Day 6: A Poem about My Best Friend
this is an interesting muse
my intuitive immediately chimes, 'you have no best friend'
but then faces pop up
charm- mugure was the first. debbie the second
debbie was my real best friend for a time; the last few years in college at delaware. we shared new york even though we did not know each other then, back there, our respective and mutual home
charm-mugure was my close friend at graduate school michigan
chantilly was my best friend for a time in 2006 when she opened her home to me that summer, i staying at her place while she traveled her academic prowess.
do you see the trend?
my best friends have always been for a time, a place, situational.
i have moved around too much
my life too vagabond
i never stayed any one place more than ten years.
twelve, was the longest, growing up on e 42nd street in brooklyn
and i have no friends from that block remaining or located
i had leslie it seemed for a time in elementary school
i remember no one from the two years in meyer levin
and for high school of james madison, was there a best?
i think of a sister whose name now i cant remember, but seem to me she and i were the two bourgies . we both had real cowboy boots we rocked at sixteen.
my high school track team; yeah i was cool with the girls, but no besties there . i even refused to go with my relay team on our scholarship to grambling. i went to delaware instead
but the one who stands out from back then is charm-cantstop my jamaica sistah...who thanks to fb is still here; and she not alone. a whole crew from high school the ones who were in my classes, kicked it with in the halls, in front and in the courtyard of school before and after, old boyfriends who are now pastors, even but no best friends
the truth is the one best friend i had in life was at and from tuskegee
we met as we both entered vet school. she went on to completion and i believe some measure of fame, i dropped out to become an economist, a traveler of africa as a developmentalist. stephanie miles richardson.
want to know how you know who is your best friend? It is the people you are literally in love with. the folk who so amaze you with the things they do, their accomplishments stir your soul, their friendship to you is gold, you love spending time with them, doing anything with them. i remember when i learned i was in love with stephanie. it was when i realized my emotions and connections scared her. at that point i realized her best friend was her life, family and husband. she was not so free avant garde as to not be shaken by such deep attachments from a sister who has been co-traveling.
and by then, so early still, i was such a best friend i knew it was time to let it go
i have not had a best friend since. even in hindsight doubt those i so label as such. just good connections for a time, reason, purpose and space.
having a best friend means people travel with you to psychic emotional, psychological, physical , economic, mental and journey places. and they dont leave you there either. they travel through. they arrive and exit with you. the road before you continues with best friends. they can tell your story best and better and sometimes before if not after you. no one really knows my story.
to write 'knows my story' reminds me of one best friend for a time. now gone. tShaka Dagbovie. a sister who i knew all through doctorate grad school but we only became close when my economic reality took a down turn...i was one of the early economic crisis casualties. tShaka used to come over and bring wine, take me out to dinner and put money in my hand. I was shocked. I was touched. that was back in 2002, 2003. she even wanted us to do a movie, film script together. about an international intercontinental global black sister traveling her life and story. it took me coming to trinidad and living this trauma for that script to be written. if that writing ever turns into a film, it will be dedicated to her. but you know what is peculiar? i left her in 2003, went back to visit michigan on a fluke in 2007, only for that sister to go to sleep one night, lay down and die. leaving a husband and three sons. i have always wondered why the universe saw fit to have me present for her crossing over. as it was all I could do was just grieve and watch. it appeared she was my best friend in silence, and in the scheme of things, her family, other friends, husband, the reality, paled me and mine out of existence
all those stories but the truth is current time and life, these eleven years, may sixteenth twenty fourteen completing, is a period of no best friend. best friends have turned out to be haters, enemies, conveyors of deep envy and resentment. friends and families, cousins with whom i traveled with for a time, and only in more time do i learn of their duplicities, coversions; refusing me employment, telling me no one makes and plays individual mas, and that was because coming from a carnival cultural family who lived here their whole life and never once did any of them think to be so independent brave and free to design their own costume, own the road, mas solo, so who was me to wash meh foot and come in and so or something like that it go.
being around people who have no clue or coordinates to relate to your life story or circumstances prevents any pretense to friendship, and now as i have grown older, and have a long road to look back on, i know my idea of basic friendship is Rumi, and then beyond that impossibility, who can top that to be bestie? What is best beyond Rumi? not even god, or oneself. the idea and pinnacle has not been corroborated.
a poem about my best friend is a prose essay instead.
if and when ever i get to a poem of stanzas and lines less sentences;
it will be called,
Once Upon a Best Friend
..."i feel like someone attended me accompanied me
all through last night's sleep
but i dont feel like i slept
i dont feel rested
nor was it fitful
just endless talk, reassuring, coddling, guiding, teaching, exhorting and showing
and when i think of the company
it is a female sense that comes to me
but quickly, immediately after
i know that is not complete nor true
it was male too
as if intergalactic metaphysical spirit energies
have no gender or such fake banal constructions
but as if the entity was there to reassure me of the myriad forms, paths , and processes of breakthrough coming my way.
