't stop the social pressures and stigmas against Covid-19 to get to me, especially when feeling mentally ill. Microaggressions of being stared or moved away from, first because I'm a tranny but now also because I'm (East)Asian... I couldn't help but feel unwanted and undeserving of space, which isn't new but now buried in flashbacks I still wonder of death. I wonder of those without insurance or assistance, I wonder of us erased in medical books, I wonder of those turned away and let go, of how the state fails us again and again with lives slipping through the cracks. I wonder of this breath for us all, even in death. 

          Though death will not save me from my own depression, nor will I let the world use this disease for their own. I ask if we were really concerned for each other if we're not impacted, I ask how are we really concerned if we're not at risk, and what will we do, to keep each other safe ? How can we stop the delusion that we keep ourselves safe individually when really we only rot in comfort individually... Panic is of privilege response and a distraction; what we need is preparation and action. The virus is real but what we think we know is not. It is inhumane to call for awareness when we're not aware of those already suffering without acknowledgment. What we need is not better ethics but empathy, and expect moral compassion to follow organically... May we grief ever so softly, gently, and gloriously thus may we die in power and rebirth in gold.

Abolishing The Police Within

          every breath i take i balance between life and death. every day i wake feeling undeserving, crying into my sheets and apologizing to the world, for how i have failed at love, for how much i hate myself, for not being or doing enough, for not feeling enough... through experiencing/witnessing violence, hating/loving myself, and embracing death that i (re/un)learn life from lessons of humanity. we study humanity, we research compassion, we experiment empathy; we come to understand that humanity is of such soft essence, many would name it fragile but through softness comes strength, as life only blooms the brightest in organic ways - as souls only saved in the peace/truth of salvation - as "there is brilliance in survival but thriving is an art form"... what we have been taught, even by ourselves for survival, may not always be the medicines for healing. how do we find freedom while still fighting for liberation ? how can we find collective joy amongst such pains ? how do we move forward, together ?

          every time i go to the waters i wish to bow in balasana, pray in child's resting pose, stretch my hands into receiving the waves - i meditate for cleanse, for clarity, for clear conscious. i hate myself so i ask for forgiveness, i love myself so i ask for teachings. i hate the world because i love the world, and i dare to hate myself deeper, to love the world better... the nature of our egos position ourselves in the good, as we most make decisions that are self-serving. the connections of such relates to moral developments as well as a test on empathy, and somehow everyone becomes an enforcement of social/moral hierarchies, a judge of their rights and wrongs, and a defendant to their own standards. we become hypocrisies to our own humanities, we become the labourers of our own oppressors, and we become ignorant/denial to our own complicities through the ways Black/Indigenous women/femmes are always at the frontlines but never given the honour/credit/respect, in the ways we govern over stolen lands, as well as from the ways we perpetuate/gatekeep colonial notions of understandings/expressions... they say fuck the police but will police your gender, they will say abolish the state but then want to erase your existence, they say uplift their women but will stomp trannies into the sidewalks. maybe we are all just compensating for the flaws of our becoming, as we're too busy performing our growth that we forget about our being. how do we make space to move forward, together ? how can we make spaces for those who doesn't look/feel/love like us ? how do we make space for us to slow down, to pause from survival, to dare to reimagine ?

getting yourself together.

what about undoing yourself.

- the fix 

by Nayyirah Waheed 

          every night i crawl to my bed for comfort as i survive through the city in safety... every day holds another lesson of humility as i explore my own humanity, and every breath i take is full of grace and growing pains as we dare to keep going. i dare to claim for my uncertainties for life to be evidences of exploration, as at times it takes dancing with death to make peace with living. i dare to claim for my uncertainties for love to be lessons of compassion, empathy, and preservation, as often it takes lose to make ways for rebirth. i dare to claim for my uncertainties for our humanity to be deep meditations of what it means to be, as we survive and we evolve - as we are becoming... what is your being and who is your becoming ?

be easy.

take your time.

you are coming 

home.

to yourself.

- the becoming

by Nayyirah Waheed

          abolishing the police means to confront its violent legacies internal to our humanities. abolishing the state means to decolonize lands/bodies, to pray in reparations and meditate in reconciliactions. abolishing systematic violence means to relearn community care and unlearn individualism, to relearn collective joy, to unlearn for justice... abolishing the colonial-patriarchy means to embrace compassion and vulnerability, and return to the roots of feeling for our collective breath.

Why I Love Hating Myself

          sometimes i think that feeling suicidal is a blessing and a reminder for my ego, that i am nothing. yet sometimes i blame myself for feeling depression, as it is selfish to center myself even through sadness. a cynical part of me dares to ask, that maybe if the world would be more loving/caring when we just hated ourselves a little more... a balance of feeling nothing, and everything: i remind myself that humility is not of thinking oneself as lesser, but to just think of oneself less often. but then i am sad, and angry - mad at the world for escaping themselves, mad at the world for abandoning me, mad at myself for abandoning yet never escaping me. i want to cut myself as much as i want to set fires to city halls; i want to strangle myself as much as i want to hang nooses on colonial statues. i want to burn my skin as much as i wish to assassinate billionaires and police officers; i want to slap both me and those around close - as even though we are dying too, we still douse and drown in our own complicities and shames. what is so wrong with hating yourself ? what is wrong with truth, with deep introspection and reflection for accountability past/present/beyond ? what is so wrong, about confronting/confessing of all the ways we rot and hide ? is that not how we find freedom ? is that not why we fight for liberation ? there is something deeply disturbing for the ways we survive and function; deeply rooted in the oppression of our humanities, we might have even become fearful of our own reflections thus i wonder if we will ever find peace... i love hating myself, and my loneliness keeps me going. i hate myself, thus i embrace/seek/work for change, as change does not wait but collaborate... i hate the world, because i love the world. and i dare to hate myself deeper, to love the world better.

