Black Architects is a lyrical tapestry of poems and meditations that transforms Blackness into a sacred hymn that’s part prayer, part protest, and all love. What inspired you to write and publish this collection? 

Well, first I want to thank you for the opportunity to reflect on the work. It was inspired by an incident that was racially charged, which occurred at a job that I had. I remember feeling the lowest that day, though refusing to let them see me cry. On the train ride home, I started to write this soliloquy/prayer, declarations if you will, by hand in protest. Every time I wrote a line I felt a sort of redemption that I knew, if no body else, the Almighty would be witness to me climbing out of the hole I was in. In that job space, and other spaces, I felt the compression and pressure of having to hide the majority of my identity. Though I dared anyway, in some ways, to embody the ideals, culture, and depth of what I encompass as a black woman, I felt the battle every single day to be, speak, do, and exist otherwise. Aversion for true expressions of blackness is so intricately and subtlety interwoven in the fabric of our society, that it becomes easy for that aversion to manifest, and the smart from it is hard at times to pinpoint, but undeniably experienced. Black Architects was born from this. It came as protest, as a resistance to extinction. It is my love letter to and celebration of black people, written to those who continue to build our legacies in this world. The architects are the young, middle aged and seasoned who see themselves as caring about this world, being architects of thought, experiences and manifestations that will lead people to honor themselves, despite how others may dishonor them. The work was also inspired by the community where I live. I see black faces, in all variety, everyday. Working, playing, growing, having setbacks, prospering, loving. So it was important to tap into this pulse of the people and show us in even the mundane aspects of living. In this predominately black community, we still don’t control resources or have many businesses, so in a way Black Architects is also how one dreams to be the architect that lives just beneath the surface in each of us.

How did you approach balancing vulnerability and defiance in your writing about Black identity?​

I balanced the two by just being honest about my experience. I let my love for mankind in general shine through as an act of defending an oppressed identity, like I would for any other people I see being stifled. I practiced a sort of curiosity as though I was both outsider and member of the community, which informed the observations presented in the work. It was important for me to come straight from the heart and to say everything with my chest despite resistance because my only audience at the time of the work’s conception, was myself and the Almighty. Both of whom it is impossible to lie to, and I wanted to extend that courage to the reader. It came from love’s protest and can be seen as Love’s defense of me, who at the time of writing felt deeply wounded and dangerously vulnerable. That day at work, and many others in that work environment, I suffered almost disparaging defeat. The part of me that refused to die found a home in the larger tradition of struggles of black identity, and expanded within the honesty and authenticity of expression.

In the process of writing, I felt the support of my 10,000, my ancestors – and  all of heaven, really – witnessing and celebrating with me. Even so, I knew I risked offending and that is also where defiance set in. There are some who expect that every other identity can be celebrated without question but when black people unite in this way, it is threatening. I’ve noticed and experienced that the black voice tends to be sacrificially inclusive, speaking for every and each, with associations to other black people only assumed, rarely explicit. Even in this interview as I express my love for black identity, I feel compelled and forced, almost, to remind about my love for other groups as if my expression of solidarity with my community would mean otherwise. Why is this?

We, like other groups, are not monolithic and I tried to show some of our diversity. I was not trying to speak for a whole group of people. These lines are simply a testament of how a single mind sees blackness and they are for any others that can see and celebrate this too. Being unapologetic about love is something I’ve had to practice and my fondness, deep affection and concern for my people, I hope, is apparent. Honesty, truth and love are the only ways to truly touch and reach people. In keeping with this reminder I was able to maintain the balance between the vulnerability and defiance so palpable in the work.

What were some themes that were important for you to explore in this book?

Vulnerability is one of them. In all our function and dysfunction, we are bared for the world to see. This work came through me while I was on the train, with my writing pad open for all onlookers to see – to some pleasing, and to others distasteful. Still the courage to be –  considering and despite – persisted. Love is another theme. The multi-dimensional and variety of ways that we do exist and persist conveys, I hope, the beneficence of the Almighty who avenges the oppressed and reinforces the poor in spirit. We’re inspired to have this joy that for little reason, be. Redemption is also a theme. The work ends calling forth the youth, painting a picture of the architects of better days to be birthed from the sowing of this work.

Which artists, writers, or ancestral voices guided you while writing this book?​

Christ Jesus guided me to be unflinchingly honest about the triumphs and despair of being a black woman. His walk on Earth inspired me to endeavor the universal heart through love and appeal to the cosmic conscience in man transcending identity throughout the work.

Emperor Haile Selassie I, the quintessential, cosmopolitan man, was a huge inspiration. His concern for the world has always been apparent to me, though his love for his own people never to diminish. Reflecting on the heights chartered by his words, inspired the loftiness of description in the text.

Dr. Maya Angelou was a huge influence. She took on the challenge so well of expressing her love for her people and for all people simultaneously and effortlessly. So I felt less alone in taking on the mission of this work.

They both were so masterful with the written/spoken word, that I could only dream to pave my own path and trajectory with their light as my guide.

E. E Cummings also has a quote in the same tradition of how the work was born: “To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else – means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.” Black Architects bandages the mind broken from this fight.

I identified with Frantz Fanon’s Black Face, White Masks and I ambitioned to be as astute an observer as he when it came to communicating and constructing the plight and positionality of the black architect.

I was also listening to this one Nina Simone song on repeat while composing the collection: it’s called “You’ll Never Walk Alone”. The work was written matching the ebb and flow and climax of her piece. It is very much woven into the every line of Black Architects.

Lastly, Marcus Garvey was a model because like Garvey in the whirlwind in one of his infamous speeches,  I wanted this voice – this celebration – to be witness to the love and defiance enduring through time in the blood, DNA, genes and generations of a people. It is a message to the people at that job and in the world at large that they/it can never kill my spirit. Love, which I have chosen, will always outlast hate and though I may have died in battle that day, I am destined to be resurrected in the coming generation of architects that will redeem this world, black and otherwise.

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