do you think i am broken just because i do not yell, or i do not yell just because i am broken
open sore, 2023. Photography by Amida Oluwatobi
I am very close to turning thirty and besides being grown I do not know how I feel about it. Three decades in this life, at least a millennium in the ether of in-betweens, and an eternity as a god at one of heaven’s gates, yet nothing could prepare me for love. Relearning the act of love, knowing how to be, really be in it. Love, its intentional pursuit and unexpected arrival. Two bittersweet ends of the same coin, to go after it, seek it out but be taken by surprise when it makes that wondrous leap in your chest. Those pangs, that longing, the divine strain to be matched, met halfway and totally consumed. It’s everything I have wanted for my life in this last decade and when it showed up within grasp, it was because someone else wanted to be touched, engulfed by that divine tingle as much I am willing to touch, inundate them with mad pursuit.
Sometimes i think unrelated but intertwining thoughts like, if i could reach the deepest & darkest parts of the ocean would i have made it to the back side of the moon, or if i did not lose my mother would i still consider this new life a result of some form of death. Like the title of this entry I do not know how those thoughts help the meaning of whatever we are trying to express at any given point, but I am certain they all have combining emotions. These thoughts rise from a condition that is trying to understand and be understood, from me, my deepest wounds, greatest wonders, smallest desires. I want to be loved as much as I want to love, yet I know that I am already love. We are love. We are always already the thing we are seeking. That is the only way to find those things, if they are not already there then what are we reaching for?
Love in all its forms is romantic. Maybe not physical, but definitely romantic. Our existence, the way I want to exist in my body, the ways I want to experience my flesh, how we want it to look, feel, be, my perception of myself in this body, this existence is in cosmic romance with the universe. A universal dance with as many people as I touch and let touch me across the human race. Again, maybe not physical but definitely romantic.
In this last decade, I have grown, really evolved several leaps within my own life. We have died and come to life again in many non physical ways, and the thing i’ve learnt about resurrections is that they require relearning a lot of things, convincing yourself and others that the sacrifices you made are worth it. Displaying your wounds and scars for those in doubt to see, touch, dig into, so they can be convinced of your miracle. So you too can convince yourself of this new life, its realness, its signs, and its wonders. My life is a miracle and I am worthy of it. This is what I have to remind myself of, that my life, this life, is a miracle and I am worthy of every good fruit it will bear. We contain multitudes, consequently we must be willing to confront multiple evolutions, multiple experiences and multiple realities within this life. And that is living, it is what the human condition demands of my existence and that of everyone else around me.
I am confronted with the reality and possibility of being madly in love, and I am ready because I am already a mad thing, but I feel ready because i am willing, more than willing to put in the work to be in that love and let its cosmic dance be divine through me. I have been broken because I did not yell, really go after the things I wanted, but I did not yell, really fight to get them because life had broken me. This is the irony of life, of existence, of love. It is intimate because it knows how to give as much as it knows how to take and now I too have learned to do the taking as much as I am giving.
A while back, we created a digital art collection which stayed online on our site for a long time. Now we’ve taken those art works, and we’ve put them together in a ebook format.
Message us if you can’t afford a copy and you still want to take a look, we’ll send you one for free!
