Aspasia

I want to be loved. It’s a general statement with specific requirements

Feb 233 min read

Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child

Reflecting on the transition of summer and winter. Holding space for who I am and who I think I am not.

Jan 202 min read

Callaloo: I used to hate you

Sitting in the window of Cafe Kino, watching Bristol's finest. Dreams coinciding.

Nov 6, 20242 min read

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Aspasia

I want to be loved. It’s a general statement with specific requirements

Feb 233 min read

Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child

Reflecting on the transition of summer and winter. Holding space for who I am and who I think I am not.

Jan 202 min read

Callaloo: I used to hate you

Sitting in the window of Cafe Kino, watching Bristol's finest. Dreams coinciding.

Nov 6, 20242 min read

Get up again

My PMDD has been intense this month, I locked myself away and found some of the pieces I've been looking for. This is that.

Nov 2, 20243 min read

Thandi

Violence and justice. Justice and reparations. We seem to pick and choose the circumstances where we apply our principles, and values are...

Oct 12, 20242 min read

beyond words

You are beyond words, just out of reach, in the middle of a storm, the eye of a needle, you are beyond words, morning dew made weightless...

Aug 22, 20242 min read

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Welcome to Verandah!

Inspired by my upbringing in Jamaica and the UK, Verandah is a space where I share my thoughts, philosophy, and creative work. In Jamaica, the verandah is a cherished place where people gather to escape the sun or rain, and connect with each other. This blog is a digital reflection of that spirit of gathering, offering a place for contemplation and connection.

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EDITOR'S CHOICE

Discover a curated selection of our favorite pieces. Immerse yourself in captivating narratives and thought-provoking poetry.

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To motherhood.
To friendships that germinate sisterhood.
To bodies bulging bouncing throbbing
To desires crawling scratching gnawing
To the scabs and to the scars that etch the story called my life.
To love.
To rage rightful righteous E-sensual even as it threatens me with eternity
To unforgiveness pall bearer to redemption.
To nothing in particular
To everything specific.
To needs unravelling
To those unmet and festering.
To skin.
To new life, ebbing exploration drawing me ductile.
To good food.
To good fucking.
Food of the soul
Food of the spirit.
To good food again
Kerosene yellow. Electric green. Fever blue.
To my loves.
The list grows even as we do.

Wallow in the joys that give birth to your dreams
Muthauniverse farsight here to set you free

Truly Get Yours beat by Damu the Fudgemunk
Words through me

Thoughts

I know I’m holding back
It’s just hard to put my feelings into words
Every time I try to speak
I am overwhelmed by how deep it goes
You and me…
(Something ruff but not unpolished. More to come…)

Beat I found called Cold Ocean by Snaap, soft launch, it’s Aries season, I wanted to hit up open mic tonight but 9-to-5 grind is keeping me tired, freedom for security is it a fair trade. I’ll find out soon enough. I made this instead.

Ernest Cole photograph : Children play with sprinklers

About the last time you can be naked outside without being arrested or causing a scene. Today it’s hotter than fresh baked apple pie. Our bare feet charred by the sticky asphalt. Sage now once thyme green grass singed by the summer sun offering our feet a haven. We are lucky. The sprinklers cooled our berry skin like the aloe packs my grandmama put on our burns when we came home after a long days adventure, dusty and wounded. At 2/2 time the sprinklers evacuate buckets of water a routine exposed by the rhythm of summer, and for 30 minutes we basked in their Pentecost, our naked bodies finding salvation from the heat. Baptised by the mist we were born again rising into the second half of our day, a ritual that stretched our summer days endless. Our naked bodies shone. Shone as when we first emerged under fluorescence starstruck and too curious for our own good. Although this would be the last time we could be free without suspicion we were too busy to notice the stares.

Wallow in the joys that give birth to your dreams.

