art

Creatrix in Residence @ HOME

| Sheree
visual journaling spread

The rain pours down, the temperatures drop. And we’re inside.

Miss Ella has Covid again so we self-isolate. We do our bit to keep the infection rates down even if no one else does.

Forced to stay in door could play on my mind, could make me frustrated and resentful if I let it.

What I’ve been doing is getting creative. Creatrix in Residence @ HOME is me allowing my imagination to wander while my hands are busy. Even my body as I continue to knock out my 4 miles a day of walking, indoors. It takes a whole heap longer than when outdoors. So I mix things up with a bit singing and dancing to Silk Sonic.

Things could be a lot worse. But poor Miss Ella. Just getting better after her stay in hospital and now this is just another set back. She’s taking it well as she gets creative too with video games, you tube, make up and singing.

Apart from writing a poem a day for the month of April here, I’ve also been making a ZINE a day as I’ve been accepted to present at the Edinburgh Zine Festival 2022 in May. Getting all my creations ready to share, swap and sell hopefully.

Hopefully, all will be well by the time this comes along as Miss Ella is going to be my assistant, sharing in the non- profits.

Bound up with Memory*

| Sheree

After Marcia Michael

My body has a yearning for the past. In this country, I am duped to believe and live as if we were nothing .

Nothing until they allowed us into existence. Nothing until they opened their arms, and allowed us to carry on being their slaves into the 21st century.

Search and recovery, my body reclaims her history.
My mother transported it on her skin, buried in the stomach of the ship, boat, truck.

My father carried it in his voice, trapped in the belly of the ship, train, coffin.

I cannot rely on any colonial archives for finding me and my people. Now or in the future.

Colluded, concealed, constructed, the archives have fabricated the narrative that sees we as other.

Reduce us to a footnote, a scar, a tear.

My body is my archive.
My presence is a testimony.

My imagination will do the rest.

*Quote from Toni Morrison 


The Object of My Gaze, on going project by Marcia Michael. Me Remembering you – transformations, 2021

DuppyMigrant

| Sheree
Road Openers for (E), 2019, Alberta Whittle

There’s some deep grooves

laid down through the moves,

forced or voluntary,

in the migrant’s heart

a migrant’s heart will always be a split – colonialism running through the blood like dis-ease

stitched together, makeshift, with tartan, kente, plastic and twine, scattered cowrie shells divine.

a ghost of its former self,

a migrant’s heart will always beat

out of place and time.

An escape to the balcony with the pigeons was freedom

| Sheree
The West Indian Front Room, 1970s by Michael McMilan

Sunday afternoons, after fried curry and rice and West Indian dumplings,

we’d sit on a brushed flannel blanket covering the velvet settee. Legs too short to touch the multicoloured carpet beneath.

We’d sit straight, only our eyes moving, wandering over the bright yellow textured wallpaper, tracing patterns and exits until we were dizzy.

He sat in one armchair and her in the other. Armrests protected with white hugging linens. Dollies on head rest, sideboards, side tables. Everywhere.

Behind him hanging against the white washed wall was a black velvet scroll depicting the islands of Trinidad and Tobago. Home. A silence presence.

If he was in a good mood then there’d be port and a cigar and the gramophone sounding out with soul. Other times, black and white TV shows like Survival and the history of athletics, we had to watch. Still and silent.

We were his children brought up to do as we were told. To not ask why and call our elders uncle or Tantie . Any deviation from such a course of action would result in rage and beats.

My imagination became the place of expressing my range of emotions. My imagination became the place of power and choice. Freedom.

Pigeons. Standing there.

From a marionette flat

with a pebbledashed balcony

grey feathered birds, standing

there, there on the railings.

Storm Coming

| Sheree
Storm Coming by Paula Dunn

After Paula Dunn

based on the weather
handing over a landscape like a veil,

a limited palette
to keep things simple

but storm coming on, clouds layered,
winds textured

and dark low lying land brushmarked
and glazed for atmosphere

the yellows, oranges and browns brood
within depths of time and place

searching for a flick of white
to rest and breathe

Old Memories/ New Strategy

| Sheree
Old Boat/ New Money by Lubaina Himid

After Lubaina Himid

Worn timber, cowrie shells,
currency and shoreline,
you sound like waves
and the creaking hull of death.

I try to imagine, she said, what it would be like to be taken from all that I knew, moving in a stinking wooden vessel over something I knew not what to call but it swallows our bodies whole. See sea, sea see. Propped against a white wall to suggest a wave in motion, the angle of pleasure, as I witness it, from the other side, here and now, I rumble with displaced memories. Memories that traumatise but hold onto me like seeds buried within my hair, bearing into my flesh.

Colour is Mine

| Sheree
Van Gogh, 1959 by Althea McNish

After Althea McNish

Sunflowers

big and bold

inspired by Van Gogh’s

brandished

across a

yellow and white

striped field

black lines

outline floppy leaves

and dozing closed heads

bright colour carried to

this grey isle

not a luxury but a necessity

for survival

for blooming

another time

uprooted

sunflowers

National Poetry Month 2022

| Sheree

It’s April!

Happy Poetry Month.

I know March was all about me diving deep into The Healing Properties of the Seas, 2022 Project.

But now it’s April, I’m going to focus on my poetry writing.

April has traditionally seen me taking up the the NaPoWriMo – 30-poems-in-30-days challenge. So why change something if it isn’t broken.

Of course you’ll still be able to get your seas fix on the blog for the rest of 2022. But now I must turn my hand to poetry.

These last few days of March saw me take a much anticipated trip to London. It’s been a time filled with walking and creativity, taking in exhibitions and musicals and nature.

I plan to start off the poem a day practice with a review of the images I’ve taken of the artworks I’ve visited since down in London. So ekphrasis poetry is the order of the month.

Ekphrasis is a device used in poetry or even a type of poetry which takes a piece of artwork as it’s starting point. It involves a detailed description of the work of visual art as inspiration and then who knows where the inspiration will take the writer. But the piece of art was the seed and that recognition is credited usually with the phrase ‘ After such and such.’

I start today and I hope you will join the journey.