E5- Poetry and Embodied Activism (Wicked Slam Live in Berlin)

I started my work in activism at more of the macro level. I went to law school and studied international human rights at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis. this where George Floyd was murdered and sort of the starting point of the protests against police brutality in the U.S. When I was there I was working for the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of prison inmates. One of my jobs was to read the letters from the inmates, to decide if they had a claim. Now I can tell you what I was doing was listening, to stories, to emotions, to pain and loss. I was all in.
 
The problem was that I was acting like a lawyer, And a lawyer’s job, is not about stories, or empathy, or emotions or heart. A lawyers job is to decide whether these facts square with the law. I would normally take these letters and put them in a pile that said, “NO CASE.” What that meant was that whatever personal experiences and injustices were at the heart of these inmate letters, they were not meaningful enough to make a mark on the law. This was sort of the beginning of my questioning the role of the law, my ability to work within the confines of the legal system, that I could see was deeply flawed and had so many blind spots.
 
The personal is political and making sense of our past, how these personal stories and narratives are impacted and influenced by larger institutions of power do matter.
 
So, I was very interested in this role of narrative and began work in literary theory as a Ph.D. student at NYU. I was interested in the role of narrative in the law, power structures. This sort of paved the way for me over the years, to have this base understanding of stories, and narrative, as a source of power and justice, but also as the real source of activism, healing and recovery.
 
As a writer, I’ve always believed in translating my inner experience to the outer world, and in some ways that act in itself felt political. I am now a trained narrative therapist which means that I;m really looking at how systemic issues influence the individual, which brings me to tonights topic.. emotions. Emotions drive us, emotions are the root of passion and activism, and if you think about it they really begin in our bodies. I am doing somatic work in embodied activism which is really about learning how to see the body as the center point for any work at the individual and institutional level. How do we learn to become embodied, to see our bodies as a source of power and also often the place of oppression, because of race, gender, sexual orientation. Where does this all begin, in the body. But by becoming aware of our bodies. Becoming mindful of the body, we can begin to take back power.
 
So, back to emotions. If you have never done this before. I want you to close your eyes and think about how emotions manifest in your body. When you’re scared, is your chest tight, does anger start in your gut, does excitement cause your fingers to shake. We experience emotions in our bodies and this is one way to reconnect to get really in touch with where you are in your body emotionally, so that you can channel it. Many times people don’t stop to feel their emotions, but they actually are a physical experience, and instead of thinking of emotions as something to get out, like a catharsis, it can be more helpful to think of them as a kind of territory in your body, a place where you can live them experience them, and use them as a way to fuel your power.
 
I could talk more about this, but I wanted to just give that quick intro into the potential of narrative and storytelling gin transformational healing but also make this connection to somatic healing and embodied activism. You can learn more about my community healing and work at restoryatherapy.com and I will also read this poem, which I think for me is a personal reflection on the relationship between this inner and outer world…
 
Formless
 
From the rooftops, that carve a pathway
Towards the steeple, the clouds thin and even
Where birds perch, on the stone meridian
The leaves that grow tired and fold.
Beneath this lapping sky, that once belonged to us.
 
In the milky sunset haze, the shadows crawl north.
And we wait, now, for the face of night.
Her glow, the mysteries, that lie beneath.
The stories that unfurl between promises
Between the sheets, the windows and walls
There was us. And then, the world.
 
Dampened lust, our bodies, we are lost in
Formlessness, beyond the rings of ecstasy
We know these lines, the edges of being,
Where we wait to be discovered,
Uncovered, and lifted, elevated beyond
White crests, the carnal rain.
 
The walls are dirty with time.
And tell us more than we want to remember.
So we silence them, with only our eyes.
There was nothing left to bare.
Secret eddies of lost thrown stones.
There was nothing left for us to bare.
 
And this time, we will need a map,
To guide us from these rooms, to tell us
Where to go, how to be, the way we were.
Out there in here or in here, out there.
The desert has never touched the ocean.
The sun can only long to kiss moon.
 
From pink to blue to summer night.
It wasn’t long until the hum of the street,
The dog barking, pulling at the leash,
Life is awakened, in the dark.
The wind beckons, not forgotten
From the windows, we hear her calls,
It’s a beat, a force we won’t forsake.
 
 
Kate Marlena Leone
July 13, 2020