NEO•GRIOT

42

Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie
United States

www.ekeretallie.com

 

Poet, writer, mama, herbal student, educator Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie shares the richness of learning how to swim.

Download Learning_To_Swim.mp3

 

 

 

 

BIOGRAPHY

Mariahadessa Ekere Tallie is a poet, writer, educator, New Yorker and world-wanderer.  Her poetry and fiction have been published in several journals including: Crab Orchard Review, Bomb,  Long Shot, Paris/Atlantic, Drumvoices Revue, and Carapace. Her works have been anthologized in Listen Up! (One World/Ballantine), Catch The Fire!!! (Penguin/ Putnam), Bum Rush The Page: A Def Poetry Jam (Random House), Role Call ( Third World Press), Beyond The Frontier (Black Classic Press), The Body Eclectic (Henry Holt), Revenge and Forgiveness (Henry Holt), and The Book of Hope (Beyond Borders). Ekere is a Staff Writer for African Voices literary magazine where she has worked since 1995. She performs her poetry regularly—sometimes collaborating with musicians and dancers— and has been a featured reader at the Poetry Café (London), Palabras (Holland), CrimeJazz (Holland) the De Nachten Festivals (Holland/Belgium), the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, Brooklyn Moon Cafe, Rutgers University, Hunter College, Barnes and Noble, Bryant Park, Mills College, and the Brooklyn Public library. Ekere has  taught English and conducted creative writing workshops in London , Amsterdam , New York , Chicago , and Rundu ( Namibia ). She has also spoken about issues pertaining to sexual assault against women at Ramapo College and University of Milwaukee . In 1999, she was awarded an artist’s residency at Fundacion Valparaiso in Almeria, Spain. 

 

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Learning to Swim

She was the baby of the family

curious and neon

magic unraveling her singing braids

there was music coming off of her:

violins and batas

pianos and castanetas

sounds her momma couldn't relate to

sounds that reminded momma of sin

imagine

sienna sunflower girl

knee high

southern tinged

tangos and rumbas tickling her feet

imagine

the first time the branch of the peach tree

ripped her skin because she'd been caught

moving to some rhythm

moving to some rhythm not born of the church

it was everything-her

sound, her scent, her earthspeak-

brought the hands, the belts, the switches down

and she tried,

when she left their house,

she tried to conjure her dance again

hear the whispers under her feet

she pulled watercolors around her waist

wore amber and amethyst on wrists and shoulders

she chanted and wound her way through jazz

but no one could read the smoke signals

of her cigarettes

"death would be sweeter than any of this"

and when we met

she was 35

and I was newly born

and she was still drowning

but she gave me studios to dance in

trumpets

screaming magentas

muted blues

congas

tarot cards

modeling clay

she kept judgement in a locked box too high for me to reach

she stepped aside

my mother stepped aside

she'd evacuated her own dreams

courted death many times

when I met her

she was still drowning

but somehow

she took me to the water

and somehow

she taught me to swim