A poem about my belongings and how they intersect with my counselling philosophy and positionality: Published in a 2018 issue of Murmurations: A Journal of Transformative Systemic Practice
Intersection
Shall I speak to you of my skin: bleached birthright
Born of blood and unseen despair
Child of colonization speaking with the tongues of conqueror and conquered
Twisted in the double helix shared breath of ancestry
Haunted no man's land; the privilege and poverty
Of too many voices, too many stories, too many contradictions
To ever safely claim any.
Would that I see you within the shared skin-hunger of mammalian longing
Map the shape of your scars until I have learned
The colour of all that has hurt you
held you
made you
unmade you
Shall I speak to you of my body politics: pregnant expectations
Grown within cisgender womb words
Daughter, sister, mother
Umbilical of beauty myths nursed and nursing
Sung in the oblivious voice of Patriarchy's lullaby
Platinum hair, blue eyes, not defense enough
To exempt me, to raise me, to save me
From the degradation of objectification.
Would that I see you within the fluxing fluidity of altered spectrums
Trace the artistry of your portraiture until I understand
The ownership of choice of all that has claimed you
rejected you
assaulted you
esteemed you
Shall I speak to you of my economics: Class(room) learnings
Bred in degrees and elitist fairytales
Princess in the land of opportunity dressed in the finery of power and flowed science empiricism
Schooled in the divorce story downward mobility of (un)happy endings
Shifting stability: The gratitude and shame
Of all the charity, all the hustle, all the subsidy
Within the provisions of worth
Would that I see you within the vast richness of life experiences
Open the gifts of your resilience until I buy
The tangents of fate of all that has fed you
starved you
stolen you
gained you
Shall I speak to you of my worship: goddess voice
Summoned in rite and rolled eye ridicule
Priestess of paganism dancing invisible within the fervorous rights to freedom and fear
Brought to knee in the social church of Ignorance's (in)tolerance
Fetishized outlier; the villainy and veneration
of sacred worship, sacred sexuality, sacred oneness
Exalted on lips stained with hypocrisy
Would that I hear you in all the languages of divinity
Cultivate the transformations of humility until I revere
The world view etiology of all that has created you
destroyed you
damned you
absolved you
Shall I speak to you of my pain: triparitate alienation
Held in the unknown third space
Student of solipsism living in the disparity of connection and disconnection
Shadow identities grouped by the commonality of their difference
Existential loneliness; the prerogative and suffering of what is known, what is told, what is shown
To survive untethered alone
Would that I know you within the complexity of contradictions
Ask the questions you long to have answered until I know
The multitudes of belonging that have wanted you
abandoned you
excluded you
overlapped you
Shall I speak or shall I listen
Would that I have open hands, open mind, open eyes
For in the expertise of my process I know
I don't know you without the shared lived experience of your voice, your story
Only when I have heard may I speak
Would that I be the bridge between
Story & Voice
Hunt, Andrea (2018). Intersection: a poem. Murmurations: Journal of Transformative Systemic Practice, 1, 2, 103-106.https://doi.org/10.28963/1.2.9
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