Consciousness Rising

I titled this blog about consciousness rising because we are unconscious. We, as a female people, are unconscious to the subliminal traps being laid out at our feet. We don't simply walk into this trap, we dance our way, happily into the trap and are grateful to be there. Twerk our way into the joy of "love" found in the club. Why? Because Usher says love in the club is good and Beyonce agreed?

Let me tell you something that people have known for generations, that you have probaly heard before. No big epiphany: sex sells. People write what sells, sing what sells, portray what sales. It is a natural human reaction to want to be with someone else, to be part of a couple. To know that some other human being loves us more than any other human. So we join into mating rituals, we go where other humans will be, where we can display our attractiveness and hope that someone's pheromones want to mate with us.

Courtship begins in a dancehall to a song that queries if you want to get "down with the tool in his pants". That is tempting and gets you up, moving around, gyrating and happy. Of course, if that doesn't inspire you, your wannabe suitor can be more direct and simply demand, "go get up in dis ride." At which point you swoon, falling into his arms, desperately in love, ready to bare him a boy child.

He's just being silly when he calls you a ho, which to alleviate confusion, is short for 'whore'. You know, people who have sex for compensation. But, bitch, don't be sensitive. He just playing wityoass. I mean, how can you doubt it? Your relationship began with such respect. In case there is doubt, I'm being sarcastic.

I would caution you not to be surprised when your one night stand doesn't become your husband, but your baby daddy. Of course, he's totally to blame. Can't he see what a good woman you are? Niggas just don't appreciate shit! Think of all the meaningful conversations you've had. No? You shared your dreams and goals, right? Talked about putting God first and yadda yadda yadda? No.

Oh. Well. You had a great time, I'm sure, at the club of your choice. When he sang along with the song, calling you out of your name, that shit was hot! Talk dirty, daddy. Except he was serious. You are his whore. When he sees you, he sees a bitch, not his wife. All he wanted was to make you "say ayy". Brag about you to his friends, then move on to the next female willing to bobble head in his lap.

You were a top notch bitch. Unfortunately, that makes you a bottom of the barrel lady to most men. Lady, to be a lady, the character you portray is vital. I don't know any man who wants to walk into a room where half the men in the room know what his lady is like in bed. Who wants to hear,  "Man, has she done that tongue thing for you yet?"

I'm not saying you can't like a song, just don't live the lyrics. That's like choosing to be a gangster because you see Scarface. That makes no sense, right? So why put yourself out there as a slut because of a hard beat and a tight hook. Music is catchy and wonderful, and I can't imagine my life without my personal soundtrack blaring in my ears. The problem is when I become a "rack city bitch".

All I want is for us as a people, as a female nation to love ourselves. Love yourself. If noone has ever loved you, love yourself. Set standards for yourself and hold yourself accountable to them. I'm not going to tell you to think of a child or a parent, or blah blah blah. Think of yourself and do whatever you do or don't for yourself. Live and respect yourself for you. Whomever else benefits from it, great for them, but do it for you.

Come

Come close.
Touch me like it's your right.
Press your advantage.
Press me.

Come close.
Make me flood and
Conquer my waters like Sinbad.
Come love me.
   
Hurt me as I like it.
Come fuck me.
Come close.
Come now.
   
Come with me.
On me.
In me.

Come close.
We sin bad.
It feels good.
   
Modesty goes out the window
You come in my door.
Your smile good scary.
   
Have me going before skin can touch.
Your laugh mates with me
Your eyes capture me.
Captivated from hi dancing from your tongue to my ears.
   
Wet where once I was dry
From all of the thirsty you-wannabes
Pushing up on my shores.
   
Come closer that we come together.
Crescendo like the wildest weather.Whenever, however
Just come.

(c) Pamela Shropshire 2012

Share

Share...
But with whom?
On my knees I cry out to my Father.
Hope in my bosom keeps me strong.

Share.
Who on Earth could understand?
Who would willingly shoulder this burden of everything with me?
It is not a request that you be my everything,
Rather that I'm your something of import.
   
I would share if I thought you could handle it.
It is not that no one would or could.
Rather that so many times when playing the game of trust,
I've landed flat on my back.

The memory of my ass's pain makes me yet leery.
Hope deferred,
Trust rewarded with betrayal,
Holds me back.

If you knew all there was to know about me, would you still smile?
If the thoughts I think were on display would you still profess your love?
Perfect love casts out fear,
My love for humanity needs more proofing.
   
Perhaps I should force myself to share.
Steel is tempered by fire,
Perhaps my tin relationships could go titanium.
Looking into your eyes, I want to fall, and
I want you to be there to catch me.

I want you to see all of me and
Still catch me.
Catching me, hold me.
Love me.
Befriend me.
Cherish me.
Trust me.

Are you here to push  me to share?
I want to.
With you I want to trust that a blue sky could be green.
That the river of our love could rush up peaks.
With you I can believe the impossible.

I close my eyes and speak.
When they open you're still here.
In my dreams, you don't walk away.

Taking a deep breath, I put reality on trial.

(c) Pamela Shropshire 2012

My Addiction

Your name is obsession.
You taste of hope, with a dash of desperation.
And yours is the only menu I order from.

I spew lust from my mouth like the most vile of substances.
My tongue can taste imposter.
My palate craves the specialty of you called love.

I would run.
That me that fears to trust, would push back from the bounty of your love.
I would abstain, refusing that wonderful shot of you to my veins.
I would go on a you-free diet.

Except for the cravings...
The need that grips me at three in the morning.
The shakes when you are present are nothing to the shivers when you are absent.
I fiend for your side effects.

Yearn for the weight gain of your seed growing in my womb,
The breathless rush of the process to get there.
The giddy feelings whenever our eyes mate.

