Poem: A New Culinary Me
Flourishing in My Garden. Picture by Topaz.
by Michelle Beadle Holder, PhD
Is there a type of art that feeds your soul? Is it music, painting, literature, cinematography, photography, knitting, sewing, fashion, or something else? For me it’s poetry.
Several years ago, I had the pleasure of participating in a food and literature workshop, facilitated by Shivon Pearl Love and Khaliah D. Pitts. These two amazing ladies started Our Mothers’ Kitchens in Philadelphia, PA to introduce and connect young women to the culinary and literary heritage of African American women authors such as Alice Walker, Zora Neale Hurston, Ntozake Shange, and Vertamae Smart-Grosvner. The workshop they led occurred at the Black Urban Growers (BUGS) 8th Annual Conference in Durham, North Carolina.
As part of the workshop, Love and Pitts asked the circle of women and two men to write a poem that answered three questions. What are you not? What are you? How and what do you create? They gave us 5 minutes to complete the poem. Below is a revised version of the poem I wrote.
Being A New Culinary Me
I am not a mother, traditional teacher or researcher
I am not the labels
Those constraining archetypes
I sometimes forced myself to be
I am not
The good little girl
A child that must be seen and not heard
I am not
The good student
A scholar that only follows the rules
Constantly asking permission to create, think, and exist
No, No, No, No, No, No
No
I choose to no longer distort myself into flattened characters
Or smother parts of me to gain acceptance
Today I plant the seeds that cry to grow
Giving birth to visions I catch in the early morning winds
Co-creating roots that mend cultural ties
Releasing social programs that evoke internalized lies
Today I choose to love aspects of me I learned to despise
So I write
I map new routes that must be tracked
I listen to soft yearnings
Choosing nourishing qualities
Cooking like neo-soul
Mixing, kneading, and crafting Afro-Atlantic and Caribbean vibes
The love, flavors, and laughter of us all
I choose to be
A new culinary me
I want to thank Tracy Deik, a fellow Caribbean American who encouraged me to share my art with the world. I also want to honor Audre Lorde, now an ancestor, who taught me that poems are not a luxury. Poems can serve as an essential ingredient to self-discovery. They can help one to find grounding and navigate the ups and downs of life. After years of keeping this poem to myself, I am happy that I decided to share it with you .
I would love to hear from you. Is there a part of my poem that resonated with you or caught your attention? What art form feeds your soul? Please respond in the comments below.