On the unjust killing of Karon Blake

    I am at an impasse with the this world. I cannot stomach the callousness and the disregard for Black life. Karon Blake deserved to live, Karon did not take his own life. His untimely demise is not the fault of himself, his parents, nor is it entirely the fault of the man who ultimately pulled the trigger. Even though he did so 6 times, striking young Karon 3 times. The onus still does not fall entirely on this man, this mystery Black man. A Black man of privilege, a homeowner and legal gun owner. Alleged owner of other property in DC. 

    It is however the fault of the pervasive and structural internalized racism and anti-blackness that runs rampant in this country and globally. It is the fault of centuries of normalization of death of Black people and harm toward the Black body. It is the fault of a system that dare to assess value of life based on nominal factors like the amount of melanin in ones body.

    It is the fault of economic violence and wealth disparity. It is the fault of capitalism and consumerism and our prominence toward gaining and amassing and hoarding. I find fault with the belief that property is worth protecting while people pay the cost with their lives. It is the fault of the local administration and their pre-occupation with economic growth for the few while the many are pushed out. Our homes, gentrified. Our neighborhoods, seized. 

    I am at an impasse with this world. The resounding cry is not that of justice for Karon, but of how his death is his own fault. It is even more disheartening that this cry is coming from inside the “preverbal” house. “All skin folk aint kin folk” is the age old saying. Knowing this fact does not lessen the sting. Awareness of something does not always make it easier to process. The cognitive dissonance is astounding. Black people across the internet have parted their thumbs to type the most heinous things about a child who was murdered. 

    Black children even in their death are forced to take responsibility for a world they didn’t ask to be in the first place. Black children are still regarded as property themselves, as things to be controlled if not through parental rearing then through criminalization from the carceral state.

    Emmitt Till was a Black child, just one year older than Karon Blake. He was accused, he was criminalized, he was, even after his death, forced to take responsibility for the evils of this world. In 2023 we still continue to criminalize our children. Have we learned nothing about protecting our children if not in physical at least in legacy? 

Karon was NOT a carjacker, NOT a thief, NOT a Juvi, NOT a criminal. Karon was a Black boy.  

Must we continue to be oppressors in Black skin? Must we continue to uphold the patriarchy in feminine bodies; reinforce capitalism while being apart of the working class? Have we learned nothing about supporting principles and structures that work against our best interest as people? 

Perhaps not. 

Rest in Power Karon. You deserved a better world. Some of us are still fighting for it. 

Ase’ 

Twenty Great?

Hello blogworld,

I needed a more in depth medium to get some things off my chest. I will be 28 in just under 3.5 hours. I have a 2 kids, an almost husband and a career that seems to be going, but not nearly quick enough for my liking. I know this sounds depressing to some and like a dream for others. You know when you ask most people how they feel when they turn another year older, they almost always say they feel the same, but I feel different. 

I feel older, I feel wiser, I feel more confident than I've ever been in my entire life and with all this new found wisdom comes making proper decisions. Today I chose to sacrifice a bit of my own happiness for the greater good of my family. So 28 is for loving yourself fully and truly, 28 is also for sacrifice. 20, 23, and even  26 year old me would not have been equipped to make the hard decision. 

Now in no way am I saying I did so gracefully. Mentally, I kicked and screamed, outwardly I cried and sulked. But I am determined to press through this in a healthy way that doesn't cause me to regress emotionally. Oftentimes we think that burying a situation, hiding our emotions makes us more competent in dealing with struggle. This is completely false. I almost died attempting to bottle up stress and negative emotions. It's okay to be mad, it's okay to sulk, it's perfectly normal to grieve the loss of things dear to you. 

Today I am grieving and that is okay. 

I Just Wanna...

I just wanna...

Read books and listen to the roar of the ocean



Decorate homes and make bows


Make love and maybe a little money


Enough to buy green machine and heartily thrift


Write music, poems and prose


Stay up until the sun rises


Never thinking of where the time has gone


No regrets, just cocktails and fist pumps to techno


Middle of the dance floor strobe lights abound


Dancing around white girl style


Glitter converse and bohemian patterns


Beauty, Truth and Love


Above all else, Love

Frankie, the never destined to be a great orator

I cried today, you know one of those silent cries where the absence of the audible tone makes the tears rush from your eyes and no matter how much you try to keep them at bay they become like a thrashing current.

And then they dry.

You look up with red eyes and foggy glasses at the people who haven't noticed or suspected a thing, and you sigh with relief because now at least you don't have to explain how much you feel like a fuck up every time the words that have formed so eloquently in your head and that have been so beautifully and wittily transcribed to paper, turn all the way to MUSH!
And so your angry, at yourself, at the assignment, and your peers who although they did not attempt to judge you, did so subconsciously. Not with snickers or teases as they do in elementary education, but with the solemn stare of "I'm so glad that's not me" or "Shes so smart why cant she just do this" or the heart wrenching stare of a friend who with their eyes say "Frankie, you can do this". The encouragement hurts worse than the defeat, because in my world that's been filled with parents callings of "Frankie, you can do anything" this is something that I simply cannot do.

Frankie, the never destined to be a great orator

People ≠ Groceries

People unlike groceries do not come with an expiration date. And in that I mean when you first meet someone you never know the last time you will see them, you never know when everything will come to an end. No one could have told me that certain relationships in my life would have ended so abruptly. And no one could have prepared me that when I spoke to her a couple of months ago, that would be the last time I'd hear her voice or that last summer would have been the last time I saw her face.
Always with a smile, forever with a heart to help people and a life purposed for something greater than her own. Its rare to meet people who look past themselves, peoples whose life journey has nothing to do with their own motives but everything to do with enriching the welfare of others. If I was ever lost on life's journey, if I ever was unsure about which path to take and where to go, I didn't have to look any further than what the Lord had already placed in my life.
And although I will never get a chance to say goodbye, a chance to let her know the impact she left upon my life, what I can do now is adopt her mission. A mission that she lived by every single day of her life, one that Im positive she exuded each day until she took her last breath. God makes no mistakes, in fact certain things transpire so that we may truly know our right path.

So thank you for everything that you've done. Thank you for your lasting impact, more people in this world should be like you, and from this day I will try to live by your selfless example.   

Taking it all back

Detoxing today because I've been eating rice like its water and I had a steak and a half over the course of 2 days! Ive done so well on this health journey and there is honestly no turning back now. I woke up this morning just feeling so heavy, literally and emotionally. I have to get my life back, and I have to stop running away. Running from myself and from the issues that make life exactly that, LIFE! Ish happens and the faster I face them the more quickly I will heal.

I went to Walmart and got some tea cleanser, splenda, spinach and a green machine. So for breakfast I had watermelon, a cup of spinach blended with 8 ounces of green machine and a bottle of water. And it was sooooo yumm!  

Bringing light to that which is dour,
Beauty that penetrates the three layers
Resonating and reverberating between them
Torn from home in the bosom
Shaken and thrown
She assimilates, adapted
Many at this stage apt to do
However, it is different now
A constant drumming of something amiss
Others acquire and treasure, conquer?
Perhaps, perhaps not
But still not quite abiding
No homely state, still something askew  
The others scrimmage to dominate
The light, beauty, and nature
Wars, they toil and tug until
Of home only traces remain