Category: Lifting Voices

black girl diaries (2): line leader

auzoije Leave a comment

i remember when i was nothing but Hope

i remember when i thought that my Hope was enough
to save the world.
when i felt that everything was to be done right.
when i had the answer to absolutely everything
and nothing could change it.

in elementary school i was always
running to be the line leader,
to tell my peers to buckle up
and wait their turns
and stand up straight
and quiet down
and then it’d all be fixed.

and i remember wanting to be president.
to solve world hunger and bring world peace,
to bring a better life.
the eyes of a child and the eyes of an idealist
are one in the same, and
both are so very needed.

my eyes grow dimmer,
my prescription weaker,
and i have cataracts on my soul, my spirit,
and i can barely see the light anymore.

the Hope, it persists nonetheless
like a echo.
it has lasted far longer than i ever thought it would.
i can even hear it now.

but it is dying, slowly and steadily, no matter how many times i resucitate it.

i now see those who i love and care for
who i worry and fear for
being told by others who will never care to know my loved ones
to buckle up
and wait their turns
and stand up straight
and quiet down

to listen up
and quickly move
and shut their mouths
and stay alert
and don’t speak up
and don’t resist
and don’t you dare.

and to refuse would be risking everything.
i fear for those risking everything.
i fear for them, and for those who will be told they’re risking everything
no matter what they do.

when do you cry for help?
when it is too late? when you’re there just in time?

where is our line leader. does such a person, such an entity, even exist.

will it ever.

Crooked Fool: The answer is not closing the door

Cydney Marie Leave a comment

When I  started physical theatre school a year after having basically my entire spine surgically relocated, one of my classmates was quick to say, “When we study Commedia Dell’arte, there will be certain things you can’t do. You probably couldn’t do Arlecchino.”

For context, Arlecchino is a stock character known for acrobatics and over the top physicality.

I did eventually play Arlecchino. I ultimately found a character I felt more at home with, but I still did it.

To be honest, that comment pissed me off. I put that Arlecchino mask on out of pure spite. It also pisses me off when I struggle to nail a dance skill because of my back and somebody says “just don’t do that one.” Or when I go to a yoga class and somebody finds out my spine is full of metal and held together with rope, and they automatically recommend an easier class.

I want to make this very clear: when somebody with a medical condition, disability, or any other need tries to do something, the answer should never be “just don’t do it.” They should never be sent out of the room. The choice to participate in an activity is theirs, not yours.

The answer to a theatre student healing from a back surgery is not to deny them the opportunity to learn the same things as everyone else. The answer to somebody who needs an accommodation to play a character is not that they shouldn’t play that character.

Creative spaces have evolved to be exclusive. Our culture has historically included Disabled folks from public life, including the arts, so industry norms have not evolved to meet diverse needs. When we send somebody away because their bodies or minds don’t meet our standards, we are perpetuating that exclusion. We become the oppressors.

When I push back against meeting access needs in performing arts spaces, I hear a lot of “we can’t compromise our creative vision” or “it has to be this way.” But…does it really? Or is that just what’s easiest for those who hold power in the space? Just because something is doesn’t mean it has to be.

Excluding someone does not preserve creativity. To paraphrase disability activists Terry Galloway and Donna Marie Nudd, what it actually does is demonstrate that you are not or do not want to be creative enough to come up with a solution. If we can make an entire show from scratch, we can problem solve.

I am a stubborn person and I show up in a lot of spaces where people aren’t expecting someone like me, and sometimes where they don’t want me. And I won’t leave to make things easier on those who don’t have to question whether they belong in the space.  I value creativity too much to throw it out like that.

Crooked Fool: Meditating on restorative justice and the arts

Cydney Marie Leave a comment

Last weekend, I was able to take a restorative justice training with the Dispute Resolution Center. This particular training was focused on circle processes, which basically set a container for allowing everyone with a stake in a given situation the chance to speak. In addition to being a tool for addressing harm, it turns out that circles can also be an excellent tool for building community. Maybe that’s why I couldn’t stop drawing parallels to theatre (shoutout to the others in the training for not making fun of me!)

A circle begins with laying a centerpiece down on the floor – maybe a blanket with a few objects of significance resting on top. There’s a brief reading or ritual at the beginning and the end, and an object is passed from hand to hand as each person takes their turn offering their thoughts on whatever the topic of the circle might be. Everyone else focuses either on the person speaking or on the centerpiece.

Restorative Justice practices are drawn from Indigenous cultures around the world. Restorative approaches to harm have been slowly gaining traction in the US over the past few decades, inevitably sometimes being whitewashed, appropriated, and co-opted by systems that are built around punishment and isolation rather than repair and connection. There’s a whole rabbit hole we could go down about restorative practices, but in this moment I’m most concerned about the community building aspect.

There’s a quote that I hear a lot. To paraphrase: “We can get hurt in relationships and we heal in relationships.” Whether we’re talking about personal disagreements or generational trauma, connection offers an opportunity to heal.

I’ve written before about how the arts can promote connection. My limited experience with expressive-arts based approaches through Telling It has also taught me how creating in community is not just effective at healing, but crucial for human wellbeing. Creating and sharing together fosters a kind of connection that makes tough conversations possible.

How different is it to speak in a group versus singing, rhyming, or dancing in a group? If live performance has its roots in religious ritual, how can it help create a space sacred enough and safe enough to dive into high-stakes conversations?

