Category Archives: tafakari

To train yourself, or how I manage to do ‘this work’

The most frequent and usually very first question I receive is how I manage to cope with something so sad, how I take care of myself through what is imagined to be fully painful and nothing else…but to do this work requires a different, much grittier and far less delineable praxis than a simple set of self care techniques.

to be willing, or, the gorgeous responsibility of making space for hope

Hope has been on my mind.  Hope has been a part of my family for a long time. I hold vivid memories of days in college when my mother and I cared for her father, my grandfather, as he died, and took turns reading Jane Goodall’s ‘Reason For Hope’ out loud to him, and toContinueContinue reading “to be willing, or, the gorgeous responsibility of making space for hope”

Expanding Our Knowledge: Why I’m starting a PhD and how you can join me

…palliative and hospice care for children are slowly developing outside of the US and UK and in resource-limited settings. As they develop, it’s critical we understand from the communities experiencing and surviving the death of a child what death means to them, how dying enters their lives, how the story of death and dying is told, who they need to be in the dying process, what surviving well includes, and what the good death looks like.

unlearning grace

When I was a dancer, grace was a large part of my life. Then, grace was about making your extreme physical exertion appear as if a feather was moving lightly through air. Making your effort look effortless. Your pain invisible. Part of me wishes I had never learned that form of grace, that supposed gracefulness. Part of me is grateful for what I’ve gained in the process of unlearning it.

for Kamo

Someone said to me this week “sometimes abandoning your child is the greatest act of love,” about a child named Kamo, who was neglected and then abandoned six years ago and just returned to the mother who left him, right as he nears the end of his life. It’s a notion I’ve wondered on sinceContinueContinue reading “for Kamo”

I feel her in the maybe

What if we let others walk with us, even if from a distance? What if we let our complexity shine out, rather than close off and cage us? What if we stood in our reality, and let it be?

I think that’s what she would have done.

So what if I said: my mother, the human who shaped and grew me, died two and a half months ago and this is what was in me in the before, during, and after?

Things That Appear Broken But Upon Closer Inspection Are Beautiful

In the midst of many movements, physical and figurative and of the soul, words I once wrote have a way of coming back around: 11 November 2014 Things That Appear Broken But Upon Closer Inspection Are Beautiful A slight glint of the equator peeks through the rust on the dilapidated gurney. Soft eyelashes continuing toContinueContinue reading “Things That Appear Broken But Upon Closer Inspection Are Beautiful”

For K

Here you are, a nine-year-old sex worker in the walmart parking lot. Here you are, in a sequined red shirt — flimsy, translucent, bare-ly hiding the chest you aren’t old enough to grow. Here you are, nine years old. You are nine years old. Once, in that sheltered place, bumbling through heart and soul onContinueContinue reading “For K”

wait

I learned to wait in Kenya, sitting in the shade of trees, being, breathing, until the time comes. Sometimes for the matatu to finally guzzle and cajole itself to a start, sometimes for the quorum to slowly make their way over the bulbous stones to the collection of chairs wobbling on uneven ground circled intoContinueContinue reading “wait”