An Audio Lamentation for Jayland Walker — 90 shots fired? 90? 90? Are we sure? Could be a little more Could be a little less. Who’s counting? When it’s us, who’s counting? You can’t be Black and young and afraid of authorities in America, it’s ammunition for their ammunition, and you will never win…

Music, family, release during a monthly check-in, and pushing forward — I typically share The Grieving Room newsletter every Saturday, but yesterday had been an exception to this rule. Saturday morning, I drove to Greensboro, North Carolina, to pick up my mother and bring her to my place. The drive wasn’t an intense or long one, but it had been busy…

Thanks to the digital world, it isn’t that hard — *A revised article written almost two years ago. During this season of Coronavirus, COVID-19, my father’s side of the family has two new members. Two of my first cousins have welcomed baby girls within nine months of each other. The first was born in January 2020 of this year and…

Part III: She’s stretching herself in all directions for her daughter — Today, I will give her the space she needs to talk about Bree’s graduation invitation, her current need to want to get clean, and perhaps a future for us. Today, I will learn about this woman a bit more — the one who ripped my heart out almost a year…

How many more crosses must we bear? — I don’t have the energy to put into words the sheer destruction taking place before my eyes within the United States of America. SCOTUS, to put it rather frankly, just tap-danced on our hearts. It is undoubtedly clear that women and human beings with reproductive parts do not matter. It…

It’s been nearly 20 years and I am drained — As I listened to her breathe on the other end of the phone while I asked pertinent questions about the radiology procedures I was scheduling for her, I noticed a break in her responses. I paused. I could hear her softly crying and everything in me shifted. This had been…

And why would we? — A lone, baby girl — your first, sheltered in your embrace. You loved her. You love her. Old photos are passed down through the hands of a younger baby girl. You love her, too. How have our memories been floating around the family tree making their way through our bloodline? …