top of page
3.png
3.png
3.png
3.png
3.png

 

           

     

                                       

I am. 

 An honest poem written by Jaee Sumter

​

Who is I? Who is you? Who is We?

 

Who do we become in me and you?  

 

 I. You. Community

​

The embodiment of who you are is the truest liberation. You are more than a number, hashtag, second thought, gossip line, opinion, read of judgment and earthly experience.

                              

 You are you. MAGIC. You are human.

​

                                        We are here. 

​

healing. wondering. questioning. learning. exploring. manifesting. being. transmuting, accepting, releasing, empowering. saying no, existing.

                                                 

                                                  I am

me. a person. a daughter. a sibling. a cousin. a friend. someone's kinfolk.

 

I am

 a first-born elder. I am the eldest and come from a mother and grandma of elders. I am spunky and curious. I am honest and don't take foolishness. I am understanding yet sometimes forget to give myself that same grace. I am youthful and wise beyond my years. I am a leader and a follower. I am a visionary and one in the crowd. I am an artist and a poet. I am a muse and curator.

​

I am me. I am you.

​

I am

The cheeky eyed kid with a brain so bright and a mouth so sassy. I am a grounded tree of soft sunflowers, wallflowers, magnolias and calla lilies blossoming in a garden filled with my ancestor's roots. I am a cold glass of southern tea & lemonade on a Sunday rising. I am the smell of grandma's honey and papa’s wisdom. I am ma grandpa, grandma(s), momma, dad, auntie, uncle, cousins, sisters, city, lovers, friends and my community.

and I am also not. I am a vibrant thrift store filled with colors -- shopping with ma grandma bc we used what we had. 

​

I am growth.

I am change.

I am liberation.

I am tradition.

I am creative.

I am ritual.

I am power.

I am soft.

I am hard.

I am understanding.

I am hope and hopeful.

​

​

​

I am

my ancestors' wildest dreams, and they are mine. I am my ancestors will, gift and pissy attitude of reparations. I am the vessel that attains. I am god’s gift of healing to heaven and hell on Earth.

​

I am. I am. I am.

​

I am a lover and a fighter who choses peace but is not be afraid to fight when it is necessary. I am tired and I am as hopeful as my spirit guides guidance of patience. I am an intuitive genius made of my higher self’s embodiment. I am curious of my inner child's imagination. Walking together. Head and heart held High. Feet moving in the truest direction -- screaming gospels of song and kin. 

 

I am

negro spirituals throughout the decades. I am a bounce song shared amongst the community and made by a us and our neck of hood. I am an oldie that’s been shared throughout the generations saying, “honey child, you don't know nothing about that right there. That's soul”.

 I am

 the airbrushed face on the t-shirt of a passing loved one. I am the backdrop at a block party with airbrushed masterpieces posing with hands on our hips and a baby in the other. I am sugar, nectar, plum and salt with cayenne pepper. I am the dollar bamboo earrings, Nag Champa and Sugar lip gloss at the beauty sto. I am the newspaper and fruit given on a weekday rising by our elders.

 

I am

the stories of each person who did my hair and shared their story with me in vulnerability and connection. I am a survivor of life's worst, near death and bone, but I am not the tales of who I should be but rather what I learned from it.  I am the taste and smell of grandma pecan pie with ice cream, crawfish boils and paintings found in every Black folk home. I am the representation, trials and love of a ward or hood. I am a witness of many forms of gentrification that ripped our cultures apart. I am the trials and strength of every Black Queer folk who attended an HBCU and/or PWI.

​

I am a celebration of homecoming.

​

I am

not a victim, but I am a survivor. I am sometimes hyper independent and sometimes I just need a check-in because our strong friends need love, too.

 

I am

  the repetitive memory of a native chant and a sea of second liners dancing to our own beat. I am from a bloodline of Cherokee, Geechee, Creole and Afro.

.

I am

 one who could not remain quiet. I am the little kid who challenged norms and traditions that needed integration or reframing. and a truth teller who told the truth too much and at wrong times. I am my younger self dream empowered Queerness. 

 I am

a hip hop and rap bar that understands pain, hope, likeness and trying to make it out of the ghetto while making sure everybody good. "I don't wanna write, I wanna tell you how I feel right now --my Umi said shine your light on the world". 

 

I am

the trap of an Atlanta's slang of shawty. I am the soul of a Jill Scott Long Walk home to sweet love. I am an Anita Baker song of fairy tales that's sung throughout the women in my lineage. I am the African drums of our ancestors' opened arms that calls us back home saying, “come on home baby, its gettin cold outside”.

