Speaker 1: Oh, you were listening to black revolutionary media. Here are
the latest, greatest, and most memanated revolutionary works produced for
your listening experience. This episode is.
Speaker 2: As the World Burns, based on a story that is
no longer true.
Speaker 3: Hey loved your playlist? How is your day?
Speaker 4: Sent at two thirty four pm.
Speaker 3: It was my playlist like too much.
Speaker 4: Eight forty seven pm. Nikki loved a.
Speaker 5: Text, OMG, love yours too. Nights over Egypt is my shit.
Also sorry for the late reply.
Speaker 6: Kind of wild work.
Speaker 3: Day, All good lol, and yeah, the Jones girls really
knew what they were doing virtual insanity, though, Hey.
Speaker 5: Jamaric Wye knew what he was doing. You can't tell
me canned heat isn't a banger. Tony laughed at a text,
you know.
Speaker 3: What You're right?
Speaker 5: Still on to ft tomorrow. Smile and face emoji with halo.
Speaker 3: Hell yeah, I can't wait. Smiley face emoji.
Speaker 6: I see you've been lurking on my insta Lol.
Speaker 3: Flushed face emoji.
Speaker 7: Ooh.
Speaker 4: Nikki laughed at a text, Lol.
Speaker 5: Is cool, I've been doing the same thing as emoji.
Speaker 4: Tony loved a text.
Speaker 3: Would love to hear more about this clown makeup photo
clown emoji.
Speaker 5: Lol, just me being a makeup guru in Quarantine.
Speaker 3: Amazing work. I would definitely subscribe to your YouTube channel,
c ys and smile and.
Speaker 6: Face with halo. What's you have to been painting all day?
Can I see flead and face emoji?
Speaker 4: Tony sent a photo. Nikki loved a photo.
Speaker 6: OMG, that's me.
Speaker 3: Well yeah, hence the Insta lurking.
Speaker 6: I love it's heart as emoji. No one has ever
painted me before.
Speaker 3: I was a little scared to show you.
Speaker 6: Hello, Why it's beautiful?
Speaker 3: I mean, we haven't met and I just painted you
like a weirdo.
Speaker 5: I don't think it's weird. I think it's sweet. Two
hearts emoji.
Speaker 3: Tony loved a text I'm off to cook dinner. Talk
to you tomorrow smiling face with hearts emoji.
Speaker 5: Nikki loved a text talk to you tomorrow, sleep What
would you do?
Speaker 4: Tony loved a text.
Speaker 8: Hey, Hi, how the hell are you you?
Speaker 6: I'm good. I'm good.
Speaker 5: I just got out of a meeting actually on a Saturday.
What four one of the Mentorship's programs I worked for.
It was kind of boring, just planning for the rest
of the summer since we had to switch to online.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, how's that going to work?
Speaker 7: Oh?
Speaker 5: Just hell of fucking zoom meetings and a lot of texting.
I'm trying to figure out TikTok so I can be
relatable to the youth.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I have not gotten to TikTok yet. So your
mentor is it like big brothers Big sisters kind of?
Speaker 5: But we work primarily with kids who are incarcerated in
some way. I'm actually kind of excited about the online
move because I can reach.
Speaker 6: Kids in other states.
Speaker 3: Oh so, what you're saying is you're perfect and not
at all, Not at all.
Speaker 6: I just love the kids, you know.
Speaker 3: So is that job full of time or part time?
Speaker 6: Part time?
Speaker 5: I also work as an english tutor. Been editing a
lot of personal statements lately. That's actually like my favorite
thing to do.
Speaker 3: Oh wow, I definitely could have used you when I
was in high school college too. I hate essays.
Speaker 5: Fun fact, I used to write people's essay in college
as a sidegain way yep, twenty dollars down payment, five page, minimum,
five dollars per page, acted at ten dollars.
Speaker 6: If it was a research.
Speaker 3: You never got caught.
Speaker 6: Nah.
Speaker 3: I was like, oh so I definitely could have used
you in cor I'm want.
Speaker 5: To put you up with a friends and family discount,
so I really liked.
Speaker 6: I'm sorry, sorry you go. I just.
