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The day begins with love. To women everywhere, especially those black and hive. Those that smile when we arrive. Those who switch tongues on overdrive. Those who blow kisses that jive. Those whose laughter we archive. Those who stay unmasked and alive. Those yearning for all the ways we thrive. Those who celebrate all the souls we revive. Those letting go of silences that deprive. Those freely expressing all the ways they strive. Those always prepared to live. Those who show how to do more than survive. Those too choosing the crossroads they drive. We begin this day with you, in love.

From Radiant Health Magazine.

Knowing too that they will always accuse you of tending to the past. Whether you made it or not. Whether you sculpted it or not. Whether with your own hands or not. Whether you named it or not. Whether you learnt it everyday or not. Whether you remembered it or not. Whether you are strong or not. Whether you will travel the distance or not.

Still, to know you, is to love all the ways you help us express ourselves. Love all the stories we tell about ourselves. Love all the ways we celebrate ourselves. Love all the ways we interrogate ourselves. Love all the ways we cherish ourselves. Love all the ways we pray for ourselves too.

I am so inspired to let you know that we are really cool. We are. Those who left or didn’t leave school. Those who lurk or didn’t lurk late. Those who strike or didn’t strike straight. Those who sang or didn’t sing sin. Those who We know or don’t know. All of us who die or didn’t die soon enough to this thing we call life.

Those who stay critical. Those who remain resolute. Those honest. Those bent on fathoming what it means to be black, beautiful and woman. I salute you. I celebrate you. I extend this beacon of love to you today and always. Happy International Women’s Day.

Image from the female lead.

Poetry inspired by Lucille Clifton and Gwendolyn Brooks, two iconic women of substance that inspire my life’s journey.

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I know silence. I have seen it’s power. First they use language to keep you mute. Some are clear in their intent, other are subtle, all of them are designed to keep you silent. They succeed. Or so they think. First you are silent. You observe. You notice. You think. You note. You keep silent because words are few. They keep their ways. They know their ways. They see your silence. They note your pause. They keep their ways still. Knowing power belongs to them. Or so they think. Next you note their ways. All the subtle things they do. Those seen and unseen. Those spoken and unspoken. You learn to read lines. Learn to see the lines between lines written to keep you silent. You stay silent until you remember, you were never meant to survive. So you speak.

If they are going to write you out of history, at least your words will bear witness to your victory. You speak. If they are going to keep you invisible. At least your words will tell of your glory so visible. You speak. If they are going to ignore you, dismiss you, even pretend that you don’t exist. At least your words will uplift you, represent you and celebrate all the ways you persist. You speak. If they are going omit you, unname and misname you. At least your words will name you, rename and rename you, for we are born twice with every naming ceremony we do. You speak. Even if they hoped you would be silent. You speak because you know your silence will never protect you.

Knowing too that this is what it means to be black and woman, to be bright and human, every single part of your being, those sterling and sublime, pregnant with dreams unknown, in full glow, but still unseen, and all day, all night, in the land of troubled waters, where your air is music, where your universe is melody, where the wind sings in perfect harmony, with hawks and stormy weather, there they will find you always, with your disturbing disturbance, with your dream so brightly burning. There they will find you speaking, rustling with thing called life. Now that you speak and speak, in your way, so sublime.

From Radiant Health Magazine. Keep speaking, black woman.

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First we accept. All definitions will do. Formats and styles that worked previously too. We accept things as they are. We pray they accept us too. They don’t. We try and try and still we remain unaccepted.

Then we begin to look inwards. We begin the work of looking at ourselves through their lens. A double consciousness of sorts. What do they see in us? What don’t the like about us? Are we too ambitious? How do we stay ambitious without offending them? All the subtle ways to act or not act are part of stage 2.

Then we act. If we are going to remain true to ourselves we might as well be ourselves. Or there will be no self. So we redefine ourselves and them. Choose their language carefully but redefine our own. We unname things that we know won’t work. Unname the process to. We give up parts of self that stand in the way. Give up stories and questions that paved the way. We build nests in windy places. We fill our emptiness with things hollow. Then risk it all for the beginning of truth.

The fourth stage is where we learn to rename ourselves. It’s where we learn the hidden lives of trees, the lessons of the fallen leaves, learn how every leaf too is a hallelujah. We learn the blessings of boat, learn to carry water, learn about the light within, learn all that we carry, learn how to seat at our table, know who prepared it too. This stage is where we reclaim ourselves, begin our dreaming, reclaim our mystery, know our history, so we severe our misery.

When you hear trees whisper, you destiny begins. These days I’m in a space where trees call my name. I am answering too.

