Tag: Toni Morrison
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Keep this stream of consciousness named Isioma!
To survive, first begin. Preserve, do whatever it takes to lift yourself, free yourself from anything that is not in your name. What is your name. Who named you. When did they name you. Why did they name you. All this talk of naming began before anyone and anything framed you. They are like a…
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Keep telling your dreams!
Tell your dreams to anyone. A child, a tree, a bird. Tell Say where it clicks, it swells, it falls. Tell. And if no one understands, not the bird, nor tree, nor the child still Tell. For nothing is as important as the freedom your dreams bring. Otherwise you will be like a bird with…
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Keep singing this song of freedom!
I had a date with Ms Toni Morrison yesterday. It was at the Nobel Museum. There I watched as my greatest teacher’s words were used to imprint this song of freedom I sing today. Emancipate yourself. Really, there is nothing more important than choosing freedom. Nina Simone once sang about how she wished she knew…
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Keep this freedom
Some seasons bring gifts that glow beyond darkness, underneath skies that announce the arrival of thunders, the fall of rain. I am in a season, flooded with poetry, destined to humanize all life’s experience. To be radical they say is to begin at the root. It takes time to tear down people and systems not…
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Keep this dreamlike year!
About dreams that hang in air. I have seen them and they are me. I call them too, the art of grant writing. Something about writing inspirational grants will make you become like dreams that hang in air. They will stick to you like smoke all over your clothes and demand things and time in…
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Keep words that leave you breathless!
Words that flow, like eyes that see the bluest moon, leave me breathless. Lavishly they give meaning, a justice that endures. Where they begin, clear and steady, leaves a wide range of emotions that is ushering these words I write in praise. I see windows within my soul open up with these words. These are…
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Keep smiling!
Toni Morrison and her son Slade Morrison have a book about mean people I love to read to my kids. It’s my keep for today. To them, people are mean. They frown, they shout, even whisper behind peoples back. Family members are also mean. Fathers, mothers, grandparents, siblings, all of us have mean tendencies that…
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Keep dancing in the mind or writing for people!
Imagine taking seven days to frame the entire world. The kind of patience it would take to ensure that the stars and the moon are in the right place. All sorts of fishes or sea monsters swim the oceans. Mountains and hills are perfectly framed with volcanoes ready to erupt as they please. Having such…
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Keep imagining grace from micro aggression!
Micro aggressions are everywhere especially in academia. Uncovering them is key. Last week in discussions with a colleague, we shared how this word manifests in workplace environment. Not because we didn’t know it has always existed in academia, but to see it in full display made us cringe. It begins with small acts of exclusion.…
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Keep words, keep language!
I have been reading ‘What moves at the margin’ by Toni Morrison. One of my favorite quotes by Toni Morrison, one she shared during her Nobel Lecture in Literature is: ‘We die. That may be the meaning of life. But we do language. That maybe the measure of our lives.’ Obviously very few people did…
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Writing with Juliet Iwelunmor 