Speak From The Body Poem
Written by Jolie Brownell
Over and over again
I have found this pattern in my writing,
Of feeling the need to distance my words
from my own experience.
Distance my stories from my body.
(What do I mean?)
By simply writing what I’ve learned,
And taking out my experience of such learning.
In other words, I am afraid of storytelling.
Of telling my own story.
Of speaking from my body.
This is upsetting for me,
Trying to be an authentic writer and all.
But I think I’m starting to understand
the root of this pattern: I have somehow convinced myself,
(More like, have been taught to convince myself)
That the written is more “valuable”
When disconnected,
When theoretical,
When objective.
As if taking the learned experience
Out of the flesh, makes it more credible,
More important, more truth-like.
We are a culture that values the objective
Over the subjective,
Theory over lived experiences,
The productivity of bodies over living bodies.
As if we forget we are bodies,
Forget we are flesh.
Storytelling brings theory back into flesh,
The flesh debunks theory all the time.
Storytelling has a kind of power pure objection does not.
(Is pure objection possible anyway?)
So in trying to make my story more “important,”
I take it outside myself,
Take it outside my own body,
Distance myself from it.
Yet this is not authentic,
This is counterintuitive.
For to be a storyteller
Is to be a truth-teller.
...I have been introduced
To a beautiful poet,
named ALOK,
Whose writing is rooted in their flesh,
In their bodily experiences,
In how they walk, live, and breathe in this world.
Their writing so raw,
So moving,
So captivatingly liberating.
Doing a kind of work,
Only possible through storytelling.
So for my writers out there,
For myself the next time I sit down to write,
Let us start and stay at the flesh,
Let our words and stories not reject
The very hands,
The very voice,
The very being doing the telling.
In doing this may we celebrate
What it means to be human,
Body, flesh, and all.