Griot Girls Issue 1: Let It Be Known

A Word From the Griot Girls

It has been an amazing start to our Griot Girl collective. In October we welcomed 13 young Black girl and women writers! Throughout the month of October, the cohort participated in several writing prompts and challenges. We gathered virtually and safely in person. As usual when Black girl magic gathers in any space there was ions of dynamic storytelling, healing, and overall dope creation. It's a different world then where we come from, but It's a beautiful thing to be able to gather these stories and legacies.

We are honored to bring you our first issue Let It Be Known.

In community,

The Griot Girls

Featured Writers

Autumn Livingston

Cevyn Wiggins

Ife Islam

Ishtar El

Isys Nelms

Jasmine Hawkins

Khaliah Pitts

Madison Proctor

Malaika Gadsden

Nia Renee Brown

Lishele Liyuwork

Laila Poe

Sabriaya Shipley

“We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.”― Maya Angelou.

Everything that appears beautiful and shining has had to go through some sort of darkness and face different trials and tribulations for that is what builds character. Diamonds have to go through fire and pressure and butterflies have to go through metamorphosis, a difficult growth process but necessary. So as we acknowledge the beauty of the present let's not overlook the process in which one had to go through to achieve such beauty. Let's find beauty even in the darkness, the uncomfortable but imperative stage of growth. Let us embrace everything that comes with beauty, the good, the bad and the ugly. Let us delight in all of it. -Madison Proctor

The entire world loves to engage with Black Women and the culture we create, but never in a real way only in a way that benefits them. We so often have to give up mind, body, and soul in attempts to be seen but even then people don't take the time to see us or our humanity. But also this reminds me of how much I take for granted all the hard work my ancestors put in to building themselves up and making sure I am who I am. I reap the benefits of all they sowed and I often forget that. And often forget to thank them. -Malaika Gadsden

The butterfly is beautiful to the world, because the world does not know her pain. The world does not know the fight the larva went though, wrestling through slime, breaking free of its protective shield. The world does not know that the larva risked everything, just to see her. The world does not know the resilience of the caterpillar, munching on the leaves of the earth, evading untimely death at the mouths of hungry predators. The world does not know the perseverance of the caterpillar, the patience of the caterpillar, the determination of the caterpillar, as it slides through the earth, over the branches, under the green shrubbery. The world does not know the solitude of the caterpillar, with only itself to provide company, as it waits for those beautiful wings to sprout. The world does know what those beautiful wings look like: oranges, blues, reds, yellows. The world does not know the journey of the caterpillar, but appreciates and consumes its beauty. Much like a woman, disregarded, until she is... regarded.

-Nia-Renee Brown

I feel the quote by Maya Angelou talks about the time of adolescence. The time where we start to have new feelings about others and whilst our bodies are changing. The time when our minds and hearts are open to others and we shape our personalities based on how we are brought up by the things we experience in this time, what we do with our friends, what we do at school, the vacations and activities we do with our family.- Laila Poe

It is almost funny

how people can see the

beauty

in everything

from a flower

to a girl

or a twinkling star

and yet not even

acknowledge

the struggle that was underwent

to get to that state

of beauty;

flowers start as seeds,

little tiny nubs beneath the surface

of the soil;

stars are burning balls of gas

not too pretty

if you're close;

and a girl is

so much more

than her pretty face

or tiny waist

she is a girl, not a picture

she is a story,

not a page,

and like a butterfly

she started out

as something much more

small

- Isys Nelms

Alice Walker's definition of a Womanist. "loves music. Loves dance. Loves the moon, Loves the spirit, Loves love and food and roundness. Loves struggle. Loves the Folk. Loves herself. Regardless."

The woman who loves life and everything it has to offer. The woman who loves the joyous feelings that music brings and the connections and deep emotions that are brought through dance. The woman who loves the strongest action of love itself. The woman who loves food and each and every flavor that comes within it. The woman who loves the struggle and everything that comes with it, the struggle that is tiring but she would not trade it for the world for it is what makes the woman herself. The woman that loves the folk, loves people, loves her family in the fun and exciting times, the woman who stays and fights in the hard and and trying times. The woman who loves herself, her strengths, her weaknesses, her beauty and her scars, and would not change herself for anyone or anything, regardless. The woman who is not afraid to use her voice and speak for those who cannot is also the same woman who truly hears you and is a soft and comforting soul. The woman who embraces every aspect of her culture and dwells in the fullness of her being a black woman. The woman that stays true to herself and her experience. That is a Womanist. - Madison Proctor

