Now Shipping!
What is Remembered Lives is a deeply personal collection of stories, poetry and narratives about specific and collective ancestors and about the experiences and transformations brought about by acts of remembering.
Available
It’s the river that frees me. The water sweeping over boulders, pouring down my skin uproots most any upset. And not only the upset that comes with agony.A new day, success, even love can waylay then disorient you the same as sadness or frustration.
From The Breaking, Xochipala Maes Valdez
I believe that the bones of my mother contain her essence. I visit her grave because it is where she is.I believe her essence recognizes me as her daughter and communes with me. I need to believe it, to relate to what is left of her physicality, her bones. I can no longer hear her voice.
From My Inheritance, Sauda Burch
The land of my most recent ancestors is a place of rivers and creeks, of fountains of oil, of chronic conquest, of pecan trees and watermelon patches.
It is the place where the mixing of the Indian, Mexican and African gave birth to me, a place where my grandmother went from mulatto, to mixed race, to Negro, to Black all within the space of a few years.
From Responding to the Ancestral Call, J. Phoenix Smith
Tears filled my eyes and I felt an immense sadness fill my body. What wretchedness had been perpetrated on this land? Which people were forced to dwell in this place? How many had survived to be taken to worlds they had never imagined to endure sub-human treatment? And for me, the greater question was, "Were any of these long lost Ancestors mine?"
from The Ancestors of Goree Island, Uzuri Amini
In hindsight, too, I believe my journey is a tiny metaphor for the huge challenge that all members of Earth community now face. That is, the challenge of going through an initiatory rite of passage and being "cooked" into individuals, and collectively into a species that can create personal, social, and cultural forms of relationship to Earth that affirm life and will ensure a healthy future for all who follow. Recovering and renewing ancestor reverence knowledge, practice and ritual will be essential to our success.
from Turning to Face the Ancestors, Gail Williams
I have a history of spirits trying to contact me. I should say, I had a history of spirits trying to contact me. Ghosts touching me at my dead grandmother's house, the evil spirit that lived in the paneling of my bedroom door, and the time death walked into my room to tell me something I really didn't want to hear.
from Erasing the Line, Mkali Hashiki
We come in praise of the water people. We give respect to those ancestors who were able to feed their families from the salty waters of the ocean or the sweet waters of rivers and lakes.
from Reaching Back to Reclaim Genius, Awo Fanira (Vance Williams)
|
