In Your Honor

I am listening.

Following your guidance.

Embracing the process and doing the work.

Continuing your legacy that still bleeds in the hearts of every tree.

I hold you with open palms to keep from clinging onto the past, while honoring the dreams for the future I have yet to awaken to.

This is freedom -

the opportunity to breathe this moment in, to have peace and joy.

This is the freedom your souls sang about as you worked the land. This is the joy you created from. This is the love you somehow kept alive, even when your hearts and bodies were broken. We still live off of your sacrifices.

I plucked every weed of deceit in your honor. Every lie the oppressors pressed against our names has been uprooted. And I will continue this work for our children. I am clearing the land so that their minds and hearts will not have to wrestle with our demons.

I planted food in your honor. Put my hand in the dirt and thought of you. The way you planted flowers and adorned our homes with green living things dangling oxygen for us to breathe. I thought of the way you prepared meals from recipes that were never written, only felt and tasted and recreated. I thought of the way I did not garden beside you, but I admired those who did. Our children will reap your harvest. They will plant seeds and enjoy the fruit of your labor. We give thanks.

I rested in your honor. I took myself out to dinner and enjoyed my Self. I laughed and smiled. I read and prayed, meditated and moved at my own pace throughout the day. I tasted goodness and mercy and savored every bite. I basked in the glory of light and resisted the urge to be busy. I shed tears of longing and hope, of repentance and acceptance, of gratitude and determination. I celebrated the opportunity for stillness and silence. I embraced solitude and welcomed love with open arms.

This feast of fruitfulness and restfulness is for you. This is what you wanted for us. Your labor was not in vain. Your prayers are being answered. Your dreams are being fulfilled. We give thanks. It is so. And so it is. Ase'

“Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave, I am the dream and the hope of the slave. I rise. I rise. I rise.” - Maya Angelou

Honored to not only celebrate the day our freedom was announced and solidified - Juneteenth - but the age during which we are experiencing the manifestation of liberated minds and hearts across all ages. The work continues, even in the unseen realm. The miracles are happening, even in the unrecognizable. Take a moment to honor the ancestors. Pause. Breathe. Speak life and love to all. Live to love today.