I've never felt like I was allowed to just be. To just exist and enjoy my humanity and human experience. I've always worried about my body and the space I take up or the way people perceive me. This has really stunted my growth in terms of knowing what I actually like and enjoy. This also might be because I'm only 16 but for my entire life I've never felt like I really enjoyed anything at all. That I was just going through the motions and doing things because it makes others happy or because that's what I'm supposed to do. Alice Walker 's definition of a Womanist is someone who loves all aspects of themselves and their life regardless of others or other's perception. A Womanist is a person who is truly at peace with themselves and the world around them. It often feels impossible to be at peace and be settled in this country especially as a Black Woman. But I feel like once you're there, everything makes more sense and things just come into perspective. - Malaika Gadsden

Loves music: she is carefree, consuming sounds, letting them flow through her. She is unbothered, eyes closed, imagining herself as her own main character. She is all-consuming. Loves dance: she is the bird, she is the swan, she is the water that houses the swan. She is fluid, but she is the rapids around the jagged rocks. She is hurting, so she dances. Loves the moon: she is best understood after dark. she is best seen when others shine around her. She is serenity, tranquility, her soundtrack is the hooting owl. Her lover is the sun. Loves the spirit: she is falloff spirit, she worships the spirit, she becomes a spirit when the world forgets her, but she does not forget the world. Loves love and food and roundness: she is maternal. to the siblings who never had a mother and to the children she brought into this world. she is a fountain, an overflow of good feelings and vibes, of love and affection. she is round, like her heart, like her belly, like her love: circular. never ending. Loves struggle: she loves a "no," because the "yes" is so much more satisfying. she loves the struggle, because her muscles grow stronger, and she is stronger and greater because of it. She loves a struggle, because she knows she will ultimately beat her adversaries. Loves the Folk: she loves her people, her neighborhood, her culture: she loves her identity. she is her people, her neighborhood, her culture. she is her identity. Loves herself, Regardless: that is the hardest part. she is still working on it. - Nia-Renee Brown

As women in general, especially women of color, we are stereotyped and belittled. Black women said to be too angry, loud, and intimidating, for being powerful. When are we seen as soft and calm? Why aren't we allowed to be more than what we are labeled as? People have tried limit us to the stereotypes of our race and gender. Latina women are objectified and sexualized; their attitude has been labelled as "spicy" and they have been called "feisty". We are judged based on our bodies, and the way we present ourselves to the world. If we wear tight or short clothing clothing, certain hair styles, we're too grown or it's inappropriate. These are few of many examples and issues. Society refuses to let us be who we are instead of being who we are labeled as, in peace. So as womanists, feminists of color, we escape these limits and labels. We fight the women we are. We make it known that we love music, but every single kind of music. I love indie and pop, in addition to my R&B. I have interests like astrology and spiritual growth. I love food, and I will eat as much as I please, because it tastes good to me, it makes me happy. I love every kind of love, romantic, friendship-wise, familial. I have love for people for who they are and not who people say they are. I love, love, but As much as it hurts right now, I love struggle because I know I am making my way through it and adjusting myself as I go. And I am learning to love myself, regardless of who loves me. In loving these things and more, women already push past barriers because we're being who we truly are and not who a man, says we are meant to be. -Ishtar El

The idea of putting strings of letters together to form something that invokes emotion and brings forth memories from a person is invaluable. - Isys Nelms

Write a haiku about something you love

“The strength inside me

burns, fighting every last breath

I’ll never let go”

- Autumn Livingston

“Solitude is the

one steady form of love my

heart acknowledges”

- Isys Nelms

Every shade of brown

a cinnamon cocoa mix

made in God’s image.

-Jasz Hawkins

In the age of Twitter and Instagram, our attention spans are very limited. When writing journalistic non-fiction, it's very important to grab your reader with the first line. If you had to write an article or essay about 2020 being the year of COVID and civil unrest, what would be your best opening line?