 

I am

the soul love of Common and Erykah, "there are times when you need someone, I will be by your side. There is a light that shines special for you and me."

​

I am

the country and the midtown of short bobs, deep voices and doo ops. I am the gospel of soulful voices and answered prayers-- "and the people say STOMP". I am the jazz of a soft melancholy autumn in New York. I am the Roy Ayes of a Joyful Sunshine Spring of light showers, bare feet, rain dancin and sweet watermelon. I am a Summer Madness and Maze & Frankie Beverely of oneness that sings "Joy and Pain in like sunshine and rain."

​

 I am

the rhythm of my ancestors' hips swaying to the recipe of creole seasoning and gumbo. I am a skating ring on a Saturday night jammin to the natural flow of life.

​

​

3.png
3.png

​

I am

the kid who was silenced, scapegoated and parentified. I am the adult who speaks loudly, freely and proudly in my convictions & beliefs while honoring others and adapting new ones that feels most true. I do not apologize for who I am, and I will not be anyone that I am not. I have hurt others and have been hurt by others.

​

I am

  a southern comfort of red beans and jambalaya. I am expansion that moves through each cuisine beyond one culture and intersects with others through many lenses of foundation and tradition. I am the pepper of my neighbor’s needs, and they are the salt of mine. I am the elders who shared great wisdom and "tall tales' that were woo woo medicines. I am the ghost stories of Charleston and multicultures of New Orleans.

                                     

 I am

the culture of a nation and the movement of a protest. I am the voice of inspiration, pain, joy and celebration that changes a nation. I am a “hero” and a “villain” depending on the person's story and who tells it.

 

I am

an empowerer, weaver, cultural bearer and cultivator with a past, present and future. I am a soul and a body. I am empathy, logic, history and methodology. I am medicine – an elixir of tradition and innovation.

 

I am you. You are me. 

 

 I am

a star seed and I am a regular person. I am an embodiment of integration; I am my hood, and I am also of many hoods in likeness, coast to coast and beyond the seas of currency. I am a “what you see is what you get” kinda person. I am that person who cooks for others and make sure they got extra to bring home. I am that person that make sure I am good, and folks are good too – "so let me know when you make it home safely.

 

I am

neo divergent and a genius who understands that we are all geniuses with our own forms of learning and processing life; institutionally and in our own backyards + homes. I am an old head and a new breed. I am the hugs shared in a greeting of love.

​

 

 I am personal, collective and historic.

I am legacy.

​

                                   

  I am not

a face, an ass or a number. I am a person with a face, an ass and has a favorite number. The difference is found in the life of who I am and not how others perceive me to be through their own internal reflection.

​

 I am who you are - book and street smart

 

   I am

a person who forgets things and sometimes forget who I am. I am always reminded. I am the kid with all the questions with openness to the answers. I am the possibilities that guide space to wonder & wander.

 

I am

destruction and I am rebirth. I am a challenger of societal norms that does not include the community's voice. I am a table builder for folks who have been told for too long that their voice at the table does not belong in the decision-making process because “grown folks” are talking.”  I am an advocate for intergenerational healing + bridging.

​

Again. I am you.

                                   

   I am

a person with many stories that are combined into an illustration of “folk webs” bc charlotte's web needed a little more community involved. I am as intricate and intentional about my shit as a spider and the collective mission of a beehive in raw form. I am the puzzle that needs all of our pieces to make collective sense of a world that is flipped backwardly.

​

I am charming. I am independent. I am human. I am creative. I am community. I am ratchet. I am honest. I am androgynous in beinghood and in approach. I am all and nothing made into an Omnipresent mural of Earth and natural change that exists within and beyond everyone I meet and have yet to. 

​

Who I am is not what I have or who I am not, I am just who I am. An encompassing river of magic filled with all that is unknown but all that is possible. 

 

    I am whole

 

 I am

one who understands and continues the journey of rediscovering that in the purpose of community. I am the baby in a king cake so that means you gotta bring the next cake for everybody to eat together. and we shall pass that down where everyone is fed, and everyone has given. 

​​

A tradition. a ritual.

​

Add to it until it looks and feels more like you. and we. Follow what feels most true and you will have the answers you seek. You are a lineage of golden choirs and savory pralines. 

​

I am

changing my narrative knowing my future kids and their kids and their communities and our people are str8 - a dying wish. 

​

Remember--- I am you. and you are me.

​

 

I am community care, and I am self-care. I am liberation. You are liberation. Let’s create a liberated world with who we are.

​

Self + Community Care 

​

- A collective vision of reflection

3.png
3.png
3.png
3.png
IMG_E0862.JPG
IMG_E0869.JPG
bottom of page