Speaker 3: Wanted to like know more about you or got you
interested in education.
Speaker 6: What I like is like anything.
Speaker 3: Really, you're really cute. I am.
Speaker 5: I mean yes, one because I'm looking at you, and
two because it's just.
Speaker 6: Nice that you're asking about me.
Speaker 3: Well, I'm curious.
Speaker 6: I'm just not used to that.
Speaker 5: What people caring without it feeling like they want something
from me?
Speaker 3: M what's that I like? I've never been.
Speaker 5: It's warm there all the time, and it'll always be
home to me. My mom, grandma, and uncle are all there.
Speaker 6: I love New York though.
Speaker 5: Since I've moved here for college, it really feels like
I actually grew up here. You know.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I get that. I don't claim Miami at all.
Speaker 6: That makes sense. Florida is crazy as hell.
Speaker 3: Yeah, got out as soon as I could. Do you
have any siblings?
Speaker 6: Yeah too, a brother and a sister, both older.
Speaker 3: So you're the baby of the family. You do not
seem like it.
Speaker 6: What does that mean?
Speaker 3: My little sister is the baby and she acts like
the world revolves around her like no one else matters.
You don't seem like that at all.
Speaker 6: How old is your little sister?
Speaker 3: Nineteen?
Speaker 5: I was pretty self centered at nineteen two. Maybe she'll
grow out.
Speaker 3: Of it, I hope. So she's a pain in my ass.
Speaker 6: I love her, though, Is it just you two?
Speaker 3: Yeah, she's at Florida State right now, and I don't
really go home, so I don't see her that much.
Speaker 6: Oh why don't you go home work? Nah?
Speaker 3: I My parents and I don't really get along.
Speaker 6: If you want to talk about it, you can.
Speaker 3: There's not much to say, really, we just they don't
really understand my issues with my mental health. They refuse
to believe I'm depressed, So going home it's just.
Speaker 7: Not good.
Speaker 5: I hear that it took a forest hospitalization when I
was sixteen to get my mom to finally pay attention.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, I'm so sorry.
Speaker 5: Nah, there's no need for that. It's in the past
and I got the help that I needed. It sucks, though,
that black families don't really have conversations about mental health.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 5: I think that's why I went to mentor to teach.
I want to be the person I didn't have when
I was younger. I didn't grow up around a lot
of black people. All my role models were white.
Speaker 3: Were you also one of like six black kids and
predominantly white spaces? Because same? Plus my school was Catholic.
Speaker 5: Ooh, yikes, my school wasn't Catholic, but boy wasn't white.
Speaker 6: Shit sucks, man, don't not fucking know it?
Speaker 3: Are you and your mom close down?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 5: That was definitely a breaking point. It was rough in
high school, but we got over it. I call her
like every day now.
Speaker 3: That's nice.
Speaker 6: Yeah, Well, she's all I got.
Speaker 5: My brother and sister are twins and four years older
than me, so they had their own thing going on.
Speaker 6: We're chill.
Speaker 4: I just.
Speaker 6: Don't know them very well. I want you, though.
Speaker 3: Sometimes relationships like that take time.
Speaker 7: Yeah.
Speaker 3: What you got going on for the rest of.
Speaker 5: The day, probably nothing, to be honest, Might watch a
movie or something.
Speaker 6: But listen, this pandemic has got me scared as hell.
Speaker 3: Heard the Have you been going to protests at all? Nah?
Speaker 5: I was heavy in the protests surrounding Orlando Castill in
Alton Sterlin got arrested in Times Square. This time around,
my mom did as called me to make sure I
wasn't in the streets because she didn't want me getting
arrested again.
Speaker 3: Wow, so you were out there, out there.
Speaker 6: I guess.
Speaker 5: But also this time around, and maybe it's the pandemic,
or maybe it's just finally an actual breaking point. Things
feel different, more urgent, more violent. I've been organizing mutual aid,
donating to funds in doing jail support. Though I do
want to be with the people, but it's just not safe.
Speaker 6: I'll let the white people be on the front lines
this time.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I haven't gone out too much either, mostly because
I don't want to put my roommates at risk. I
really like what you did with the healing space, though
maybe I'll do one of my own with your permission,
of course.