1. She tells herself things will get better
2. one day She’ll look back on days like this with pride not venom
3. She swallows her pain hoping it’ll juice her up
4. steroidal concoctions fill her cup
5. She reaches out guided by instinct it’s the natural result trained to believe She’ll never be enough She’s imprinting
6. masked up familiar circumstance
7. She believes in herself, yes but voices in her head tell her hope is dead it’s convincing
8. She wakes up everyday failure oozing from her pores
9. She’s locked in a prison of her own devising hoping to be saved that’s the right thing She wants a Breitling
10. She wants the best She wonders if She’s settling he’s not the right guy but it’s the right thing
11. Its frightening She can’t shake this feeling
12. there must be something more than this
13. A path to bliss a world beyond
14. She keeps picturing it.

Things that piss me off today/in general by no means comprehensive

[Winter skin]
[How men weaponise misogyny to victimise women]
[How much trauma informed language and concepts are used to gaslight]
[How wars are perpetuated by the bottom 1% and its consequences used to further validate the need for war and such acts of violence]
[How surveillance is used to keep us in a hyper vigilant state so we cannot access resources for liberation, well-being, community etc.]
[How the media disempowers us through its rhetoric and works to reinforce the principles of greed and control]
[The cult of productivity which makes me mask compulsively to keep my place in the running for the capitalist/patriarchal/white supremacist prize of access to more stuff]
[How stuff also includes people (objects)]
[How I am conditioned to be culpable in my own subjugation]
[How I buy clothes made by people who are treated as objects (slaves to the subject)]
[How my ideas/data are invalidated, stolen and repackaged and sold back to me]
[How men make excuses for the abusive behaviour of their fellow men by compartmentalising their abuse saying “he’s a good guy, but a bad boyfriend/father etc…”]

No one makes sense
So I’m manufacturing my own.
Stay tuned!

Gloria
A weight lifted
New flow
Cramped hands
Rusty
Stretch before you really go for it
Buk up
All said
All done
Weeping may endure
Joy cometh
Something wise
You’re hard to read

A fish out of water
Mesozoic fantasies
Don’t make waves
Make sand castles
Even when the tsunami comes
it’s still now and you are still here
Stay don’t go
Deep trance phenomena
Looking through the past with the future’s eyes
Ambrosia whirls
Bright brown eyes
And Silk.

1111
I also wanted to say how much poetry is like church it carries within it the hallowedness of worship and the supplication of devotion
1313
I wanna make history I want my name to become a verb for a noun in a story
1414
2222 my life has changed
Worrying is betting against yourself - TM
I want to find beauty in my everyday life but compulsively I look for it everywhere else
1717
Beautiful in my everyday:
Rae’s smile
Cat’s Joie de vivre
New life
Old life
Mammie’s wrinkles
A perfectly brewed mug of peppermint tea.

She wanted more than most people would ask for. How would here life look if she honoured her desires. What would it feel like to stretch into the folds of the day? Would they be silken or linen, soft and smooth or rough and wild…

Always dreaming when I’m with you
Green butterflies and peach skies words just won’t do
Laughing Meltdowns and skinny zxxts
I’ve been trying to write you a love song but the words won’t come through
So here’s to all the time we’ve spent and all the time we have left and the rest of everything else
Jesus was a WOMAN makes every ounce of sense
Masters adhd autism breakdowns PhD breakdowns
True loves and doing what ever the fuck we want to.

Me
Me
Me
Ben Okri (heavenly)
Sam is having a good time
You’re beautiful Cat

at Ecowild
(@diverseartistsnetwork )

Connection.
Sanity check.
Warmth.
Hearty.
Full heart. Full belly.
Invite your dreams in for tea and biscuits.
Laughter.
Letting go.
Raindrops staccato on zinc roof.
It’s my turn.
Om.
Om.
Om.
Peace.
Grateful.
Split off. here and there.
Reconciliation.
Sage. thyme. mint. Kale. Kohlrabi. Pepper.

She was curious. She often felt she was hiding but she couldn’t figure out how. Sometimes the thought occurred to her that maybe it was her mother stood over her, trying to get to the bottom of some truth the Holy Spirit convinced her was a lie. Her shoulder caved in pushing air out of her lungs. A hiss then a sigh, trying to catch her breath.

You’re bleeding from the inside no one can stem the flow but you.

“I feel that…” = what usually follows is a thought about the other person not a feeling.

What story would you like to tell yourself?

I feel beautiful when in able to be myself.

Focus
Emotional involvement
Agitation
Repetition.

