Really like the way

Do you really like the way my scarf hung round my neck?
Cos I thought it was just the sound of your own voice
that was draped in the space between us.

Did you really feel the way we connect?
Cos I thought it was just the sparks as my Ipod crackled intermingled with my sweat.

Did you really like the pale of my lips?
Cos you know that's not real right, it's just Maybelline or Revlon or some other shit.

Do you really want me, to want you to want me to want you?
I couldn't remember the rest, I was too distracted by my own revulsion/attraction.

Does it normally work?
Cos even though they'll all tell you it doesn't
It does.

As long as you don't mind that I want you to want me to want you.

And that's it.

four and twenty

I'm 24. Four and twenty.
Stories in my head, I have plenty.
I. Just. Can't. Tell. Them.

Not cos I don't want to.
I. Just.Can't. Get the. Words.
Out.

I'm not shy, I'm not fly, I don't cry.
I'm not 24.

I've got less years than that.
You'll see less me than that.

You wanna see my hair?
It's shiny underneath
wavy underneath
There's no grey there underneath.

You wanna see my neck?
It's so smooth underneath
So cool underneath
There's no rules there underneath.

You wanna see my kneecaps?
It's so scarred underneath
So marred underneath
There's no covers underneath.

You won't see my neck, or my my hair, do you care? It's not fair.
You won't see my knees, no one sees, I'm not a tease.

You won't see my elbows,My shoulder, My chin, My forehead, my buttcheek, my armpit, my shin. My thigh, my hip, my pelvis, my chest, the small of my back and the curve of my breast.

You won't see my beauty, my pleasure, my shame, my shadows, my silhouette, mu childish game. My giggle, my fighting, my fears and my sigh, my groans, my bruises, not even my lie.

Oh sorry.
You will see that.
The lie. In my eye.
You will see that.

touching the veil

The only way to ever feel alive is when you are touching the veil. Otherwise it feels like being in a waking coma. You cut your hair, you meet your friends, you eat your meals and you start to smoke, because it seems the idea of cancer and death is so far away that it really doesn’t matter. And even if it came up right and stared you in the face, you wonder what the difference would be between alive and dead. What are you when you are dead? You don’t breathe, feel, think, love, connect. And you think to yourself, same difference. But then you realise. There is a difference. By the simple fact of wondering if there is a difference, therein lies the difference. But you realise you think you might prefer dead. At least when you are dead you don’t realise you are dead. Being dead alive and knowing it. That’s worse.

And you wonder, you didn’t always feel this way. And its not like anything has changed. No trauma, death, sorrow or pain. Those things make you feel. Alive.

But here you realise, in this robotic death, that the only time you ever feel alive is when you are touching the veil.

The veil of truth. You know you can never, in this life, go through the veil. You will always be on this side of truth. But maybe, maybe just brushing the silk veil will give you something. Truth lies on the other side. It has always been on the other side and you know it always will be on the other side. But you realise, sometimes, if you stretch, reach, force your dead mind to reach for something it knows is good but it doesn’t really want or care, sometimes, if you reach, you don’t even have to grab, you know that would be too much for your poor excuse for a being, that if the fingertips could just brush the waves of the silk veil of truth, you would be jolted. Alive.

Like cutting into your flesh so deeply that the nerve is exposed. And touching, with your finger tip the bare, raw exposed nerve. It is agonising. But you can feel it. And suddenly you are alive. Just the slightest contact and your whole body is writhing with wakefulness.

That’s all. Touching the veil.

Need I say more?

Some people don't need self promotion.

former child soldier
lost all family in the war
rehabilitated
degree from USA
written a book
Met with Kofi Annan & Bill Clinton to discuss the plight of child soldiers.
Addressed the UN General Assembly

The most impressive person I have met. Possibly ever.

The art of Self Promotion: ugly or creative?

I am here surrounded by people who are 'the cream of the crop'. They are the success stories of their families, the 4.0 GPAs and the honours students. But I sit here asking myself, is this really true? It is not because they are incompetent, far from it. I am intimdated by their efficiency, their aptitude and their clear genius. Or is it rather that I am intimidated by their uninhibited willingness to share this with me? Surely someone who is so forthcoming in tellng me how 'brilliant' they are, how well travelled, experienced and wise they are must be certain of their ability?