fall apart.

please

just, fall apart.

open your mouth.

and 

hurt. hurt the size of everything it is

- dam

by Nayyirah Waheed

          its ugly of me to wish the world to awake from sadness, but i don't know how else for us to unlearn without pain, without empathy... i have witnessed too many times and people coming together only to cope, for laughters that aren't ours to finish and for joy that isn't ours to own, only to escape from solitude. i pray myself to hold onto grace, for how the rotten can be bitter and sour too. i hate myself/the world so much thus relearning self/community-love/care becomes revolutionary in our essence, our bones, back to our ancestors and for the daughters of tomorrow. we must hold onto hope, through the love for and pains from life... i wonder if people smell the shame off of my community presence and advocacy, i wonder if they notice me shaking. i wander through rallies from protests to political demonstrations, i wander for sanity and salvation for another day. i am tired of self-care being not community care; i am exhausted for us so invested in becoming that we forget to just be, just breathe, just be...

We believers in softness here

Believe in imagination, the colour pink

Believe in ‘fuck the police’ poetry

Believe in our hearts as heaven. I believe in bath time

I believe in bubbles on my nose, and warm warm water

I believe in my bed. I love my bed... 

But sometimes I’m afraid that if I die everyone will be too tired to remember my name, 

so I take care of my little body

You, take care of your little body

Take care

So when all we have left is each other's song

And unknotted curls

And clammy hands

We can rejoice and dance for having loved our skin so well

For having found finally at the end a healthy way to hold

Take care

And repeat it

Ritual, until the syllables run on sentence down your spine

So that when the next deaths come, because they will

We will have vigour enough to remember their names

Speak them angel into our pillows at night

And wear them in our hair in the morning

- "Take Care" by TASHA

Drama Queen

CW/TW: mentions of mental illness, suicidal ideation...

          I remember a theatre teacher who said that just because I'm dramatic doesn't mean I'm good at drama. I remember hating myself growing up, being told that I'm too dramatic, emotional, and weak for a "boy". I remember coming out in high school, being turned against then to blamed for the drama once again... I remember sisters calling me dramatic, telling me that they wish I learn to chill in the city amongst the chaos. People tell me to rest, to pause, to stop doing, to stop crying, to stop being emotional and extra, but no one ever tries to understand the oceans I feel or to affirm the waves I try to stay alive at riding... They wonder why I live as if I'm in crisis but never dare to swim in my heart. People wander into my life to take, telling me to calm down but still call for emergencies and their needs/desires of joy that doesn't include mine... People have gotten so comfortable with my softness that they expect me to carry theirs while rotting with conditional compassions.

"sometimes the night wakes in the middle of me, and

i can do nothing but become the moon."

- Nayyriah Waheed

          I don't know how to stop imagining my body hanging, or to stop crying when alone, staring into walls and listening to silence. I feel myself ill but there's no one there to witness the show - such a shame, for how a trauma clown goes insane, as she is found in a room muffling screams and licking her own tears off the floor. Perhaps I like walking alone at night because I want to die unexpectedly, a suicide attempt every block just waiting to be clocked... The next available psychiatry appointment is in mid-July. I am tired and scared to keep on observing my mood swings, snapping at jokes, phrases, sentences, wrong-sized bed sheets, broken glass, and/or even changed traffic routes. I find a woman hysterically begging for softness, for empathy, for an embrace but only met with labels of a drama queen. I have never made excuses for my mental illnesses but am I really for blame to ask for more sensitivity and compassion ? Especially within my own communities, I become exhausted of coping and surviving together that we must reimagine ourselves better - softer/gentler - kinder.

"poetry is fire leaving my body"

- Nayyriah Waheed

          I went to the waters for teachings, trying to (un)learn peace and (re)learn joy... I burn sage for cleanse, sweetgrass for purity, lavender for faith, and cannabis for tranquility; I kneel in the sand praying for forgiveness as I sit by the rocks meditating on salvation. Dandelion and chamomile, alongside chrysanthemum in water, finally rebirthing, for healing... Like the ways I rot and die with houseplants in isolation - unwatered soils and ashes on leaves, when did my solitude become such self-destructions ? Neglect became a routine as I searched for worth in all place else, fitting myself into people like homes even if it means to make myself smaller, and smaller... just to be friend-/familyless/homeless at the end. A room is not a room without being as a house is not a home without breathing. Maybe I'm not enough I think/feel, but to remind myself of the ways we've all become too good to survive that we mistake it as living. As the truth is that in no reflections of our survival and pains are we truly learning to thrive.

          I am the earth desperate for water and air - enriched yet heavy in heart, still searching for softness while waiting to bloom. Exhausted and burnout I feel a forest fire starting within... I have so much to learn, I must give myself the time and space: A love letter of forgiveness in light, thus a reminder that we all deserve to start again even while hopeless and dreaming of death. Perhaps a new lesson is joy instead of pain, to example by healing. At times I feel guilty for being a storyteller and not a healer yet, for the days I can not offer joy and for the ways I may not deserve the glory. Though do believe me when I say that loving you almost makes living worth the pains, that the rest is up to us to grow gardens of community and mutual-aid. I have died so many times in mind today, replaying visuals of past/possible violence, waiting for a pause or a breath... Make no mistake as this story is not a drama but a documentary. We dare to witness and reimagine joy, through teachings of empathy thus the inner work of practicing compassionate reflections. To all persons of feelings: we must heal and stay alive, together, as the world is often too cruel and ready for our erasure/endings. 

"if the ocean can calm itself - so can you

we are both salt water mixed with air."

- Nayyriah Waheed