Not Okay

By Autumn Livingston

A life of wonder I’ve always lived. Why must we be separated from those around us? It was not okay with me, but somehow it’s okay with them. And why must we act a certain way so they can feel comfortable? Why must we be extra polite to police officers so that we don’t get killed? I was not okay with it. I cried myself to sleep thinking about what happened to George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Amaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin, and hundreds of others. I used to think that racism was long and gone, but how wrong I was. I was not okay with it. For if we can’t give respect, how can we expect to receive it? It didn’t make sense then, and it doesn’t make sense now. Frightened to leave my own house, I clung to my bed everyday. My room was my safe place. I was not okay with it. My friends all had white skin, which gave them privilege. But mine was Black, which gave me my strength. And that’s all I needed. But I was still not okay with it. Why should my heart race whenever a police car comes up to my house? Why should I feel a life of wonder I’ve always lived. Why must we be separated from those around us? It was not okay with me, but somehow it’s okay with them. And why must we act a certain way so they can feel comfortable? Why must we be extra polite to police officers so that we don’t get killed? I was not okay with it. I cried myself to sleep thinking about what happened to George FLoyd, Breonna Taylor, Amaud Arbery, Trayvon Martin, and hundreds of others. I used to think that racism was long and gone, but how wrong I was. I was not okay with it. For if we can’t give respect, how can we expect to receive it? I didn’t make sense then, and it doesn’t make sense now. Frightened to leave my own house, I clung to my bed everyday. My room was my safe place. I was not okay with it. My friends all had white skin, which gave them privilege. But mine was Black, which gave me my strength. And that’s all I needed. But I was still not okay with it. Why should my heart race whenever a police car comes up to my house? Why should I feel uncomfortable because my friends don’t understand what it’s like to be a Black person? Why can’t they educate themselves? Why don’t their parents? Why can’t the school give us African American history classes instead of only European history classes? I was not okay with it. Today, I am stronger than I was the day before. I no longer feel scared, or ashamed of my skin, or angry at the world. I feel hope and I feel at peace. And what is it that I hope for? I hope for equality, justice, and to not feel uncomfortable whenever I’m surrounded by white people. I want to feel comfortable in my own skin without worrying about what others say about me behind closed doors. I am not okay with it, and you shouldn’t be either. But if you are, oh well. I can’t change who I am because you are who you are.

Can you tell a great story in only 50 words?

“Rain couldn’t stand the sight of him. He could never apologize and own up to his mistakes. Everything was her fault and her fault only. It was hard because she chose to forgive him everyday. Then she came home one day and told her mother, who said; “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” - Autumn Livingston *Quote inspired by Maya Angelou*

“Let it be known,” the man shrieked.

The crowd before him banged their fists and feet on the concrete and each other.

Shantae and her brother-the boy whose name she had forgotten and simultaneously never known-huddled together. They couldn’t stay hidden for long.

The man continued: “This is the way.“

- Ife Islam

“He crawls all over me. Choking me with his web of lies. Sometimes it feels like his venom poisons me into believing he can be better. He can’t. He won’t. His choices trap me, trap me inside my own mind. As his eight legs begin to wrap around I push him off and stomp on him with my shoe. I relish the sound of him squelching beneath my boot.” - Lishele Liyuwok

“She was strong, not just in the physical sense but in mind and in soul. She was fierce. Her soul was ignited, no amount of water thrown on her could put the fire she had burning inside of her out. She was a lion that walked alone amongst a flock of sheep. She knew who she was. She was a warrior.”

- Madison Proctor

“How do you explain what it’s like to someone who is your complete opposite? Hi ,my name is Assata, and I happen to be a Black girl going to a majority white school. It feels like I'm a chocolate chip in a bag of sugar, you could pick me out easily in any class. Now there are some Hispanic people in my class, but do they really understand fully? I mean they’re a majority there too. I’m the only Black person in the entire school, if I haven’t mentioned before I stick out very, very well. Going to a school like this is extremely hard, whenever civil rights or slavery is brought up everyone looks at me, the teacher asks my opinion. If I wear my hair down or the way “white people normally do”, everyone, girl or boy comes up and says my LEAST favorite phrase, “Can I touch your hair?” In other words if you say that phrase in my head I may hurt you. I never ever know what to say to that question. I mean what do you say to someone who wants to put their hand, and who knows where it’s been, and pet your hair to tell you how soft it feels. This happens to be the situation I’m in now. A girl came up to me and asked that very question, I’m rocking my hair in a fro - hawk. For the first time in my life I felt strong, powerful and independent, I said “No.” - Laila Poe

Think about your favorite folktale / fairy tale / cultural story / myth (such as Anansi, Aesop's Fables or the story of Icarus). How can you retell the story in a more modern context? Write a two sentence synopsis.

“The story of Orpheus and Eurydice

Hades sent Eurydice back up on a train, in 2020 they had trains going in and out of the underworld, it was much more efficient. Hades had also given Eurydice a phone so she could talk to Orpheus on her way up, Orpheus so excited to see his wife , so he facetimed her. The second she answered she disappeared back into the underworld, without the phone. “ Malaika Gadsden

“How the duafe returned home? When Black women started strapping the world unto their back. “

- Sabriaya Shipley

How are you a griot? What messages / stories do you share with the world?