The concept of self-promotion is not something I come across everyday, and yet here it seems to be a necessity. I wonder if it is my English reserve that makes me think it is such an unattractive thing to have to 'blow your own trumpet' or if it genuinely is ugly. It's not as if the English are not proud beings, I realise that I probably assume I am brilliant, wise and well-travelled and that rather than modesty it is an assumption that everyone clearly knows this that causes me to refrain from comment.
I know it is also my fear that if I raise expectations then I am bound to disappoint, where if I keep quiet I can only delight people with my 'understated' brilliance! And thus I start to question if my way is better after all.

I have to admit it is not simply that I consider self-promtion to be so ugly that I am irritated by this prevalent character trait. Honesty compels me to acknowledge that what really gets my goat is that people- not as brilliant as me - are portrayed as such.

I recently went to a conference, and out of not only English reserve but also a sense of inadequacy I fear I misrepresented myself. I implied a level of ignorance about Human Rights and the rest of the world which wasn't fair to myself. I then spent the rest of the week answering the inquiry of whether coming to the USA was my first time out of England. I know I am not the most global citizen, but my parents live in Burundi and my sister lives in Afghanistan, so I do have some sense of what it is to be 'overseas'. I shot myself in the foot and spent the rest of week feeling as if I had been labelled 'the silly white colonialist who has a good heart'.

So I ask myself, should I buy into this self-promotion game? Should I vocalise my skills and be a walking talking resume, where any experience is maximised and exaggerated? It seems to be an important feature to the climbing the career ladder, and I can see why.

I still think its ugly though.

I woe for the days when the map was pink...or at least thats what they think.

Will I ever be able to live it down? I am sitting here at a UNESCO Human Rights Youth Leadership conference, and next to my name, in front of me, is a union jack flag. And I feel ashamed. I am the only British person in the room, and now I am coming to realise why. They struggle to find Europeans to come to this Human Rights conference, but I think I know why. A mixture of shame and arrogance.

I cannot work out how I feel being British. Sometimes I think I am fulfilling the basic prejudices of my kind, I think the UK is the best place to be and that I am so grateful to be a UK citizen. And the other half of the time I am so ashamed of being British and long for another life. People would tell me not to be so ungrateful of what I am and have. As if I really would like to be in a country that has no healthcare, where I cannot go to University as a woman, and a place that is always on the brink of war. Of course not. I don't want those things. But for exactly the same reason that I am protected from those things I feel utter guilt.

People here will tell me not to feel guilty for the sins of the past, but how can we not, when every conversation and discussion we have comes back to the arrogance of the West in believing they are right, when we all agree that Human Rights activism comes from a sense of empathy. I sit there and I wonder, do they think that I shouldn't be here as I think? How can I possibly empathise with a Sierra Leoneon soldier, or an Ethiopian woman? How can I even dare to sit here and discuss as if I know.

So I begin to wonder what I am doing here, what my role in all these Human Rights is. I know my country is ravaged by Human Rights violations, but they don't happen to me. I want to do something about it, and speak out for the voiceless, but I am terrified that they will stand up and ask me, 'how can you possibly know how I feel?'. I feel as if I do not belong with a group of people so passionate because of their experience, because of their reality.

Why do I care about this I ask? Is it colonial paternalism, that is so deeply embedded in me that I think it is philanthropy? How can I ever know with this skin and this accent that I am not making the same mistakes as my forefathers?

I want so desperately to know that what I feel and what I desire to do is about love, about my commitment to humanity and equality, but I know that I am riddled with prejudice and confusion.
And so it is that very feeling I have, that longing to be sincere, that is the same feeling that fills me with doubt. Is my compassion real?

I should not be here, not with these people who have experienced the human rights violations, the turmoil of being downtrodden and oppressed. I have not the position to make myself worthy to express an opinion on Human Rights violations. What do you know about it says the voice inside my British skin. And I realise its because I am the only one sitting around that table with a Union Jack flag next to her name.

And then the same voice says to me. Now you know what it feels like.

I fought the law and the law won

I fought the law and the law won

Is this how I publish? I don't want to write anything substantive just yet, every body is so eloquent and articulate, I don't want to appear ignorant, Imust fool the world.

do you think people ever read this?

And it's from the old I travel to the new, keep me travelling along with you

I only wanted to send my sister the end of the song lyrics. I don't even know if it is the same song...