ophelia

My new favorite (always changing) musician is all around general bad-ass India Aire. If you like the message of Maya Angelou's poetic words, you might really like this. Her lyrics are absolutely spiritual...medicine for the collective soul of our culture. A message of female empowerment--that it's okay to 'just be.' I want to play it all day into the ears of American young ladies, young girls go though so much- and women, too, for that matter. Our souls are damaged, clouded by the unforgiving way our culture judges our bodies. I say I don't buy into the aesthetic pressures Western culture puts on women, the microderm abrasion, name brand clothers, but the fact is, I do...So, what I'm saying is that these lyrics- all of her lyrics- are good for my soul. I encourage anyone who hasn't to download some India. Need some help choosing? Try: I Choose, There's Hope, I Am Not My Hair, Wings of Forgiveness)

India Aire - Video Lyrics


Sometimes I shave my legs and sometimes I don't
Sometimes I comb my hair and sometimes I won't
Depend on how the wind blows I might even paint my toes
It really just depends on whatever feels good in my soul

I'm not the average girl from your video
and I ain't built like a supermodel
But, I learned to love myself unconditionally
Because I am a queen
I'm not the average girl from your video
My worth is not determined by the price of my clothes
No matter what I'm wearing I will always be the india arie

When I look in the mirror and the only one there is me
Every freckle on my face is where it's supposed to be
And I know our creator didn't make no mistakes on me
My feet, my thighs, my lips, my eyes; I'm lovin' what I see

I'm not the average girl from your video
and I ain't built like a supermodel
But, I learned to love myself unconditionally
Because I am a queen
I'm not the average girl from your video
My worth is not determined by the price of my clothes
No matter what I'm wearing I will always be the
india arie

Am I less of a lady if I don't wear pantyhose?
My mama said a lady ain't what she wears but, what she knows
But, I've drawn a conclusion, it's all an illusion, confusion's the name of the
game
A misconception, a vast deception
Something's gotta change
but,Don't be offended this is all my opinion
ain't nothing that I'm sayin law
This is a true confession of a life learned lesson I was sent here to share with
y'all
So get in where you fit in go on and shine
Clear your mind, now's the time
Put your salt on the shelf
Go on and love yourself
'Cuz everything's gonna be all right

I'm not the average girl from your video
and I ain't built like a supermodel
But, I Learned to love myself unconditionally
Because I am a queen
I'm not the average girl from your video
My worth is not determined by the price of my clothes
No matter what I'm wearing I will always be the india arie

Keep your fancy drinks and your expensive minks
I don't need that to have a good time
Keep your expensive car and your caviar
All I need is my guitar
Keep your Kristal and your pistol
I'd rather have a pretty piece of crystal
Don't need your silicone I prefer my own
What God gave me is just fine

I'm not the average girl from your video
and I ain't built like a supermodel
But, I learned to love myself unconditionally
Because I am a queen
I'm not the average girl from your video
My worth is not determined by the price of my clothes
No matter what I'm wearing I will always be india arie

In minor ways we differ, in major we're the same

My last post got me to thinking a little more about Maya Angelou's words on the human condition. I decided to post her beautiful poem. The picture is one I took at the creek today. I think it is fitting, except that they are ducks.

Human Family, by Maya Angelou
I note the obvious differences
in the human family.
Some of us are serious,
some thrive on comedy.

Some declare their lives are lived
as true profundity,
and others claim they really live
the real reality.

The variety of our skin tones
can confuse, bemuse, delight,
brown and pink and beige and purple,
tan and blue and white.

I've sailed upon the seven seas
and stopped in every land,
I've seen the wonders of the world
not yet one common man.

I know ten thousand women
called Jane and Mary Jane,
but I've not seen any two
who really were the same.

Mirror twins are different
although their features jibe,
and lovers think quite different thoughts
while lying side by side.

We love and lose in China,
we weep on England's moors,
and laugh and moan in Guinea,
and thrive on Spanish shores.

We seek success in Finland,
are born and die in Maine.
In minor ways we differ,
in major we're the same.

I note the obvious differences
between each sort and type,
but we are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.

a day for good news.

