HOPE RIVER

1. 

   Black-Brit-ish (4), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (1), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (2), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (3), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (5), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (6), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (7), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (8), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (9), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (10), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (11), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (12), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (13), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   

   Black-Brit-ish (14), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 1

     Black-Brit-ish (4), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 2

     Black-Brit-ish (1), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 3

     Black-Brit-ish (2), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 4

     Black-Brit-ish (3), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 5

     Black-Brit-ish (5), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 6

     Black-Brit-ish (6), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 7

     Black-Brit-ish (7), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 8

     Black-Brit-ish (8), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 9

     Black-Brit-ish (9), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 10

     Black-Brit-ish (10), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 11

     Black-Brit-ish (11), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 12

     Black-Brit-ish (12), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 13

     Black-Brit-ish (13), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   • 14

     Black-Brit-ish (14), Hope River, 2023, Graphite and pastel on paper, 20 x 20cm

   Black-Brit-ish Void, Identity's Delicate Search, Unpicking the Self

   Being Black-Brit-ish, is a journey with no defined face.

   Am I the sum of trin parts?

   Rwandan, English, and Romany Gypsy,

   a tapestry woven with threads of gold,

   empire’s blood, stories untold.

    

   Somewhere you should find me in this racial alchemy,

   but your question erases me, consumes my mind.

   Like the wholeness of a black hole, relentless and strong,

   I search for my place, where I belong.

    

   Race is not a ribboned gift bestowed at birth.

   It’s micro-aggressive, perceived certainty, but oh so deceiving,

   adding to the death toll, black bodies grieving.

    

   “The Deliberate Miseducation of Britishness” cries a name for a book.

   Because my entire personhood is shaped by the white man, fuck!

   Should I thank them, the creators of my world?

   For everything godlike says I should,

   I should forgive.

   But, then again, god gave the white man his reign,

   so should I thank, forgive or disdain?

   Fuck!

    

   If you really want, you will find me out there,

   on the blade of a racialised social reality.

   Tip-toe-ing, nav-i-gat-ing my hy-phen-ated existence,

   Black-Brit-ish, embracing the resistance.

    

   Me, my, I -  they’re such funny concepts.

   From the shade of my melanin to the words I write,

   none of me is to do with I.

   Me is cultures deep,

   back and back and back and back and back.

   It’s the white man’s fault that I can’t get a grasp,

   it makes them terribly glad.

   it makes me terribly mad.

    

   Behind a two-way mirror stands my ancestors past, present, and future,

   maddingly screaming a chorus of love.

   If I just stopped here,

   lost and at a loss.

   I would stop mocking, envying, and hating others who know who they really are.

   I would see the two-way mirror,

   I would see the hypocrisy.

   I would see that the construct of language itself is abuse, control, and exploitation of this idea of me – of I.

   I would see the shit on the fan spinning, revealing the truth with its twirl,

   and apologise, genuinely, without any performance or swirl.

    

   Apologies for entertaining the invention of race.

   Apologies for falling in love with being the brutalised and not the brutalist.

   Apologies for falling prey to the white man’s hands.

   Apologies for taking the time for your manmade question.

   Sorry,

   sorry for not actualising my fucking insignificance,

   embracing my true state,

   accepting my true fate.

    

   Really, where are you from? Where are you from, really? No, but where really are you from?

   Nigga please!

   I am a blip in time’s scope,

   a speck seeking a self that defies Hope.

   Forever stretching my fragility in search for a me that doesn’t exist.

   Where am I really from, you ask again and again and again and again and again,

   but from here I choose to move backwards,

   unpicking all the layers of me.

   Starting with this psy-cho-tic-hy-phen-ated-ra-cist-bull-shit.

   Unfolding, reclaiming the true essence of me,

   embracing the void, finding solace in the infinite black sea.

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