#portrait shots

“ It seems like it should be so simple.

That I could respond to common questions,
Often meant to fill empty spaces and bring people together.

But our tragic flaw often comes as a result of us looking at the world how we would like it to seem, not for what it truly is.

So despite it seeming simple, it was the opposite.
While your curiosity hovered above my being, I for one could not take my my mind off of the tightness in my chest.

The clamminess of my hands.
The pounding of my heart against my chest.

And with the slight tilt of your head,
A soft brown gaze boring heavily into my own eyes…

I couldn’t help but wonder,
“Can you see everything I’m trying to hide?”

And sure enough,
If that dreamy stare and those curling lips were any indication…

So simply you could and in truth you already had.“ - Jade Annae Peters

“1 time for ya mind
2 times for Mumia, Sekou
3 times for the Brooklyn dimes”

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“He was cool
Super-cool
Ultrablack
A tan/purple
Had a beautiful shade
He had a double natural
that would put the sisters to shame
His dashikis were tailor made & his beads were imported sea shells
He was triple-hip
His tikis were hand-carved
Out of ivory
And came express from the motherland
He would greet you in Swahili and say goodbye in Yoruba
Mannnn he was so cool & intelligent
Cool-Cool, ultra cool, icebox cool, so cool his wine didn’t have to be cooled
He was air condition cool
Cool-Cool was so cool he made me cool
Cool-Cool so cool we nicknamed him refrigerator
Cool-Cool so cool he didn’t know
After Detroit, Newark, Oakland, and Chicago
We had to remind Cool-cool
that
to be black
is to be
very hot”

-Don L. Lee, 1969

“Attitudes necessary for survival were vigorously pounded into the wooly heads of black boys and girls by their loving mothers. The boys were reared to be Negroes, not men. A negro might survive a while, but a black “man” didn’t live very long…. a black boy aiming to reach “manhood” rather than “Negro-hood” rarely lived that long”
- Jamil Al-Amin

Pure happiness.