The world is ending maybe, everything is up in arms, more people more arms, my adhd is fighting my autism, I spend a lot of time staring at walls, I call it my reset time, I need money and a space with floor to ceiling windows, south facing of course, wooden floors of course, I want to see mammie and daddie, visit my childhood home, I dream about it all the time, I’m having demand avoidance with my blog, the news makes me sad so I only tune in sporadically, justice is a western concept perpetrated on those who cannot defend themselves, my father was a good man, I hope everyone can find some spec of peace today.

Work-in-progress
I’m hoping posting it half done will help my neurodivergent brain find some sort of urgency and finally do the final bits to get it where I envision it needs to be

It is based on My Life Mantras:
- This is my origin story
- Why is this the best thing to have happened to me
- I am where I need to be see what I need to see

If you want more details hit me up and we can engage in a psycho-spiritual-alchemical-ecological-intersectional-etc conversation.

——

Button down shirt something that makes your eyes pop •/• your favourite trousers that makes the right drop •/• who told you I’d be here when you didn’t even come back •/• for me things were real clear you said without words and I was listening so I really did hear you like that •/• we were over so I took myself away to heal so my life I could live and in time I could forgive for the sake of me live and let live.

Verandah

>> 1705–15; <Hindi baraṇḍā, barāmdā<Persian bar āmadaḥ coming out (unless the Hindi word is <Portuguese varanda,Spanish <<

Mammie a shell peas
Plastic chair a bruk
People dem a come from ma’hoe ‘ill
Sticky a yuh dat
Daddie
Skelentan
Fambily
Duppy story when light a gane
Winky yellow
Belly a buss

Check out my blog
*Verandah*
A place where you can peer into my soul, it’s that deep and its not I’m just out here blooming, have a seat, sip some tea, there’s loads more coming
Link >> https://shakarajillisa.wixsite.com/verandah/post/beyond-words <<

As I walk out into the world I search for places to unfurl into uncurl my fingers let go of all I cling to…

As I walk out into the world I search for places to unfurl into uncurl my fingers let go of all I cling to…

As I walk out into the world I search for places to unfurl into uncurl my fingers let go of all I cling to.

——
Transformed my mangled flesh looks kerosene yellow under lamp light
She carries her joy in her heel
He wears his peace on his head
The mango yellow sky calls to her the red earth pushes her up
I sense your longing whisper in the silken morning
Testimony comes from miraculous ends how can I know how to begin how can I know where I must go
I thirst
my throat is parched brown and ochre fleshed against my thigh

Only the good parts
That’s where the love starts
Only the good parts

Only the bad parts
That’s where the love starts
Only the bad parts

———————————

Breast bouncing
Asphalt kissing foot bottom
If I put one foot in front of the other
Where is it that I cannot go.

Join me x Diaspora Fest workshop, ‘User of the Erotic: The Erotic as Power,’ inspired by Audre Lorde’s essay, for a transformative exploration of sensation, feeling, and personal empowerment. Through movement, meditation, and reflection, together we will delve into the depths of our erotic selves. Engage in dialogue, share experiences, and witness powerful performances, all aimed at unlocking the full potential of the erotic as a force for self-discovery and liberation.

I’m also performing amongst beautiful peoples @wildheartwithacamera, @sukina_noor, @imanwest_ and @habieber.fever

Curated by @valentinapazhux, moi et @kaarokaaro, @sonderspokenword
Link in bio for workshop tickets!

Poetry x AI
With @valentinapazhux
Can AI write poetry?
Does that make creativity obsolete?
Are the machines going to create a utopia where we can eat grapes and sun ourselves 🤔
Come find out!
Saturday @w_shed 1pm
@sonderspokenword x @lyrafest

Should have been writing but I couldn’t help it….
** Turn on your audio**
It’s taken me so long to comprehend (I’m stilling comprehending)
Loss
Grief
Expressing pain
Lessens the rage and in the silence of grief I hope to find reprieve hope this helps who ever might need ❤️

Look how cute I was (am) ❤️

This week

Rage is a trance like state
Expressing anger prevents rage
but corner me and this rageful state
Serves as a protection mechanism for me to combat hate
———///———