and i was just writing a prose and it occurred to me,
this year, is eleven years here
from may sixteenth, i surmise, might itself be an entrance, doorway, hallway, portal
a crossing over
perhaps that entity last night was my guardian best friend"
this is an interesting muse
my intuitive immediately chimes, 'you have no best friend'
but then faces pop up
charm- mugure was the first. debbie the second
debbie was my real best friend for a time; the last few years in college at delaware. we shared new york even though we did not know each other then, back there, our respective and mutual home
charm-mugure was my close friend at graduate school michigan
chantilly was my best friend for a time in 2006 when she opened her home to me that summer, i staying at her place while she traveled her academic prowess.
do you see the trend?
my best friends have always been for a time, a place, situational.
i have moved around too much
my life too vagabond
i never stayed any one place more than ten years.
twelve, was the longest, growing up on e 42nd street in brooklyn
and i have no friends from that block remaining or located
i had leslie it seemed for a time in elementary school
i remember no one from the two years in meyer levin
and for high school of james madison, was there a best?
i think of a sister whose name now i cant remember, but seem to me she and i were the two bourgies . we both had real cowboy boots we rocked at sixteen.
my high school track team; yeah i was cool with the girls, but no besties there . i even refused to go with my relay team on our scholarship to grambling. i went to delaware instead
but the one who stands out from back then is charm-cantstop my jamaica sistah...who thanks to fb is still here; and she not alone. a whole crew from high school the ones who were in my classes, kicked it with in the halls, in front and in the courtyard of school before and after, old boyfriends who are now pastors, even but no best friends
the truth is the one best friend i had in life was at and from tuskegee
we met as we both entered vet school. she went on to completion and i believe some measure of fame, i dropped out to become an economist, a traveler of africa as a developmentalist. stephanie miles richardson.
want to know how you know who is your best friend? It is the people you are literally in love with. the folk who so amaze you with the things they do, their accomplishments stir your soul, their friendship to you is gold, you love spending time with them, doing anything with them. i remember when i learned i was in love with stephanie. it was when i realized my emotions and connections scared her. at that point i realized her best friend was her life, family and husband. she was not so free avant garde as to not be shaken by such deep attachments from a sister who has been co-traveling.
and by then, so early still, i was such a best friend i knew it was time to let it go
i have not had a best friend since. even in hindsight doubt those i so label as such. just good connections for a time, reason, purpose and space.
having a best friend means people travel with you to psychic emotional, psychological, physical , economic, mental and journey places. and they dont leave you there either. they travel through. they arrive and exit with you. the road before you continues with best friends. they can tell your story best and better and sometimes before if not after you. no one really knows my story.
to write 'knows my story' reminds me of one best friend for a time. now gone. tShaka Dagbovie. a sister who i knew all through doctorate grad school but we only became close when my economic reality took a down turn...i was one of the early economic crisis casualties. tShaka used to come over and bring wine, take me out to dinner and put money in my hand. I was shocked. I was touched. that was back in 2002, 2003. she even wanted us to do a movie, film script together. about an international intercontinental global black sister traveling her life and story. it took me coming to trinidad and living this trauma for that script to be written. if that writing ever turns into a film, it will be dedicated to her. but you know what is peculiar? i left her in 2003, went back to visit michigan on a fluke in 2007, only for that sister to go to sleep one night, lay down and die. leaving a husband and three sons. i have always wondered why the universe saw fit to have me present for her crossing over. as it was all I could do was just grieve and watch. it appeared she was my best friend in silence, and in the scheme of things, her family, other friends, husband, the reality, paled me and mine out of existence
all those stories but the truth is current time and life, these eleven years, may sixteenth twenty fourteen completing, is a period of no best friend. best friends have turned out to be haters, enemies, conveyors of deep envy and resentment. friends and families, cousins with whom i traveled with for a time, and only in more time do i learn of their duplicities, coversions; refusing me employment, telling me no one makes and plays individual mas, and that was because coming from a carnival cultural family who lived here their whole life and never once did any of them think to be so independent brave and free to design their own costume, own the road, mas solo, so who was me to wash meh foot and come in and so or something like that it go.
being around people who have no clue or coordinates to relate to your life story or circumstances prevents any pretense to friendship, and now as i have grown older, and have a long road to look back on, i know my idea of basic friendship is Rumi, and then beyond that impossibility, who can top that to be bestie? What is best beyond Rumi? not even god, or oneself. the idea and pinnacle has not been corroborated.
a poem about my best friend is a prose essay instead.
if and when ever i get to a poem of stanzas and lines less sentences;
it will be called,
Once Upon a Best Friend
..."i feel like someone attended me accompanied me
all through last night's sleep
but i dont feel like i slept
i dont feel rested
nor was it fitful
just endless talk, reassuring, coddling, guiding, teaching, exhorting and showing
and when i think of the company
it is a female sense that comes to me
but quickly, immediately after
i know that is not complete nor true
it was male too
as if intergalactic metaphysical spirit energies
have no gender or such fake banal constructions
but as if the entity was there to reassure me of the myriad forms, paths , and processes of breakthrough coming my way.
and i was just writing a prose and it occurred to me,
this year, is eleven years here
from may sixteenth, i surmise, might itself be an entrance, doorway, hallway, portal
a crossing over
perhaps that entity last night was my guardian best friend"
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