Finally, we rename our world. When eyes have seen oceans, lagoons will never do. Rather, we bring all dreams to the ocean, we bring our fears too. We connect the two and dream beyond our fears. We know the force of our lives. We know the source of our lives too. We dance, we love, we work, we dream. The possibilities of a self renamed and reborn, resisting and reimagining all obstacles along the way is rewarding. The freedom too, from being defined is pure joy. All the ways you rise like a bird in flight. All the ways you peel things off like an onion, down to the core of you, is sublime.

These days, I have given my name and my life, freedom, my history and dreams, a new medium, all the misery from things and people, a deep hum, while I press forward to a new dawn. All the trees inside me have moved into the forest. Roots are connecting deeply with other roots, as leaves shout hallelujah. The sun and moon are me, forever hungry, forever sharpened, like the edge where day and night meet. When you know you were never meant to survive. Know too that the battle is on.

I read this yesterday. Love love love.

There are five stages to becoming a soulful grant-writer. I listed them above. One steeped in storytelling too. These lessons personify how I do more than survive the grant writing process, survive academic setting too. Last week, some things tried to break me but truly failed. From the those who only see what they want, to those who follow without spine, some things tried to hold me back that all they did in the end was remind me of my dreams. Hold on to your dreams. It is a matter of life and death these days. They will come for you in subtle ways, ignore and dismiss you in big ways, but their ways are not your own, you who dream dreams that dream their own dreams. Know this and know peace. You are divine.

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We celebrate things we see. Birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, marriages, even funerals. But the things in life we rarely see, those that leave us breathless or speechless are worthy of praises too.

I have shared previously that for every single visible thing I keep, there are many that remain invisible. Some the world may never see. The aspiration, to remain invisible. Writing in this manner started as an exercise focused on keeping something, my way, and free from any guide. The true value continues to unfold with each day. To keep something may have been the true intent. Yet, the next phase keeps me humble. My spirit had to go through this exercise of purging itself of everything that held me back. In doing so, my eyes opened.

I became the child that was not satisfied with the lagoon, when my eyes have greeted oceans. The unseen things in my life these days are my masterpiece. What you see, the ones celebrated too, are merely byproducts. It has been difficult to dream up the next phase, to summon up the courage to accept what the spirit desires without struggle, even when I would rather hold on to a higher calling. I am who I am after all. Writing freely has indeed woken my mind up, like birds without wings, who still sublimely fly. All the possibilities too, those for change, those for freedom, those focused on lasting, those full of light, and those guided by the spirit, are its many gifts. The sun has moved permanently close. The stars and moon too. I am a child of all, and now prepared to amaze.

From A way of being free by Ben Okri

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How might we create the conditions for a soulful life. I am learning this every day. In a quest to do my most audacious work, I found myself strolling down a never ending hole of what it means to live your most authentic life whether at work or at home.

For starters, and everyone will have to discover this for themselves, but it means doing work necessary for your soul. Not for profits, not even for pleasure, but for all the possibilities that exist when you know your soul.

From Breathe Magazine!

It means being open even when you would rather be closed. It means thinking and speaking in images, like how rivers change their course and so can you. It means paying attention to your dreams, it feeds your soul. It means being aware of where you are going, even when the road seems long and unwinding. It means having a litany for survival, knowing you were never meant to survive. It means knowing when the rain began to fall on you. It also means learning how to carry water and air and anything that seems free and light for only a free mind can make a free world.

It means giving your life all the beautiful things it needs, like watching two birds spread their wings and soar at the glimpse of your arrival. It’s the soaring part you keep, knowing that every time you fall, the alternative is to rise. It means stepping into your eternity, your own kind of paradise where the sun and the moon rise to greet you. It means aiming for the fullness of life, it’s emptiness at times, but it’s fullness most times, like in Spring when new flowers start to bloom. It means creating conditions that allow your soul to live, even if it means turning things upside down and stepping away from that which depletes your soul. There will come a time when you will have to leave this world. We will all die one day. Until that time comes, do what makes your soul happy. As for me this mere moment of reflection is all I never knew I needed. Welcome to my most soulful year.

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Ben Okri has a poem, “I sing a new freedom” that ended with these worlds: “children of the stars…ought to amaze.”

I agree and as part of our recently concluded STAR designathon which ended this weekend, I reminded students of STARS about why all of them are quite simply

Amazing

Brilliant

Celebrated

Dominant

Elevated

Famous

Genius

Hero

Icon

Just

Kindle

Lead

Major

Noted

Outstanding

Prominent

Quest

Renowned

Stellar

Talented

Unique

VIP

Worthy

X-factor

Youthful

Zenith.

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If anything I do, in the way of writing grants or whatever I write, isn’t about lasting, or sustainability or the community or villages I belong too, then it’s a waste of time. These days I want to indulge myself in open conversations that allows the collective ‘we’ to dream, which is to say, sustainability, is like air. Everything we do must have that at it’s core.

