I have been waiting to tell the stories for beads for too long. Something about their origin, their glimmer, their silence. Earlier in the summer, I started to write something and of course I got carried away. Not before I saw a paper that made me pause. It noted how beads were silent witnesses to histories long forgotten, histories many will never know because the history writers omitted that aspects of beads that made our ancestors feel whole and secure in themselves. So now I’m back to the story I started to write. I lack words these days due to finally being exposed to what we have all feared for the past 2 years. The illness and fatigue is debilitating but we are finally coming around and words are slowly returning. In the meantime, see the tiny piece my brain managed to put together about beads and hopefully stay tuned for more.

We were once silent, like beads, distant, but present, next to skins, golden and warm. We were once, precious, like jewels, dwelling, within hands refusing to part ways for good. Now we lay, discarded, no longer silent nor precious. Just waiting for shadows, rising anytime now, without fear or shame.

And I made this for an event I attended beginning of the month.