Speaker 5: Hey, by all means, just be sure to shoot me
the zoom link.
Speaker 3: You have a really great smile.
Speaker 6: Thank you. Shout out to my four years of braces
three for me. You have a great smile too. Oh hey,
it's my mom. Can I call you back later?
Speaker 3: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Yeah, of course? Text?
Speaker 5: Okay, yay, I'll talk to you later. You're really great,
So are you okay?
Speaker 6: Bye?
Speaker 3: Bye? A list of things. I am no longer afraid
of breaking things or making a mess. I am wild
and awkward and graceless sometimes, but so is everyone. It's okay.
For as long as I have been aware of my
body and its capacity, I've been afraid of it. I
keep my clothes on, only let THEMN touch my softest
parts in the dark and undercovers. I do not worship
the scars and muscles and imperfect skin. I hide from
myself because that's what I believe to be safest for me.
So much time alone has forced me to become a
magnifying glass to my own being. I stop apologizing to myself.
With the way my body moves itself through space. Got
to know my tones, the contour of my kneecaps, feel
my chest rise and fall as my eyelids grow heavy.
Lying comfortably and now naked, I kiss myself on each
souldier I say I trust you in the mirror.
Speaker 6: I mean it.
Speaker 3: The noises the radiator makes when it is adjusting itself
in the middle of the night, there are no ghosts
that I can't face. I am very brave. The sound
of my breath, only my breath. As the deep purple
corners of my mind begin to expand and bleed, I listen,
still an eager student to the professor, or my own
quiet abundance love.
Speaker 6: Dying. Let me explain it.
Speaker 3: I am deeply terrified of being left, because that, to
me sounds harder and more gruesome than my departure. I
live knowing I will die, so I live with compassion
and kindness. I move meticulously through this life, avoiding traps
and snares I could get hurt by, or lost or
tangled in. I try not to set any of my own.
Don't worry, I am careful. I am very, very careful.
But no, I'm not afraid.
Speaker 6: Sometimes wanting is the only thing I know. I forget
myself in the process.
Speaker 5: Of feeding this seemingly insatiable yearning, more often than not aliment.
Speaker 6: The last person left quickly I let them.
Speaker 5: They screamed, why don't you ever tell me what the
fuck you need? You're impossible to please. It's cruel. You
will choke on your own tongue and die if you
don't learn to spit out your desires.
Speaker 6: I'm leaving them. Don't wait up.
Speaker 5: I cannot possibly please someone with so many cobwebs in
their throat. In that time with them, I guess I
wanted more time than they had available.
Speaker 6: I don't know.
Speaker 5: I know what it's like to lie awake four am,
languidly bathing and wanting.
Speaker 6: I know what it's like to want so hard you sweat.
Speaker 5: Through your sheets, the joint falling out of your shaking hands.
I know what all of that is like. It's exhausting
work to live in his body. Nothing ever feels like enough.
I feel like I'm never enough. It makes me so.
Speaker 6: Tired.
Speaker 5: It's easier to fall in love in your head when
you want as much as I do. It's always easier
to be enamored in private.
Speaker 6: No room for disappointment, no room for hurt.
Speaker 5: I remember having to grip the sink, knuckles white, repeating
over and over through wine soaked lips and red eyes.
She doesn't want to be with you, She doesn't want
to be.
Speaker 4: With you.
Speaker 5: The words rolling around in my mouth a hard marble,
and all that I wanted was to feel her warm
bite next to mine every night.
Speaker 6: It hurts no to want this hard.
Speaker 5: Sometimes I feel like breaking my ribs open, reaching deep
deep inside of me, and ripping the hurt out.
Speaker 6: Growing is far away from me.
Speaker 5: I don't though, it would only find its way back
into me. I will always want and want more.
Speaker 6: And no, I am not a song.
Speaker 5: Maybe I'm a city, maybe I'm a universe.
Speaker 6: It doesn't matter. I've been I've been learning to want myself.
Speaker 5: Lately, I'm learning that wanting is okay, because one day,
I mean someone that feeds me heaping spoonfuls of love
until I am belly full, pants unbuttoned.
