when the bell stops ringing: bell hooks and the ending of forever
Loss during this pandemic has come with a marinating that might not have otherwise been present. The pause of the earth causes us to pause within our bodies more often and consider life in the waves of death. But we realize with a greater sense of realization that death is final. Not just an idea or discussion or something you know to be certain but the void at the end of a journey once believed to stretch beyond.
The amount of deaths we’ve experienced, whether directly or inadvertently through our scrolling on social media, has impacted us in ways we won’t know until this chapter of the existence of the globe is over. But bell hooks leaving this earth left so many of us speechless. Her writings and teachings met so many of us at a time where we had never considered there was a place for the voices of Black women in the feminist movement. She spoke to that uncertainty and reminded us not only is there a place but that our voices have leadership and power and purpose.
But
I thought the greats would live forever.
The ones who helped us find ourselves in a world scrambling to tell us that we’re lost
And unworthy
And uncertain
The ones who knew exactly where we were to take us with them on a journey of discovery:
Self, love, sexuality, identity, freedom.
Bags not too heavy for ours to tag along, as our collective unpacking became food for healing. Watching it grow across sisters and brothers. An ocean unfamiliar but feels like home.
Collective healing is home.
The ones who reminded us and celebrated us as we learned to remind ourselves and find our Black stories worthy of celebration. As we stuck it to the man or wo(man); learning to bend beyond their brick walls and boarded boundaries.
The ones who told us to tell of the time. Of lives lived and the ones to come. Find our voices in the rubble and use the dust as evidence of our wisdom we’ve kept buried for too long but
no time like the present.
The ones who loved us fiercely…
Black women
on purpose.
I thought the greats would live forever but I guess that’s what hearts are for.