The performing arts are filled with examples of systemic harms and unchecked privilege. I can definitely see an opportunity for restorative practices to help address some of the more harmful industry norms. But I also think that focusing on deep connection in the arts has at least as much potential for creating change. How do we create spaces where people can speak openly about their thoughts, whether it’s about creative ideas or the power dynamics in the room?

So often, I feel as though we treat both creativity and restorative approaches to harm like extras: something nice to have but not crucial, and often overridden by the needs powerful systems. What if human expression and connection became crucial? What if deep honesty were centered? Who could be heard and what would be possible?

black girl diaries (1): measure of success

auzoije Leave a comment

push your cries down here,
and hold yourself to the promise you made.
you were born to be great, and you must die great.
your fortune is no mistake,
and it is not your fortune alone.

there is no way to go back now
unless you want to prove everything anyone ever said to you.
are you worthy?
do you belong here?
will you ever?
people who are not like you may
never have to question this.
people who are not like you may
never have to face this.

there is no real way to succeed, but
there is surely a way to fail.
you can see it so clearly in front of you, the
height of your anxieties
seeping in and
making you lesser.

when you be more than what you acheive?
have you even been allowed to be more than that?
will you ever be more than that?

i dream of a future where i am nothing more than a person
with a house and a cat.
a future where my job means nothing to others
and everything to me.
a future where i am no longer nervous about construction.
where i do not feel lonely in crowds or anxious in circles.

when will i start measuring up to this.

will i ever stop measuring.

Crooked Fool: Are you angry yet?

Cydney Marie Leave a comment

Witness.

I was young, crooked femme, buzzing with energy, a nova of anger that was pathologized, bad-ified, otherized, punished…

A performer adapting to the endless energy and life force late-stage capitalist performing arts charge as the price of admission to a club that will blacklist without hesitation. I was easy to work with. Disciplined. Energized regardless of fatigue, a vessel down to my fingertips, twisted body best when unnoticed and unclaimed.

I am a rebel in circus garb, prepared for the tower to fall, knowing my role when it happens.

A clown questioning the colonized, controlling, punishing logics of the state, somehow more threatening in a red nose, but not always thought of as such.

Arlecchino, Brighella, Colombina, Pierrot surviving, working, playing my way through a system designed to keep me wanting, needing.

The crooked, hunchbacked witch who served literal communion to an actual demon in the scariest place there was. The gods rewarded me with a red nose and a spine full of titanium so that eyes, breath, spine will forever be grounded and protected in the act of cursing systems that need to crack, crumble, re-puzzle.  

But remember, it’s just a show…

I am the deformed artist who was told by a psychic that I mastered dark magick in a past life and by a spiritualist reverend that even the darkest creature goes to the light.

I am the one who spent years seeing THIS quilted together in dreams, and now feeling the living, pounding, vital force in those hazy green, buzzing and burning images come to life.

I dance in darkness, a ghost in the making, a demon falling madly in love with my mangled form, the footsteps in the night, screaming the angry children out of sleep because they are the ones who know that something is not right, and that something is not them.

I am, apparently, The Bad, so why not play games with the worst of the worst, week after week?

And why not argue where I can? When nice accomplishes nothing, I can at least still play the game – wrong if I choose.

As an annoying clown once said to me, and as I once said to someone who talked down to me like I was a noisy 27-year-old child, cheating is a mode of play.

Apparently, there are those who genuinely hate crooked, hunchbacked witch clowns. And they’ll dress up their deep, burning hate like light, saying I’m sick, unfriendly, whatever, because they know they can’t say Bad.

Except now they probably can.

I will play the game with all the Bad ones, overdressing, playing ferociously, cheating if I have to. If they want a demon, I know a few. If they try to cut off my rough edges, I’ll crack their rigid walls and dance on the rubble, and everyone loves to dance. Eventually they’ll join.

Slainte to the Bad ones. When this ending happens and this tower crumbles, we will dance in the flames and build with our disfigured, tired bodies in our own image. The vengeful gods will die. And there will the demons be, in the light, turning to ghost with Mad, irrational love and screaming into the dark in joy and rage as our dance party goes on atop the elements that once made us. Who’s the demon now?

Are you angry yet?

You should be.

Crooked Fool: Dance it Crooked

Cydney Marie Leave a comment

Meander, twist

Dancing around

No lines, no limits, all angle

Twisting, turning

Like the branches of a tree

Like an ancient river

And yet somehow this is wrong

Every day

Stretching away pain

Exploding power into muscles

Insisting.

And trying to remember that the enemy isn’t my body

It’s the expectation that if you can’t do things one way

You shouldn’t do them at all

Insisting

On movement

Because it heals

And I don’t have to do it standing “straight”

Breath expanding

Crushed against ribs

Heart pounding more than it should

Feeling deeply into each muscle

Because crooked things can be beautiful

But take a bit of searching

Breathe

Sharp exhale

Dizzy

Lightheaded

Still moving

Insisting

For me

Dance

In a spiral

In a twist

Roll

Leap

You’re not made of glass

Don’t let them tell you so

This dance is resistance

Against the idea that only certain kinds of bodies can do it “right”

That some bodies should only exist in breakable inaction

Noiselessness

Cooperation

Convenience

Move

Dance

Spine

Breath

Because you were not meant to be shackled into stillness