Moon mostly full waiting for the end to come
Belly bang but belly nuh full
Mi wanga gut bus becaw mi a long fi sum

CAPTCHA

C(ompletely) A(utomated) P(ublic) T(uring) (Test to Tell) C(omputers and) H(umans) A(part)

Conspiracy
conspire - to act in harmony
( spīrāre to breathe)
Spirit
( spīritus a breathing)

To be chosen
To be loved because
To be loved in spite of
To be loved despite that
To be chosen of course

Summer’s (nearly) over
Here’s something half finished…

It’s nearly summer
The sun’s come out of its slumber
The trees have grown leaves and my sex’s driving’s getting quicker
It’s nearly summer
Got ma bid prepped set to simmer
Heatwaves and waved days out by the river
Bunning zoots drinking Prosecco with some syrup
Strawberries and some lemon
Living my best life softening like butter
Yellow like the chakra flowing steady like water

It’s nearly summer
Winter coat is falling off my shoulder
Butterflies emerge from darkness
Beauty sprouts from hardness
Stork’s nest in the chimey’s of old houses
Neglect and her consequence…

Fringe Fundraising
With these beauties @imanwest_ , @valentinapazhux , @kaarokaaro , et moi
Giving you the good stuff
Alien org*es and good ol fashioned trauma dump
Cafe kino dis Thursday @7.30pm

My notebook.

I never reread my notebooks
I’ve been collecting them pouring myself into them
I never show them to anyone either
They’ve become my safe place
A place where I work through life
A place where I find peace
A place where I tend to the tender parts so I can face the world

Being a self taught creative is fraught with ups and downs
Imposter syndrome, self criticism, self judgment
But also joy, rapture, excitement
Here’s some of my scribbles
I’ve been so reticent to share because I’m worried if they are good enough,
If I am artistic enough, if I can capture anything well enough

No doubt after I post this a world of judgement will well up in my head
They will be in my voice but made up of all the people I’ve encountered who’ve said something that stung, all the things I’ve picked up in the zeitgeist to invalidate my expression, all the whys of not being good enough to express and share

But what else is there
What other options do I have
If I’m quite the torture of silence is there still
If I am loud maybe then the voices will be drowned out by the thundering of purpose and I’ll somehow find what I need.

Exactly as you are
Right on the cusp of it
What feels right to me
If I’m exactly who I need to be
And right now is right where I need to be
What feels right to me

—-///——///—-

We need some mula
Performing at Edinburgh Fringe is a great honour
But since we’re rooted in reality we need your help to get us where we need to be
It’s cash we need
Donate on our gofundme
Every little helps so don’t worry
Whatever you can give and we’ll be grateful eternally

A likkle rhyme to get you there
It’s me, @valentinapazhux, @imanwest_ , and @kaarokaaro
Sharing our soulwerk with a new audience

The link is in my bio
Please share
Please donate
If you need an exchange I can also do maths and programme if that helps you in anyway hit me up
Watch this space
🙏🏿👅

Playing
Plaything
Ramping
Plea/sure

All made by me
1one - programmed this
2one - cutting things out and putting them together is grounding
3one - same thing as 2one but different

Portugal was fiyah
Black people are so fucking beautiful
Learnt how to shake my ass
Drank white sangria
Bonded Loved Discovered
Found what I needed
Will be back @afronation

Audre Lorde says:
In touch with the erotic, I become less willing to accept powerlessness

the erotic offers a well of replenishing and provocative force to the woman who does not fear it’s revelation

But giving in to the fear of feeling and working to capacity is a luxury only the unintentional can afford

In order to perpetuate itself, every oppression must corrupt or distort those various sources of power within the culture of the oppressed that can provide energy for change

For it is not difference which immobilises us, but silence

For there are no new ideas. There are only new ways of making them felt

The real way to eat mangoes
Yellow sticky juicy
It’s mango season

Been a bit reclusive, Sometimes my body forces me into hiding And there’s nothing I can do but listen Been trying to connect to myself again Setting the intention helps

@imanwest_ and @jadeayino doing cool shiz today @centrespacegallery

I’m doing a poetry workshop this evening - a likkle meditation, some journaling, a likkle pen to paper alchemy

I’m excited to share my practise so come, think about something, someone, someplace that you love and we’ll explore

@evierey_art and I are doing a ting with @softbutchbristol feeling Eroticism xx 15th/June

@valentinapazhux a great and beautiful human is doing a ting and they’re getting us all involved at @theislandbristol FolkLore —//— spoken word, paintings, projection, magic

Going where the spirit leads
Trying some stuff
Being myself sharing what’s near and dear to me

Ps does anyone have a tripod I could borrow for some filming? Please and thank you!

