The Journey

lover of all things beautiful. Johannesburg

[theafrolegalise]

“You say I have an attitude I say I am human Dealing with the generational trauma of being unheard Silence! you ask why i do not speak out but when i open my mouth to speak you reach across the dinner table and slap the food out of my mouth why do you enjoy seeing me in pain? why do you not see me? see me. i am human but this process of dehumanization has me feeling bottled up in expressionless unexpressed rage i am stuck trying to be liberated from the past i try to live with daily affirmations on my mirror reflecting my value I am worthy I am beautiful I run to you with joy , hoping for a good morning kiss. something again. you are cold. yelling about all the things i have done wrong to you, the family, the children, the community, me. Black women break the Black family. yet here i am sacrificing myself to hold us together.”

— @theafrolegalise

[theijeoma-deactivated20180827]

Hi Ijeoma! I genuinely love love love your writings. I feel as if they just... speak to me. Could you please share some of your favourite books?

These are some I could think of quickly. Enjoy the list:

1. Create Dangerously: The immigrant Artist at Work by Edwidge Danticat

2. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

3. Brother, I am Dying by Edwidge Danticat

4. The Four Agreements by Miguel Ruiz

5. The Gift. Poems by Hafiz, translated by Daniel Ladinsky

6. I Know why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou

7. Shake loose my Skin by Sonia Sanchez

8. I Have Been a Woman by Sonia Sanchez

9. For Colored Girls who have Considered Suicide by Ntozake Shange

10. The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

11. Bad News: Last Journalists in a Dictatorship by Anjan Sundaram.

12. James Baldwin: The Last Interview: And Other Conversations

13. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison.

14. There was a Country by Chinua Achebe.

15. The Lion and the Jewel by Wole Soyinka.

16. The Concubine by Elechi Amadi.

17. Fela: This Bitch of a life by Moore Carlos.

18. The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga. 

19. A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Child Solider by Ishmael Beah.

20. Letter to my Daughter by Maya Angelou. 

P.S. Thank you for your kind kind words. Thank you.

[lynnblaze]

Healing

Its 4:21AM I am up fixing myself. Taking all the broken pieces and bringing them together. It's an art I learnt from all the women in my family.

[lynnblaze]

Self love

Sing love songs to me my love. Bathe my soul in poetry. Dance with me. Laugh with me. I am here, not there. No don't look out, I am here. Love me. Love thyself. ❤

[lynnblaze]

Reciprocation

I have learnt not to force reciprocation. I have learnt not to demand it. If they love me they will love me. If they dont, its not the end of my world. I deserve a love that reciprocates and I will find a love that reciprocates. 🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸🌸

[lynnblaze]

#AfricanPoetry ❤

[lynnblaze]

I found an amazing poet on Instagram. I love her work. #AfricanPoetry ❤

[theijeoma-deactivated20180827]

For black girls who have to pretend to be strong yet go home breaking down in the middle of the night, trying to breathe. Trying to breathe. For black girls battling depression. For those who feel so alone in a world telling them the disease is for whites alone. Please, live. For black girls who are imperfect, insecure and trying to fit into a world that stifles their voice. For black girls still learning to glow. For black girls trying to fit into a world so afraid of their beauty they sell them cream to lighten their skin. For their black skin. For black girls who smile when they see themselves represented.

Ijeoma Umebinyuo, 

For days that feel heavy and days that feel light for days that feel beautiful and days that break you

(via theijeoma)

[thegabdonwrites]

[thegabdonwrites]

when you are sad more often than you are happy. that is how you will know. that is how you will know it is over.

farah gabdon (via thegabdonwrites)

[theijeoma-deactivated20180827]

We have loved ourselves despite being unwanted. We have loved ourselves despite being ridiculed and standards of beauty placed upon us. We have written ourselves back to ourselves. We have held pain, made it into a song, a hymn of love, a daily prayer to us. We have done it. We have seen nieces, daughters, little sisters hold a mirror to their body and cried for another skin, another face, another body. We have Lover, carry the sins of being a woman. Double that, carry the sins of being a black woman.

Ijeoma Umebinyuo, we have found our garden (via theijeoma)

[theijeoma-deactivated20180827]

Tell me Ijeoma, how much heartbreak can a women take? -Tired

A woman can be broken and during the night, she will sit quietly sewing her heart back. Never the same, sometimes with new affirmations. A woman can go back several times to weep for the girl she was but when she decides to forge ahead; a hundred days & nights of grief will not stop her. A woman can weep, sit and dwell on those who turned their back on her but when that woman decides to shed the pain, you will see even her creator will dance & dance.

For i have seen women who have been hurt become a light so bright even the weapons fashioned against them never prospers and these women give love. They know what hurting feels like, so they give love but most importantly they love themselves dearly, never apologizing for it. They love themselves dearly.

How much heartbreak can a woman take? There are times when the breaking is so severe she has to shut her heart to lovers, because it is okay for a woman to understand nobody can love her better than she can love herself, it is okay for her to know she is healing, she is shedding old pain to love again. These women slowly take the time to heal, to become herself, to become too full of life to be half-loved. The world can always wait, the woman will return, whole.

Yellow,Ijeoma.

[lynnblaze]

❤❤❤❤

[rhsin]

@nightwriterpoet

[rhsin]

#whiskeywordsandashovel

[rhsin]

they’ll only stay if they deserve you. no matter how hard you try, you can’t keep someone who doesn’t belong in your life.

r.h. Sin (via rhsin)

[troublegirl13]

I could never cheat on anyone. It’s the type of mistake and wrong doing I couldn’t live with. Knowing that you destroyed someone’s trust is bad, but destroying someone’s perspective on love is far too worse.

Amino Auditore (via troublegirrl)

[lynnblaze]

(via https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3ycM-Yk_i8)