I am no saint. I have hurt the people I love the most in the world. But no matter what hurt a person believes we’ve inflicted, nothing gives them the right to reign terror on our lives, to hijack our peace of mind, to make us so paranoid that we’re afraid to walk down the street, to sleep, to eat, to see a car linger … Continue reading The untold story about how the systems failed to protect me from an unstable man’s reign of terror

March 30, 2017 World Poetry Day Umana Yana Dear Nana, Charlene Wilkinson is reciting poetry in the tongue of our people to the beat of African drums. It is the kind of sound that tugs at your heart until your soul makes itself felt. I am listening to her and I miss you. I miss you more than any man’s language can ever tell you. … Continue reading Why it’s okay to be sad

Dear Self, I read Derek Walcott’s “Love After Love” for the first time a few weeks ago. Yesterday, I heard that he’d died. I could not believe it. How could the creator – of those moments in my life where I was wildly happy or able to see with unparalleled clarity – be gone? But then, I suppose he’s not really gone. Not so long … Continue reading A Love Letter (Love After Love)

I’ve lost three people I loved very much this year. Two of them I lost to death and the other I lost to what happens when people are not honest with each other about who they are and what they really want. My mother’s youngest brother died just after New Year’s and one of my favourite, and perhaps funniest, aunts died at the end of … Continue reading How feeling loss increases our ability to love