If that were all, perhaps I could escape.
Its not only what you gift to me;
I need what I give in return.
Need you to need me.

When your hand seeks mine.
When your arms pull me in close, as though even breath is an intolerable space between us.
When your eyes close and a sigh of release shudders out of you,
I know we are home.

Your laugh when I'm silly is my favorite song.
Your body is my playground; you are a joy to my senses.
A blessing to my life.

Ours is the love that could launch a thousand ships.
It is the purity of peace and the insanity of war.

Perhaps it is the perfection of you for me that makes me want to run.
The improbability of our oneness that does battle with logic.
That causes me to question,
To scrutinize under microscopic lenses.

No matter the equation, the magnification,
All I can see is you loving me.
Me in love with you.

You are my addiction and I want no rehab.
If you were an incurable sickness, invading my heart...
If you were a poison, I would gladly drink your Kool aid.

From now until eternity,
I want this love forever.
To infinity and beyond.
In my Buzzlight Year voice.

Smile, love.
This is my surrender.

(c) Pamela Shropshire 2012

Dreams

You are the hope I hope for.
You are the crushing need crashing down on me.
Your absence sends my smile running.

Nights like this I wish...
Days like tomorrow I wish...
Moments like now I yearn.

The memory of never mocks me.
The hope for my maybe being upgraded to a definitely throws my emotions a lifeline.

Just a friendly reminder that I still wait.
I still love you.
I'm ever in love with you.

So.
Yeah.
Hurry up.

I need you.

(c) Pamela Shropshire 2012

My First Time

You penetrated my body and knocked on the door to my soul.

Everything I thought I knew flew away with one thrust of trust.

You were let in, my everything.

What I felt with you was like a revelation.

It was like a prophesy carved in stone.

I didn’t want any barriers between us, just your flesh to my own.

I wanted us as close as we could get,

As close as our love already brought us.

When you mated our bodies, my mind was on forever.

I remembered your hand holding mine as we walked by the shore line.

I thought of your whispered declarations of love when the world came too close.

You made me a woman when I still fantasized like a child.

Still had dreams created in a Hollywood film set or an Atlanta music studio.

Following the eruption of completion came the crush of reality,

Weightier than the fall of your body to mine.

The perspiration on my upper lip now has more to do with regret, with sorrow, than with passion.

Though the first time was less than perfect physically,

What I felt in that moment we could never duplicate.

In all the times since, the climax of our passion has been insufficient to replace the enormity of that moment to my emotional self.

You were my everything.

I let you in.

I not only unlocked the door, I gave you a key.

Sometimes I think I gave you the only key.

I am full of emptiness now with this damned reality.

Devoid, a void.

I avoid thinking too deeply about what was and what is no more.

I avoid the thoughts of regret and self flagellation.

Emotionally constipated by how very much you have shit on my hopes and dreams.

You had me thinking…

I had me thinking about forever, when what we had was until.

Until you got bored.

Until the grass became less green or more so on the other side of the fence.

Until…

I’ve been thinking about forever, but you are no longer in that picture.

I want to be sophisticated and thank you for being my first time.

Thank you for the moment of completion I felt when hymen gave way to hope.

However the conflagration of this infatuation to my self, my psyche, my mind’s heart, doesn’t allow for that level of sophistication.

I’m just trying right now to get past reality.

I’ve been going deep into me, figuring out how to change the locks on my being so that you no longer have the key.

Perhaps I’m strong enough to thank you for the lesson you taught me;

Arousal isn’t love and orgasm doesn’t equal eternity.

Boundaries have been set, fences, bulwarks erected to protect my future for my forever.

My next first time will be real.

With my next, my last, every time will be complete because of the love that will blanket us with its beauty.

Until he arrives, I’ll wait patiently and forgive myself for you.

The hope of him makes me smile again.

(c)Pamela Shropshire 2012

Vent To Reinvent

I wish I knew how to be a better friend. It is said, and I believe it that to have friends you must show yourself friendly. I believe that I am friendly most of the time. The problem with being friendly is being oneself. Who I am is difficult. I can get moody when I’m thinking about something of import. I pull into myself and I don’t let people close enough.

I watch people who are friends and I see the way they are with each other. The ease of dialogue, not watching every word, being relaxed. I have people that I have been friends with for years and I am still afraid of them knowing me. Still afraid of the day they actually see me and say, what am I doing with this person?

There are people of reason and wisdom who I can speak with, but my mind can’t seem to focus coherently on what I would say to them. Besides, this seems like so much narcissistic bullshit, except that I truly want to be a better friend. I want to have the type of relationship where I can go to someone and just cry.

Lately I have needed that. My life has altered and reshaped itself. Personally and professionally I have gone through upheavals. I normally go through them alone, but it feels like there’s this buildup of emotional need and no one to go to.

In the now it all feels like I need, but I don’t believe in feelings. I don’t believe in emoting. I believe in rationalizing, logic, wisdom. I believe in working things through mentally instead of emotionally. Feelings clutter up what is with what could be, might be, want to be.

Yet the feelings are still there. The need for a connection that I don’t have to be there. I love my friends. I love the people in my life I call friend and I will do anything for them. The problem is that I don’t share with them. I’m still working personally on how to receive from my friends. I feel like I am getting better, but I’m still a very large way away from being the kind of friend I want to be.

When my mom died, I needed. I just simply needed and I went to a friend who was just there for me. We didn’t talk about pain or loss. We were just together, silly and together. It was what I needed to get through that day to the next. That day, I received and the world didn’t end, so it’s baby steps being taken.

In the meantime, I have who I have always had. Me and God. For now it has to be good enough.