Description

I brought you flowers series is about love, heartache, the ephemeral and belonging. Picking flowers has been a favorite pastime of mine and the flowers I pick are always intended for someone else as a gift, a romantic gesture, or an expression of sympathy. Every morning during my time at Chautauqua, I picked flowers for myself. I walked barefoot before the sunrise and carefully uprooted the abundant summer flowers, grasses and herbs. At first, I felt self-conscious and cautious. As a person of color in a majority white affluent spaces I felt out of place to pick flowers in people’s yards or around their homes. However, theses flowers don’t have owners, they grow to be admired, to bring beauty, and eventually, die. Bringing myself flowers every morning helped to feel comfortable in my own skin. In bringing myself flowers, I felt in kingship with the flowers and herbs I picked: uprooted and transformed into something else. In bringing myself flowers every morning, I started to forgive myself and give permission to heal from heartache. It is a gentle reminder that somethings may die or wither away but will leave an everlasting imprint with no set owner.   I brought you flowers As you were sleeping dreaming of a better life, I laid restless. I caressed your face and wondered, will I be invited to the future you have envisioned?   So, I decided to bring you flowers –the wildest of them to adorn your head I toppled through clovers and wheatgrass and kissed the morning dew as I picked one by one He loves me He loves me not I baptized my sins in muddy waters, hoping the moon and stars will forgive me for scaring Love away.   Today, I sought company in Japanese maples and blooms of lavender to heal my swollen feet from the toxic waste I’ve been dancing in.   I bring you flowers to remind you that this is temporary, and that starting today these flowers will always belong to you.