The best grants I have ever written, those that failed and those that succeeded, have at their rim, a desire to last, a desire to remain, long after the funding ends. We begin always with the end in mind as the end is certain. But what we do from the beginning is unquestionably crucial. When you don’t plan to last, when you don’t even know why you ought to last, you ultimately keep nothing. You are also lost. Which is why I ask always, what will you keep? For me these days, every single thing.

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I saw a soft radiant sunset last evening. We were driving through an estate whose name when translated from Igbo to English means ‘blessings are great.’ Everything about out evening, from the setting sun, to our time at the estate, was full of grace, full of blessings. No wonder an Igbo man retires home the last few days of a year. The sun, the estate and all its hidden meanings are all I need as we begin to close out 2022.

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Imagination is crucial for life. I’m learning that every day. Imagination, that space between dreaming and thinking, between believing and daring, is a vital source of life. The prolific author, Achebe said if we starve it or pollute it, the quality of our life is depressed or soiled. The sterling writer, hooks noted that it is one of the most powerful modes of resistance that oppressed and exploited folks can use to provide a survival life like. She went on to note that when we are free to let our minds roam…imaginations will provide the creative energy that will lead us to new thought and more engaging ways of knowing. For all these reasons, I say keep your imaginations.

The imagination needed for this balloons on a bike as gleaned from a friends page is an inspiration for me.

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I have always loved Langston Hughes poem, ‘Dreams.’ They personify my mood these days. My story is one of dreams. I shared that during a presentation yesterday at NYU. I have this presentation where I go from dreams to ambition to dips and rising and back to dreams. It’s my take on the programmatic focus of my research.

How I sustain my work also known as dreaming, being ambitious, experiencing dips and rising through this field called global health.

I live to sustain evidence-based effective research in limited resource settings. It’s an audacious dream, many people describe as vexing or least understood outcome of research. I beg to differ. It isn’t vexing to me. Never has been. I have written multiple grants on it. They failed. The field was not ready then. They still may not be, I said during my presentation yesterday. But I can dream and when I do, I am reminded of the words of Langston Hughes:

Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreams

For when dreams go

Life is a barren field

Frozen with snow.

While we are at it, today I did the unthinkable. I have always dreamed of being a children picture book author, so I pitched a story, inspired by dreams and gazing out to a night full of brilliant, radiant stars. It’s the annual picture book pitch fest on Twitter and I figured I have nothing to lose. I also finished the first completed draft of the most brutal grant I have every written today. Grants, stories, one thing for sure, I am holding on to my dreams.

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I walked through the halls of our school of medicine today. Something about history moved me. There were things about the school’s history that I didn’t know. Like a Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine in 1943 to Dr. Edward Doisy for his discovery of vitamin K. When I started this blog, legacy was the impetus. I imagined that one day I will leave this earth, but I wanted my kids to have something that characterized my life story. I also wanted to share it my way, not as told or remembered by others, with the caveat too that I was a born dreamer and a storyteller and that in the end, I did it my way. This caveat would keep me happy no matter where I end in the next life.

Seeing all the work of Dr. Doisy make me glad I’m on this journey for myself. It also made me realized that what I keep with each single day, no matter how small, is for that legacy and myself. The past couple of days have tried to keep these words hidden from the world, tried to keep me down, as if to say I have no right to rise. But in the words of Maya Angelou, I rise. I rise. I do so knowing that What I Keep, is the life story of a life lived in prayer and thanksgiving and joy and love for all the ways I am guided to do more than I could ever imagine with this thing called life.

The journey of a lifetime begins the day we are all born and continues long after we are gone. Some may have a history that tell their story eloquently with a library that displays all they achieved. Some may never have their story told, not even a notable achievement or joy or struggles. Ije Uwa as my dear friends father would say, is a gift, one that I intend to keep for history. So I ask you today, what are you keeping for yourself, from yesterday, for today, and for tomorrow. For me, everything. My history, my story, my way. It’s a gift that keeps giving. One I am grateful for.

What was kept about Dr. Doisy’s achievement. To think that vitamin k, that thing in the cream you use today was discovered at my university and by him is wow. Keep your history.

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I sat and listened as trees sighed this afternoon. It’s the end of October and we are still in a spring-time flow. The grass is no longer green but yellow, with a hint of brown. And trees have leaves falling all around, no longer green but crimson red and brown. They call this the fall season. Everything seems to be falling. Trees, leaves, grass, the earth. Everything but me. Call it grace, call it faith. My souls keeps being plucked from its secret place this fall.

We spent the day outside raking leaves with a make-believe stick. I can’t believe it’s almost the end of October and the weather is acting like the start of Spring. Either way, we are together, resting and thanking God for his grace and mercy. Happy Sunday.