“I guess I write mostly about love

And the pain and torture that shouldn't go with it

But does

I write about and for Black boys and girls and children of indeterminate gender

I write for niggas, I guess

A love letter to niggas

And the pain and torture that shouldn't go with being one

Black lives matter, they say

I say nigga lives matter

Black is dummy respectable

Or it should be

Black is docile and just normal enough

I write for the hoodrats and the ghetto dolls

I tell stories for the chicks and the bros and the niggas of indeterminate gender

In layman's terms

I don't write for your negro

The one that lets you pet their hair like a dog

The one handing out "N-word passes" like it'll make everyone hate us less

The kind and easy going

The sweet and polite

The whitewashed wannabe who makes everyone aware that she hates rap music

I guess I write mostly about love

And the anger that goes with it

So

To my niggers and negroes and niggas of indeterminate gender

Has anyone told you they loved you today?”

- Ife Islam

“I am a griot because I desire to learn the stories of those who were and those who will be. The message I want to share is the message of the free and bonded, the new and the old. I want to share the story of the in between. “ -Lishele Liyuwok

“I am a Griot because I am collecting and sharing the stories of my people, I am sharing the stories of those who cannot share their own stories. I am collecting the stories that might be forgotten, I am doing this so our legacies will live on forever, so our lives will not just be another casualty in this war we are living through.” - Madison Proctor

“There was always room to speak

Even when the corner became the most comfortable shoulder

There was always room to speak

Even when hands pressed so firmly over my limits

In a hush child language I never understand

There was always room to speak.

I could have used my body to pave the way

But even that was crushed down into pieced submission

The room was found amongst stained tearfilled journals

The room was in a rope of affirmation so thick that no monopoly of tug of war could break

The room was found in hush voices with increased volume

There was room for me

There was room for you

There was room for us

Let the truth be known

There was always room to speak”

- Sabriaya Shipley

drought: done forgot the taste of water

pouring water from palms

dusty, ashy and cracked with age

pouring

watering

quenching

feeding

during drought

does the ground forget the adoring embrace of

water?

or does it pray with lips

dusty, ashy and cracked with age

does it scream to be watered?

the babies cry out

mouths gaped open, squalling with desire

for libations, for the water

the ghosts don’t forget the water

the babies come back with grandma’s memories of the water

and here are we

pouring water from palms

dusty, ashy and cracked with age

pouring

watering

quenching

feeding

the ground never forgets

and is always thirsty

thirst thirsty

needing

wanting

the water.

- Khaliah Pitts

Some roles aren’t voluntary.

Breath breathed in before lungs formed,

before I knew me,

mommy and daddy knew each other

a union of her laughs & his lessons

her back in the day stories & his secrets

his & her

faith

fight

favor

for their willingness to stand

on shoulders of ones before them.

For all of them

the ones who carried

& those who cracked under the pressure

those who bled into me

who fed & feed me

who wiped my tears & beat me for crying

for everything I held in

(forcibly or voluntarily)

for everything I learned to hold

no matter how much it hurt

for finding the strength to let go

for being afraid to shed

for shedding anyway

for being willing to stand on shoulders

for being willing to walk

with, for, & because of them,

for those reasons

words were placed on my lips

before I knew to speak.

-Jasz Hawkins

Like the tree, how do you change each season?

“Does a caterpillar know that it won’t be a caterpillar it’s whole life? Like one day it will be able to fly? And everyone who looked at it in disgust will now look at it in awe. Or do caterpillars just one day wake up as a butterfly? Unaware of what they once were. I don’t see myself change season to season. I just look in the mirror one day and see someone different than 5 years ago.” - Malaika Gadsden

Recognize

“I saw her yesterday

My ego

I even shook hands with her

Asked her when’s the last time she danced with the devil

Last time she tripped

Got caught in her web of lies

Who rescued you

Cause it damn sure wasn’t me

Damn sure wasn’t blind ambition knocking down your door

Damn sure wasn’t a tasteful benediction

Well I’ll be damned who was it

How long did it take then to arrive on the scene

Of your social suicide

How long did they massage your heart

Call it healing

How long before you took your last breath

Spit the baptism back in your savior’s face

Cursed unborn seeds out of fear

Spotted the blind to your damnation

You’s a trip

Big ego

Tripping

Off your own supply

Addicted to your own dime

Why is it my first time checkin in on you

With no regards for your girth

You have grown far past my understand

And now your ego has an ego

Twice and thrice removed

I don’t recognize you

Like I recognize myself “

- Sabriaya Shipley

Thank you for bearing witness to our stories! See you next month for another collection of documenting Black Legacies!