Speaker 6: One day, I would not be too much for the
right person.
Speaker 4: Ten pm.
Speaker 3: Hey, Hi, what's up?
Speaker 6: Nothing?
Speaker 5: Just watching Parks and Rec. I love Parks and Yeah
it's my go to comfort show.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's good for that. I rewatched season five when
Quarantine FIR started. So what did you do today?
Speaker 6: Lots of bullshit admin stuff.
Speaker 3: My brain is for ride on your Have you just
been staring at a screen all day?
Speaker 6: Yeah? I had a headache earlier.
Speaker 3: Is it better now?
Speaker 6: Yeah? Plus talking to you helps.
Speaker 3: I'm glad to hear it.
Speaker 6: Oh, that smile gets me every time.
Speaker 3: Stop we're gonna make me blush.
Speaker 6: I can't help it. You're so beautiful, so are you?
Speaker 5: I really wish I could kiss you right now.
Speaker 3: Yeah, to be honest, I spent most of our last
face time looking at your lips. Really, yeah, I really
want to kiss you too.
Speaker 6: Mm hmm, yeah, that'll be nice.
Speaker 3: And if I can people, I want to do other
things too.
Speaker 6: Oh it's like.
Speaker 3: That, I mean yeah, if that's okay.
Speaker 6: Yeah, it's okay. It's I. You gotta be flustered over here.
I'm sorry. No, no, no, no, don't be sorry. It's just I.
Speaker 5: Okay, yeah, yeah, I'm fine.
Speaker 3: You don't sound okay.
Speaker 5: Okay, I am freaking out a little. To be honest,
did I say something. No, this isn't your fault at all.
Speaker 6: I just okay. I am definitely interested in other things
with you.
Speaker 5: I just wow, Okay, this is hard for me to
say suddenly. So I'm a survivor. It happened a long
time ago. But sometimes when i'm when I have sex,
it's hard.
Speaker 6: For me to I freak out.
Speaker 3: So yeah, okay, Well, we don't have to talk about
this if you don't want to No, no, okay, it's okay.
If you're not.
Speaker 5: I just don't want you to think I don't want
to or I'm not attracted to you, because I am.
Speaker 3: I just we don't have to talk about it, is it?
Speaker 7: Okay?
Speaker 3: If I say one more thing and then we can
talk about something else that may help you be more calm. Okay,
there's no pressure whenever we do, and I will wait,
and when we do, I promise we will operate on
your terms. I want you to feel safe, Niki.
Speaker 6: Thanks, thank you.
Speaker 3: Of course your safety would be my priority.
Speaker 5: How are you feeling better? Kind of like a deflated balloon,
but better? Okay, I guess good.
Speaker 6: Thank you for what being you.
Speaker 3: Always, babe. Would you like to talk about something else, please?
Something about dark blue, something about your hand and mind.
Something about breath on skin as we sleep. Something about
your voice humming in my ear, my heart beat yours,
I don't know. Something about the taste of you in
our first kiss, mystery flavor, my favorite every time. Something
about socks and legs and laps and reading poems until
you fall asleep.
Speaker 6: Have you ever.
Speaker 5: Wanted to bury yourself into another person and actually feel
like doing so would be safe and not violent.
Speaker 3: You are made up of so many of the things
I had reserved for my wildest dreams. I keep them
there because I was never sure the capacity to deserve goodness.
I have always been terrified of abundance. I have never
felt worthy for deserving. But something in your smile makes
me feel safe. Something about your voice wants my heart
so fiercely protected by barbed wire and brick and concrete,
to soar up and out of my chest. Something about
you makes me feel like I deserve listen.
Speaker 5: All I know is sleeping next to you is the
only thing I want to know. Your hands and the
way you hold me, and the way you make me breakfast,
and the heat that wells in my heart and eyes
with every sence we kiss feels the hollow places in
the year's old poems, a stillness, a wholeness, a wordless benediction.
You cold water on a muggy August afternoon, Me thirsty
and bright eyed and begging for the cool blue and
green of you, both of us, willing, both of us safe.
Speaker 6: Time passes, we fall in love.
