The War Shirt: A Dialogue with the Ancestors

Michael Downey holds a Ph.D. in Dramatic Art from the University of California at Santa Barbara, and taught for 28 years in the Department of Theatre Arts at Santa Barbara City College. As a dancer he performed in various companies based in Los Angeles and Santa Barbara that operated in the 1980s. For the last fifteen years he has worked in the Department of Psychiatry and Addiction Medicine at Santa Barbara Cottage Hospital, leading groups for patients in creativity and self-care. His autobiographical video performance, The War Shirt is his most recent theater endeavor. 

 

The War Shirt A one-person play

THE WAR SHIRT is a video performance of a one-person play that I wrote in response to the exceptional closure I experienced with my father when he died in 1994. What were the dynamics that moved our lifelong encounters from fear and conflict to mutual respect? This major theme interfaces with my reflections on my sexuality as a gay African American man coming into adulthood amid the turbulent events of the 1960s. THE WAR SHIRT is also a tribute to my ancestors, whose influence has always impacted me through my grandmother's stories. 

 

https://www.thewarshirt.com

MIXED ROOTS: WRITERS ON MULTIRACIAL IDENTITY & BOTH/AND BELONGING

MIXED ROOTS

WRITERS ON MULTIRACIAL IDENTITY & BOTH/AND BELONGING

Beacon Press-Penguin Random House

Edited by Anne Liu Kellor 

 

29 personal essays exploring mixed identity, belonging, family, racism, community and the paradoxical ways of being in the world Mixed people carry lifelong embodied knowledge about existing in non-binary, intersectional worlds. Mixed Roots presents 29 personal essays that complicate the narrative around race and identity—dispelling narrow ideas that there is ever one “right” or singular way for folks to identify. 

 

Born out of a community of writers formed through editor Anne Liu Kellor’s annual writing workshop, Mixed Roots is filled with pieces infused with a deep examination of privilege, microaggressions, whiteness, ancestral trauma, internalized racism, and paradoxical truths—going beyond common tropes found in many mixed-race narratives. Highlighting various Asian, Black, Native, Latine, and Arab mixed voices from writers ranging from their 20s to 70s, Mixed Roots invites more multiracial and mixed roots people in to actively contribute to the dialogue around race, whether or not they publicly identify as “mixed.” 

A powerful collection of personal truths and cultural insight, Mixed Roots reveals how community and narrative can be useful tools to see how alike we are. We all carry in our bodies the historical legacies, confusion, trauma, and harm caused by racialized experiences—Mixed Roots says we are multilayered, not easily defined or contained by one story, and as such, can speak to us all.

Anne Liu Kellor is a mixed-race Chinese American author, coach, developmental editor, and teacher based in Seattle. anneliukellor.com

penguinrandomhouse.com/books/828233/mixed-roots-by-anne-liu-kellor

Setting Imperfect Prayer

by Kim Shuck

Stitching old stories with types of 

Love we actually know 

All of the rivers changed to 

Bring us closer 

Hiding nothing as is 

Essential for both and 

Someone right now is 

Trying there is no 

Book in particular 

Rhetoric damned 

Carrying a central truth closer finally there is 

Just

Truthshiver and the most complete 

Ache of intention it is 

Possible to offer 

Copyright © Kim Shuck. All rights Reserved.

Kim Shuck is the 7th Poet Laureate of San Francisco Emerita. Shuck is solo author of 9 books, co-authored one, edited another ten and has contributed to a vast array of anthologies, journals, curriculum guides, tours, and protests. www.kimshuck.com

Crisosto Apache named the 11th Colorado Poet Laureate

Crisosto Apache is originally from Mescalero, New Mexico (US), on the Mescalero Apache Reservation, and currently lives in the Denver metro area in Colorado. They are Mescalero Apache, Chiricahua Apache, and Diné (Navajo) of the 'Áshįįhí (Salt Clan) born for the Kinyaa'áanii (Towering House Clan) and are Associate Professor of English at the Rocky Mountain College of Art + Design. They hold an MFA from the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico. 

crisostoapache.com

Sacred Grief

by Hollee A. McGinnis a.k.a. Lee Hwa Young 

 

Because we lost 

families and cultures 

as children, before we had words 

and could only express 

the loss and grief 

through our bodies, 

crying, acting out, 

behaviors that adults want to stop, 

we learned we do not 

have permission to grieve. 

 

And yet, grief is the holding 

of the paradoxical and simultaneous 

experience of love and loss. 

We grieve because we loved. 

We grieve because we have lost that love. 

We loved our mothers, fathers, 

sisters and brothers. And 

we lost our mothers, fathers, 

sisters and brothers. 

 

Why not give permission 

to grieve that love that was lost? 

 

This is the grief 

that never gets expressed 

and released: that turns 

into anger, self-loathing, hate. 

We have all experienced love 

and the loss of that love. 

 

Through a parent, 

who did not return our devotion, 

a lover, who no longer 

matched our passion, 

a friend who turned enemy, 

a death. 

 

We find it 

hardly bearable 

to imagine 

we loved so much 

and were so loved. 

And not believing 

ourselves to be 

loveable and loved, 

we cannot access 

the doorway 

that is offered 

by sacred grief 

because we are in denial 

that we were ever loved. 

 

And so, we sit 

only with the loss, and 

we think we are grieving 

all we lost. 

But the sacred grief 

is the realization: 

we are grieving 

our knowing 

of how much we loved, 

of how much we are loved. 

 

Copyright © Hollee A. McGinnis. All rights reserved. 

 

Hollee A. McGinnis, MSW, PhD, is a scholar, writer, healer, and wayfinder. Adopted from South Korea, she has worked for decades in community organizing, policy, and research on childhood adversity, adoption, complex trauma, cultural loss, identity, and mutual aid. As a wayfinder, she integrates Western science and Eastern ancestral wisdom for transformation and healing. 

Hollee writes at https://substack.com/@holleemcginnis