Intersections

…by Jenn McKinney

 

Inter-sections -the word makes it seem so clean cut

That parts of me merge at clean angles

To form the whole, like a road with directions

Signposting my whiteness, my femininity,

Religion, class, ability, identity.

But I have these unseen parts, invisible even to me

That hide behind the thickets of my life.

And in those growths like blades of grass

There are different shades of my white, woman, worldview

That only begin to make sense of my being and becoming

When like leaves upon the tree of life it naturelinks me

To other foliage of different intensity, hues and tones

I am part of something bigger than can be said

I join the stream of life’s complexities

Encountering the ebbs and flows

From me to you, whatever form you take.

Rhizomatic whirls of roots

Entangled but glorious in their growth.

There are no straight lines that connect I to you

And you to me and us to them

Instead they weave their way through ups and downs

The highs and lows, upheavals and celebrations

Turning in on themselves, making knots

A labyrinth of winding paths, until at last they find their way

From I to you and you to me

From us to them.

 

Pay close attention to life’s inter-section-ality

See it in its many complex forms striving against

Banal-ity, immoral-ity, convention-ality, condition-ality

Socially gracing us with intention-ality to bear witness to

Immateri-ality, conceptual-ity, limin-ality, univers-ality.

Intertwine one and all, make a forest, feed each other

Find ways to deal with threats lying in the undergrowth

Breathe a sigh and let that expiration be inspiration

Speak out against extinction in all its different forms

Give voice to evolution, emergence and expansion

Give rise to living, being, relating as one.

 

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1 thought on “Intersections

    • Jenn, I look forward to reading more of your writing. For me, your poem has spareness and fineness, it’s visual and weaves cognitive, emotional and bodily together so effectively…”Breathe a sigh and let that expiration be inspiration “ thank you!

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