Speaker 3: It's like I've known her for centuries.
Speaker 5: The world is burning around me, and here she is,
this perfect thing.
Speaker 3: I can't wait to hold her.
Speaker 5: I can't wait to use I hope to hope soon.
I don't know how much longer I can wait.
Speaker 3: If my hands could talk, they'd scream for you. They'd say, please,
May I learn every part of you, until your blood close,
skin familiar. They'd beg for permission to enter you, to
feel the movement of your body against mine.
Speaker 7: Your ebbs and flows, the whole of you.
Speaker 3: They'd say, I want handfuls of you forever, And I'd
find myself hungry for your breath, the salt, and your sweat,
the smile that breaks out when you kiss me. I
find myself dreaming about all the things you'll taste like,
sweet and earthy, wet and alive. I am fiery eyed
and wild at the thought of all the places my
mouth can go to make you smile. I'm excited to
learn you. I'm excited to please you. I'm excited for
the soundtrack. Our bodies will make something epic and beautiful
with lots of bass. ME an eager student to the
things that make you feel good, cautious and patient and yours.
Speaker 2: Ten free PM.
Speaker 6: What's up? Beautiful?
Speaker 3: Too hard? EMOJIEZ? How the hell are you?
Speaker 4: Hey?
Speaker 5: Girl?
Speaker 2: Hey?
Speaker 6: I don't know. I kind of had a bad day.
What's going on?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 6: Today just felt off?
Speaker 4: Tony disliked a text?
Speaker 3: Is there anything I can do for you?
Speaker 4: Nikki loved a text?
Speaker 6: I don't know.
Speaker 7: I just.
Speaker 5: If you were here, I'd hold your hand, rub my
thumb over your knuckles, kiss your palms.
Speaker 4: Tony loved a text.
Speaker 3: I wish I could be there.
Speaker 6: I need to be held.
Speaker 3: I feel that. I'm sorry I can't do that right now.
Speaker 6: I really want to know what you feel like. Oh no, no,
not like that.
Speaker 5: I mean like I want to feel my body next
to yours, your breath in my ear, your heartbeat against
my shoulder blade.
Speaker 4: Tony loved a text.
Speaker 3: Interesting that you assume I'm the bigspoon.
Speaker 4: Nikki laughed at attacks.
Speaker 6: I can't believe. I haven't asked, are you?
Speaker 3: I guess you'll have to find out, winky face.
Speaker 6: Lol, you're funny.
Speaker 5: I don't know if you feel this way, but I
have this weird feeling, like missing someone i've never met.
Speaker 6: Is that weird?
Speaker 3: No, I get that I feel the same way.
Speaker 4: Nicki loved a text.
Speaker 6: So when do I get to see you?
Speaker 1: Like?
Speaker 6: Actually soon?
Speaker 3: I hope?
Speaker 6: Okay? But when tullo, well, I don't know.
Speaker 3: We will figure it out. I promise.
Speaker 6: I'm getting antsy.
Speaker 3: I know, babe, me too. Uh. Maybe I could drive
to you next weekend. Did I mean you've been isolating
for two weeks? Right?
Speaker 6: Lol? I live alone. I've been in isolation for at
least a month by now.
Speaker 3: And I've been home for two weeks also, so so
what should I cook for dinner when I come over?
Speaker 4: NICKI loved a text.
Speaker 6: I can't tell if you're serious or not.
Speaker 3: I am, babe. I think it's time, don't you.
Speaker 4: Nikki loved a text.
Speaker 9: Hi, Hey, you're real, You're real.
Speaker 3: That was a lot of stairs up.
Speaker 6: I'm sorry for now.
Speaker 3: Can I come in?
Speaker 6: Of course? Selfishly, I think you were made for me.
Speaker 5: I think the goddess that created you, with still hands,
in a careful mind, tea tree and moss, soft and
healing things Earth, had the foresight to know that you
would someday meet someone clumsy hearted and wide eyed, whose
hand fits perfectly in your own, whose body feels like
a book you've read a thousand.
Speaker 6: Times, memorized and familiar.
