A CONVERSATION AMONG SOME BLACK WOMEN - August 15, 2010
SERENITY SEMINAR NEWSBREAK
2010 Seminar
Dear Goddesses,
A beautiful poem was brought to my attention by a beautiful client.
Sadly the Writer, a Noted African American Poet, has transitioned.
Included in the main workshop, will be an facilitated conversation of this poem as well as a response poem with hope and possibility written by our own Serenity Goddesses, Pearl Williams.
I feel the poem certainly addresses this year’s theme of How do we love ourselves and yet living in the reality of Life as we know it. My response to the poem as a facilitator of self love and emotional health is that it was a Poem which shows how much Ms. Rodgers understood about herself and her needs and yet her reality. Also how much she gave to her readers and new readers by writing this poem. I am looking forward to a spirited and spiritual discussion from those who choose to join us.
CAROLYN M. RODGERS
Poem for Some Black Women
©1992 Carolyn M. Rodgers
i am lonely,
all the people i know
i know too well
there was comfort in that
at first but now
we know each others miseries too well.
we are lonely women, who spend time waiting for
occasional flings
we live with fear.
we are lonely.
we are talented, dedicated, well read
BLACK, COMMITTED,
we are lonely,
we understand the world problems
Black women’s problems with Black men
but all we really understand is lonely.
when we laugh,
we are so happy to laugh
we cry when we laugh
we are lonely.
we are busy people
always doing things
fearing getting trapped in rooms
loud with empty… yet
knowing the music of silence/hating it/hoarding it
loving it/treasuring it,
it often birthing our creativity we are lonely
being soft and being hard
supporting our selves, earning our own bread
soft/hard/hard/soft
knowing that need must not show
will frighten away
knowing that we must
walk back-wards nonchalantly on our tip-toeness
into happiness,
if only for stingy moments
we know too much
we learn to understand everything,
to make too much sense out
of the world,
of pain
of lonely…
we buy clothes, we take trips,
we wish, we pray, we meditate, we curse, we crave, we coo,
we caw, we need ourselves sick, we need, we need
we lonely we grow tired of tears we grow tired of fear
we grow tired but must al-ways be soft and not too serious…
not too smart not too bitchy not too sapphire
not too dumb not too not too not too
a little less a little more
add here detract there .
lonely.
CHICAGO — Carolyn M. Rodgers, a Chicago poet and writer who helped found one of the country's oldest and largest black-owned book publishers, has died. She was 69.
The Chicago-based Third World Press says Rodgers died April 2 at Mercy Hospital after battling an undisclosed illness.
The Chicago native wrote nine books, including "How I got Ovah." Her work often delved into the experiences of black women.
Rodgers is credited with being a star of the black arts movement of the 1960s and 1970s. She helped found Third World Press in the 1960s. She also started her own publishing company, Eden Press.
Funeral services have been held. A public memorial is planned May 4 where Rodgers' work will be read.
Rodgers is survived by her mother and two sisters.
2010 Seminar
Dear Goddesses,
A beautiful poem was brought to my attention by a beautiful client.
Sadly the Writer, a Noted African American Poet, has transitioned.
Included in the main workshop, will be an facilitated conversation of this poem as well as a response poem with hope and possibility written by our own Serenity Goddesses, Pearl Williams.
I feel the poem certainly addresses this year’s theme of How do we love ourselves and yet living in the reality of Life as we know it. My response to the poem as a facilitator of self love and emotional health is that it was a Poem which shows how much Ms. Rodgers understood about herself and her needs and yet her reality. Also how much she gave to her readers and new readers by writing this poem. I am looking forward to a spirited and spiritual discussion from those who choose to join us.
CAROLYN M. RODGERS
Poem for Some Black Women
©1992 Carolyn M. Rodgers
i am lonely,
all the people i know
i know too well
there was comfort in that
at first but now
we know each others miseries too well.
we are lonely women, who spend time waiting for
occasional flings
we live with fear.
we are lonely.
we are talented, dedicated, well read
BLACK, COMMITTED,
we are lonely,
we understand the world problems
Black women’s problems with Black men
but all we really understand is lonely.
when we laugh,
we are so happy to laugh
we cry when we laugh
we are lonely.
we are busy people
always doing things
fearing getting trapped in rooms
loud with empty… yet
knowing the music of silence/hating it/hoarding it
loving it/treasuring it,
it often birthing our creativity we are lonely
being soft and being hard
supporting our selves, earning our own bread
soft/hard/hard/soft
knowing that need must not show
will frighten away
knowing that we must
walk back-wards nonchalantly on our tip-toeness
into happiness,
if only for stingy moments
we know too much
we learn to understand everything,
to make too much sense out
of the world,
of pain
of lonely…
we buy clothes, we take trips,
we wish, we pray, we meditate, we curse, we crave, we coo,
we caw, we need ourselves sick, we need, we need
we lonely we grow tired of tears we grow tired of fear
we grow tired but must al-ways be soft and not too serious…
not too smart not too bitchy not too sapphire
not too dumb not too not too not too
a little less a little more
add here detract there .
lonely.
CHICAGO — Carolyn M. Rodgers, a Chicago poet and writer who helped found one of the country's oldest and largest black-owned book publishers, has died. She was 69.
The Chicago-based Third World Press says Rodgers died April 2 at Mercy Hospital after battling an undisclosed illness.
The Chicago native wrote nine books, including "How I got Ovah." Her work often delved into the experiences of black women.
Rodgers is credited with being a star of the black arts movement of the 1960s and 1970s. She helped found Third World Press in the 1960s. She also started her own publishing company, Eden Press.
Funeral services have been held. A public memorial is planned May 4 where Rodgers' work will be read.
Rodgers is survived by her mother and two sisters.