Footage from the first queer storytelling
@evierey_art and @angharad_iris @the_living_womb ❤️

Black little girl
Red
Earth Red mud
Beatings. Cry.
The river carries so
many fishes and dragonflies. I

am
tired of
walking up this hill
Zigzagging in the heat
Drawing straws to feel complete.

Girl-
child at risk
Church School Home
that’s it. Mango tree runs
sticky sweet yellow on handwashed hand-

me-
downs nothing
fits. Black Little Girl
Dressed clean she’s shining.
Black Little Girl father dead mum

a
gone a
forren. When she
comes back different than
before. Black Little Girl works hard

not
to be left
out and ignored. She
tries her hardest. Black
Little Girl. Give her more time.

Ruff cuts
Getting it off my chest :
Right now stability equals self-love.
Creativity is the place I resource myself from.
Uncertainty is exposing all my fears.
What’s different and what’s the same, reflection is grounding me in my secret place.
Suffering is Grace, if I open my heart.
Anancy keeps waking me up, it’s all a game anyways have some fun.
My little one is obsessed with the transitions.

Ruff cuts
Working on some words :
This is in progress
I’m learning to share the process
Share the work because sharing is kindest
To me and all who choose to express
Love peace acceptance to make the Self best

Ruff cuts sharing my heart 🫀
listen put yuh sound on
mi granny at the end baddest of all the Bs
Queen of all she sees,
fuck wid har yuh get straight lashings no tongue and cheek

Ruff cuttings -> productively procrastinating

What the fuck are you doing with your time?

Fuck you to the voice that’s telling me I’m wasting my time

What is wasted time (kings of Leon song)

I’m fucking angry
Dick confused for light
Though I’m not the first woman that felt like it was right
Let you think you could ride me
Take my gifts and spite me
Fuck this shit I’m done with your bullshit
Take your stuff

Persistantly resisting the medley of existence

Today I’m battling with separateness
Boundaries lock me in and keep me out
Illusionary reverence
Cut ties with union thrusted out
Into the dark conditional acceptance
How am I supposed to learn to love
When I don’t even have a reference

I’m just trying to look right
I’m just trying to look right
I’m just trying to look right
I’m just trying to look right
I’m just trying to look right

All the time it’s the same old game
I get up get dressed look in the mirror trying to curb the shame she’s an old friend now
Cracked and reset by bones now
The deeper I reach down
The more I’m wading through black mud

What is the universe trying to tell me
I’m seeing orange everywhere

When we were free

How does insight come?

Dance until you shatter

He likes to feel wanted so he ignores people so they can miss him

I’m tired of not knowing where I am with you

Illusion a static image displaced in the stream of time

There are different parts of me
And depending on which I feed
Those are the ones that feed me

My body as a place

What is the difference between dead end and rock bottom

How many times I’ve dreamt that you were alive

Oh man I wanna fuck

“Let’s put everything on the back burner and burn it “

Watching fire dance

The silence of our fears keep us stuck
Keeps up looking back
Keeps us in quite rage
Keeps us in deafening disquiet and pain

Protect your peace by all means

We remake the same shit old paradigms with new shifts

In between right now
In the process right now
But peace is in love
So I walk in the valley of the shadow of
Spelling Kama sutra
With old wounds and fresh blood

One for the books
Bye Felicia
See you on the flip

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Aspasia

Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child

Callaloo: I used to hate you

LATEST POSTS

Don't Miss Out on New Content

EXPLORE OUR THOUGHTS

Aspasia

Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child

Callaloo: I used to hate you

Get up again

Thandi

beyond words

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

JOIN OUR COMMUNITY

EDITOR'S CHOICE

​

Follow us on Instagram