CW/TW: mentions of death, grief, trauma, homelessness,
mental health, sexual violence, suicidal ideations...
"Later that night, I held an atlas on my lap,
ran my fingers across the whole world,
and whispered, 'where does it hurt ?'
It answered: everywhere
everywhere,
everywhere..."
- Warsan Shire
I can't stop crying, anywhere and everywhere in the city - whether in an empty room waiting to be furnished despite/among economic uncertainties, or while walking to the harbour waterfront in socio-political anxieties: she is wilting but still waiting and meditating on love. Downtown Tkaronto reminds me of growing up in Taipei with all walks of life on the streets and traffic sounds all night-long. It reminds me of back when I was dreaming of New York City too, of how I envisioned a femme searching for love and herself among skyscrapers/city greens always in style... However, the city can still be cold and lonely in such warming Spring, especially with me growing into more a community server and observer against capitalism instead of an advocate/lover for a comfortable city/urban life... I see neighbours wrapping barbwires around trees - drawing lines of difference and constructing barriers of defence in our own backyards, thus I pray for what suffering must the trees feel and endure because of our egotistic needs/desires ? I ordered a new bed because I don't know how to stop crying on a mattress that I've been ra*ed on. I have become so tired, even in my sleeps - I feel as if I have forgotten how to dream... I called my mother crying after midnight apologizing for moving away, asking if I deserve and if my body is worth buying a queen-sized bed... I don't know how to function or keep up with violence, the world is burning/fighting and yet people are still walking animals past humans sleeping on benches. I feel and become exhaustion: I scroll/type on screens for scattering heartbeats; I hold onto my device tight as if its my last breath to post, to share, to repost, to donate, to check-in, to rant, to cry, to rot, and to numb... I scroll past hours and days, triggers and needs for a break, a meal, and/or even a breath.
"Take Care & Take Rest, as
The Revolution needs you after to
Rebuild the world..."
- @theoriginaldijah
Looking back, my mother had always held her children while running towards the unknown for safety and peace - from capitals of Taiwan/Singapore/Malaysia then to the rural suburbs of white silence in 'Canada'. Yet maybe its also why I feel that I must come back to the collective pains for salvation - thus challenging the comforts of avoidance while constantly confronting settler-colonial privileges. This is not just about knowing people in situations anymore, it's about living among situations and witnessing suffering daily: rotting from the inside out eating meals only after seeing someone go through garbages for food... I wonder of when/how we humans had become so trashy while claiming to have class and with righteousness slowly digesting inside - eating each other's empathy as feasts like the lands we looted. It has taken me weeks of solitude with my impostorism to understand again the magic/pains of surviving through the in-betweens... I remember last summer when I was concerned with unemployment and unstable housing thus a sex worker then a survivor from encountering ra*e and assaults. I remember how it was other sex workers who have fed me, how it was other queer/trans femmes of colour who have supported me with funds and support. I remember how it was black women/femmes who taught me resistance and it was two-spirit/queer/trans indigenous folks who have taught me resilience and joy. I would not have known care and love as a storyteller and as an immigrant trans woman/femme without the communities still constantly hurting but giving... Thus now I continue listening from the back rows while supporting the front-lines during these difficult times demanding for social justice. Now that we know better, we must do/be better. Though this is what many of us have been preparing, studying, waiting for. It is an important note for all allies to know that no matter the contexts: we are guests upon arrival while our hosts are already tired.
Moving into downtown and (trying to) moving on from a heartbreak - I am becoming tired of crying to sleep in melancholia only to wake from an ambulance praying/mourning myself back to sleep. I am exhausted of witnessing constant police patrol and officers harassing folks experiencing substance-withdraw or homelessness. It worries me to hear sirens and it angers me to see cop cars; I feel sick watching a "Queer-Eye" makeover episode for a person experiencing homelessness while knowing/seeing too many experiencing unstable housing on a daily. I'm tired of balancing in-between lines/circles/experiences of contrasting politics and priorities... I don't know how to feel while witnessing and accessing both lifestyles of privilege and survivals of marginalization. I am angry that I have "educated" peers who would tell me to report to the police after I've been ra*ed and asked what to do if their cars get stolen when we advocate for defunding the police/military. I am upset that many people can still wake up oblivious and go out with full safety/access; I am disappointed that most still search for comfort and individualistic joys with such ignorance as bliss, while others are at the front-lines and us as allies supporting and also reflecting on how we can/must do better... Yet the burdens of educating our (privileged) peers and deepening one's actioning allyship is no labours of those already fighting but ours still listening. And the most uncomfortable conversations just may be the ones in our classrooms, friend/peer-groups, families within homes and other private spheres of traditions. Though we should also be mindful of our capacities, triggers, and possibilities of facing violence while being marginalized allies as well... My mental health capacities have been at a new low and I am really trying to cope/survive with the suicidal ideations, internal doubts of worth, and self-harming/destructive tendencies, especially during these times of extra uncertainties. I feel both hopeful and hopeless, as Turtle Island (North America) may not afford a revolution with such majorities of white middle-class, but then isn't it the time to reimagine freedoms and elevating/expanding notions of organizing ? Through my weeks of internal spiral and patterned explorations on humanity and justice, I always come back to the poetics/politics of death, thus I know the answer has to be love... As it is empathy that will lead us to the light, no matter how hard the fight; and it is only through love that we bring light into life.
"... I have died so many times
So when I told you that loving you almost makes life worth it I was not joking.
When I tell you that loving you almost makes me forget
how much I hate myself, It is not poetry.
Loving you is taking all of the love I could never give myself and putting it to good use.
It is reminding myself that if someone can love a dying thing this way,
can hold the Lazarus of my body and give thanks for the way it holds back -
if someone can kiss the scars administer the pills absorb the bad days and
wake up smiling next to me, then I can try to breathe again...
Because self-love does not always come first. Or second. Or even ever.
But your love be the guardrail on the edge
be the drawers that hide all the sharp things
be the body that carries my collapsed frame into bed
be the flowers you bought; because even though
they are dying too they still dance...
Love will not heal me, will not wipe my slate of my body clean -
I will always be a woman of wounds of rope-mark neck and melted skin.
Love will not heal me; but it will hold my hand if I ever heal myself and
maybe teach me a joke that I can stay alive long enough to laugh at...
I love you,
enough to want to
love myself too..."
- Nayo Jones: Healing
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