Speaker 5: Whose capacity to love and hold is as vast as yours,
all sweeping plains and rolling hills and sunshine. I think
the goddess that created you shared secrets with the goddess
that created me. Centuries ago, added Lessen sisters in their
twin beds in a shared room, whispering in the dark
because their mother told them to go to sleep.
Speaker 6: And their secret language they could.
Speaker 5: Someday we are going to create something beautiful and wild, wildfire, bright,
but everlasting. Someday we will make something so beautiful there
won't actually be a word for it. It will always
need to be talked around, It will always leave the
describers speechless.
Speaker 6: No such word will ever.
Speaker 5: Exist, although people will spend years trying to find one.
This thing we're doing, this experiment, this prophecy, will be
flower petal, delicate, and tree barks sturdy, all at once,
will feel breathless, in slippery, in molten, but will never burn,
will never hurt, will only endure, and endure and endure.
Speaker 6: Tell me, dear sister, what do you know of angels?
Speaker 5: What do you know about sending people to earth who
are not meant for earth at all?
Speaker 6: What do we know of perfection, of destiny?
Speaker 5: Of all the things we know mortal souls want and fear,
all at once, this will be our work. We will
create two things who are not afraid. We will create
two beings who are not afraid. A quiet, pinky promise
between two sisters of fate, sealed and now here.
Speaker 6: I am with you, unafraid.
Speaker 3: When I think about all the things my sunday can be.
All I see is wild and vibrant colors stretching for
miles in every direction, the kaleidoscopes of dreams and fervor,
yellow daffodils, egg yolks, the curtains in our kitchen, the
perfect morning light for us to dance in, coffee and hands,
sun drenched and honeyed lemonade, butter, highlighted passages of a book.
We take turns reading to each other, your voice, a
low hum, a full body vibration, orange, sunsets and sunrises,
and sunsets and sunrises, clementines and a pack lunch, the
warm glow of a campfire, the hand soap in our
too small bathroom. We spent twenty minutes deciding on in
an afternoon that was full of promise, the suspension of
time when you look at.
Speaker 7: Me green, all the said loss, and every lush and
growing floods the earth provides us tenfold a one day,
flourishing garden.
Speaker 9: I cannot wait to learn from the stable hands rich
with the scent of earth, avocados, hummingbird wings, emotion, my
heart beat, algae, weed, the color of our minds.
Speaker 7: At work a twice failed key lime pie, perfected in
the third attempt, eaten with delirious glee at two am.
Speaker 3: I had to get it right, and.
Speaker 7: You waited so patient. My gratitude forever being fed.
Speaker 6: Purple.
Speaker 7: The evenings we spend skin on skin, languishing in the
depths of one another, lights off, incense, smoke, dusk, plums, lavender,
a scent that lasts and sticks, bubble bath candles, perfume,
violets growing wildly in unlikely spaces. The closest thing I
can think of what I taste when we kiss me blue,
the walls in our bedroom, endless sky and ski cool water, blueberries.
We picked ourselves, sticky and intertwined, endlessness forever. The tint
of my sunglasses as I squint up at you, abstracted
by sunlight, your face learns to me familiar white, freshly
fallen snow, whipped cream, sugar, honeysuckle, plates stained by red
sauces that took hours.
Speaker 3: To make, mint gum.
Speaker 6: We split a stick roses.
Speaker 7: Quotes that we both think tell the cosmic story of
two heavenly bodies, somehow managing to find each other amongst
so much chaos, so much noise, teeth, stars, burning strong
and bright and a night sky away from the city,
the way my heart launches itself into my throat every
time you touch me or smile at me, or I
think about you touching me, or I think about your smile.
Speaker 8: That's the color I.
Speaker 6: Don't know about yet.
Speaker 7: And maybe I'll have to amandine, or maybe I'll never
be able to put a name into that mystery. I'll
be fine the other way. Whatever it is, it is
my favorite.
Speaker 2: As the World Burns, written by Mikaela Berry, Nicky played
by Gishia Nixon, Tony played by Joanna Murkins, and stage
directions read by Miako Gavia.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Black Revolutionary Media. You can
check us out online or hear more of our work
at Black Revolutionarymedia dot com and support our work at
Patreon dot com slash Black Revolutionary Media