Where I work we have cubicals. I know this is a somewhat standard practice, but I don't think I've ever worked in a place with cubicals before. I sit in a block of six. There are three of us Organizers and three Reps. Store reps, by the nature of their job aren't at their desks very often. They are the people who visit the stores and make sure workers are being respected by management...actually I am discovering that they do way more than that, but I digress. The reps come and go and we say hi to each other when they are around, but it has been a very slow process getting to know them, given their schedules.
The Rep closest to me is a black woman too. We've discovered that we live near one another and have some things in common. She is a person who really cares a lot for her members. Sometimes she gets sad. I watch her fight for them. I see her struggle. Sometimes she goes all day without eating because she just keeps working. I have taken to leaving fruit on her desk from time to time, just to remind her to eat. A few days ago I left a poem on her desk to remind her to breathe...it's a poem I wrote a few months ago after the Oscars when the Onion called a 9 year old black girl a cunt. It was a bad day for me as a black woman. I took it really personally, so I wrote a piece called On Being Black and a Butterfly which is kind of my homage to self love. Well she really liked it, and instead of rushing off to work, she lingered to talk to me.
Somehow we got on the subject of weight. She is a self proclaimed Plus-Sized Diva. I have always been weird about my weight. It exists, but I would prefer not to talk about it. I was like that 40 lbs ago, even when I was in shape and practically lean and I am certainly like that now that I am growing into my roundness. I have never once considered myself a plus-sized diva. I've seen Monique on tv making her jokes and wearing her fabulous clothes and while I admired her, I never really thought about it as something I could relate to. But when my friend said it, when she claimed it the way she did, I thought well why not? Why not celebrate where I'm at today, the beauty I am rocking this moment as opposed to holding my breath, sucking in my stomach and saying well I'll be a Diva once I lose that 40lbs. What if I never lose weight? Will I forever be waiting to feel good about my body?
I used to think that when women said things like that it was bravado or a defense mechanism, but when she said it, it didn't feel defensive, it felt peaceful, like she was really the person who should be leaving poems on my desk to remind me that self love is an iterative process, and ongoing initiative that I have lots to learn about. So today I am a Plus Sized Butterfly (Diva still doesn't quite resonate with me-I don't think it will in 40lbs either, so I claiming my own terminology). I am a woman of consequence, a beauty of grand proportions, thick and curvy...and beautiful. And I will leave you with my poem:
The Rep closest to me is a black woman too. We've discovered that we live near one another and have some things in common. She is a person who really cares a lot for her members. Sometimes she gets sad. I watch her fight for them. I see her struggle. Sometimes she goes all day without eating because she just keeps working. I have taken to leaving fruit on her desk from time to time, just to remind her to eat. A few days ago I left a poem on her desk to remind her to breathe...it's a poem I wrote a few months ago after the Oscars when the Onion called a 9 year old black girl a cunt. It was a bad day for me as a black woman. I took it really personally, so I wrote a piece called On Being Black and a Butterfly which is kind of my homage to self love. Well she really liked it, and instead of rushing off to work, she lingered to talk to me.
Somehow we got on the subject of weight. She is a self proclaimed Plus-Sized Diva. I have always been weird about my weight. It exists, but I would prefer not to talk about it. I was like that 40 lbs ago, even when I was in shape and practically lean and I am certainly like that now that I am growing into my roundness. I have never once considered myself a plus-sized diva. I've seen Monique on tv making her jokes and wearing her fabulous clothes and while I admired her, I never really thought about it as something I could relate to. But when my friend said it, when she claimed it the way she did, I thought well why not? Why not celebrate where I'm at today, the beauty I am rocking this moment as opposed to holding my breath, sucking in my stomach and saying well I'll be a Diva once I lose that 40lbs. What if I never lose weight? Will I forever be waiting to feel good about my body?
I used to think that when women said things like that it was bravado or a defense mechanism, but when she said it, it didn't feel defensive, it felt peaceful, like she was really the person who should be leaving poems on my desk to remind me that self love is an iterative process, and ongoing initiative that I have lots to learn about. So today I am a Plus Sized Butterfly (Diva still doesn't quite resonate with me-I don't think it will in 40lbs either, so I claiming my own terminology). I am a woman of consequence, a beauty of grand proportions, thick and curvy...and beautiful. And I will leave you with my poem:
On Being Black And A Butterfly
Even our cocoons must be Kevlar.
No spindly feelers breech the bud,
no filmy wings, slick and paper thin
greet this dawn.
We emerge fully present to our
enduring capacity to remain unbroken.
Our wings are boned in titanium
framed with panes of
shatterproof stained glass.
No wild summer breeze,
nor gale force hurricane
will set us to flit and flutter.
Us with wings of leaden gold,
us with wings like eternity
improbably heavy,
must create our own currents,
raise ourselves sturdy and skyward
to take flight by surprise.
We must fall in love
with our own industrial beauty,
never expect to be recognized
for the glorious celestial beings we are,
learn to swat daggers with every wing flap,
learn to embrace wholeness
the way Vampires learn to love
the curse of immortality,
those cuts will never kill us,
might sting, might bleed,
but we will remain unbroken.
Understand the gift of our
impenetrable vulnerability.
We must learn to be held
and to hold others,
but know it is only
in the cradle of our own arms
that freedom is really free,
only in the understanding and sweet embrace
of our own souls
that love is fully expressed.
It is up to us to be:
Be the butterfly,
Be you, be me.
Be the night sky,
Be the stars,
Be the Universe,
Be the traveler unafraid of new adventures
Be the road that wraps back around on itself,
Be the song sung by a child when no one is awake to hear her,
Be the humming wings of quick moving birds,
Be the steady pulse of the mountain,
Be the river arching out to ride the wind across the desert sands,
Be the rain that makes love to each grain of rice in the fields,
Be whatever and whoever we dare to be,
Be the fulfillment of a universal promise,
Be the butterfly,
Be the little black girl arms and smile outstretched with no fear of poison daggers,
Be the little black girl with nothing to lose and the whole world on a yo-yo string already in her back pocket,
Be the Kevlar butterfly, bulletproof and daggerproof and wordproof and poisonproof.
Be the proof that black girls can fly.
Reagan Jackson is a writer, artist, YA fiction aficionado, afro-punk, international educator, and community organizer based in Seattle, WA. You can find her most Tuesdays at the Seattle Poetry Slam or maybe just being nerdy at her favorite bookstores.
Reagan Jackson is a writer, artist, YA fiction aficionado, afro-punk, international educator, and community organizer based in Seattle, WA. You can find her most Tuesdays at the Seattle Poetry Slam or maybe just being nerdy at her favorite bookstores.