(photo taken by me in Costa Rica. It is a hot spring, heated by the Arenal volcano. Most. Soothing. Place. Ever.)

Kahlil Gibran: (from the Prophet)

...When you part from your friend, you grieve not;
For that which you love most in him may be clearer
in his absence, as the mountain to the climber is
clearer from the plain.

And let there be no purpose in friendship save the
deepening of the spirit.
For love that seeks aught but the disclosure of its
own mystery is not love but a net cast forth: and
only the unprofitable is caught.

...And in the sweetness of friendship let there be
laughter, and sharing of pleasures.
For in the dew of little things the heart finds its
morning and is refreshed.

when ure hero falls

Posted in dedication to two boys who I teach (middle school English/Reading). Names changed & details altered...you know, just in case.

Juan has a sibling who was shot and killed several years ago in a gang related incident. He works a night job to help his mother with the bills. Half-awake, he sits in my class scribbling precocious lines of poetry onto my assignments (which he sometimes finishes). Clearly an old soul, murky from the hazy confusion of adolesence along with the oppression of poverty and it's angry mirror of violence. He wants nothing to do with gangs or violence, he tells me on one of the mornings that he has wondered into my classroom before school. It has hurt his family enough. He just got off of work. He says he's tired, he will try to pay attention.

The other boy, Miguel (a gang member; a kid who has been in a lot of trouble), tells me with heavy eyes that his father has begun drinking again after two years of sobriety. It is my planning period. I don't know where he is supposed to be, but he is not there. His mind is at home anyways. His eye is on the bottle that has stolen his dad away. His body is in my classroom, looking for an answer that I've been looking for for years. I share an anecdote about my own trip down this road, and I think back to my grade school counselor, Mrs. Johnson. When I was young, she shared with me a version a piece of her life story that was similar to mine; in a breath she handed to me my discarded, crumpled potential -wrapped carefully in a tiny box, tied with strings of hope. She was my proof that it was possible to make it through something through which I didn't feel I had the strength to withstand. By virtue of existence, she was the hope that remained in my Pandora's box. "God must be preparing you to help another child through this," she said.

I grasped the box of my fragile potential with knuckles whiter than winter; I tucked it deep in my soul. Sometimes I forgot it was there. And, sometimes I forget it is there. And sometimes it sings the songs it knew all along. The songs that all of our souls have always known. I believe life is about clearing a way to our souls, which have always known "the answers"...Clearing the distractions of life...the crippling oppression of poverty, the paralyzing oppression of wealth.

I do not know if I will make a difference as a teacher, but I know that the difference is already in me. At times, I am blinded by the endless distraction of beauracracy and expectations I do not know how to meet. Overall, it gives me clarity...Not clarity in my own life, but a clearer picture of the world as it really is. At night, I drive home to my comfortable, if not fancy neighborhood where most people pretend that poverty does not exist. It would be comforting to believe that, but in the morning I go back to the school that is 95% poor and minority, tucked away between used car lots and gang signs painted on overpasses. This is reality.

As for middle school...I never thought I would teach middle school; it was the worst time of my life. Adolesence in itself is pandora's box. By definition, it is a time of trauma. Add poverty. Add violence. May my kids recognize the elusive hope that hides in the corner; some never find it. Pandora found it. Mrs. Johnson found it, and she showed it to me.

I believe that Tupac found it, be it with slippery fingers. He wrote about it time and again.

Tupac wrote this poem after his seemingly untouchable mother became addicted to cocaine. She was/is an activist for social justice, a vigilante. A liver of life who gave up on living for a while.

When Ure Hero Falls
4 My Hero (My Mother)
by Tupac Shakur

When your hero falls from grace
all fairy tales R uncovered
myths exposed and pain magnified
the greatest pain discovered
u taught me 2 be strong
but I'm confused 2 c u so weak
u said never 2 give up
and it hurts 2 c u welcome defeat
when ure Hero falls so do the stars
and so does the perception of tomorrow
without my Hero there is only
me alone 2 deal with my sorrow.
your Heart ceases 2 work
and your soul is not happy at all
what R u expected 2 do
when ure only Hero falls