Women's Leadership and Revival Tour

The Berkana experience began like this:

We gather together

Sometimes under noisy highways

surrounded by painted oak trees drawn over dusty concrete and cement

The memory of the green

reminds us of what is still possible

revitalizing what remains

every day becomes a tug of faith

enriched in the moment of our lives and what is provided

shifting into a partnership between the universe and ourselves

I surrender

Acknowledging the chaos of my expectations

acknowledging an understanding of patterns like

poverty leads to war/

impatience divides us/

and love conquers all/

And so now here we are/

following the energy of the moment/

trusting the consistency of the sun rising every time/ time spinning clockwise

and the moon becoming the third eye of my night’s sky

And we surrender/

constantly renegotiating with the current/surrounded by our own thunder/

surrendering to our own availability and vulnerability/

permitting life to magically connect us and miraculously unfold/

as we frantically endure/carving our names onto dusty car windows/

we search for traces of ourselves in every vessel that promises to carry us there/ meanwhile, here we are/ a vessel so magnificent it protects us from scolding ourselves too boldly for misplacing the power within us/

our bodies choose to believe in us until it can’t/

peacefully building and breathing until it can’t/moving us from this moment into the next/investing all of our time in the moment/ so much that I become the moment/ nurturing myself/mentoring the seed from the sand up/with help from the sun and the tears from above/ sending the light straight out of heaven/

guiding the roots to ground us again/

I dream for us

Dreaming of the tide of ripples promising to take us higher

iyeoka ivie okoawo (written & performed during close of women's conference w/ Berkana inst. 6/2006)

 

and so it begins. the slow restless surfacing of inspiration. the dance that begins in the snapshot of a moment. the ripple that rides the cans from the can knots. i am break-dancing in a sweet sun ray of yesterday and now. blending my unforgettable birth with my future self.

the moments that want us

The Present was already happening
when i awoke from my daydreaming

The Past warned me of too many moments
I would miss if I blinked:

the first three steps of my niece
sharon's last breath
my brothers becoming men
my parent's dancing together like children again

I will catch as many as I can

hoping the Future will allow
my dreams to reunite

with the moments
that are still waiting
for me to arrive

iyeoka ivie okoawo© 2008

Surviving Seasons

I choose to fall on my own time

I begin believing that nothing needs me

Not the Winter as He delivers the first cool snowflake
of a soon to be covered canvas of white and frost

Not the Spring as She embraces the breeze from the Atlantic waters

Not the Summer as time sends the sun to my doorstep
chasing the shade into an already delirious
landscape of shorts, sandals and tank tops

I collapse effortlessly as Autumn shakes the leaves
to do what I fear of doing too easily

I am used to fighting against the fall
Developing compelling reasons of why I came here
Defining journeys
Separating a park bench and isolation
with Thanksgiving dinners and Christmas parties

I am used to surviving seasons

But tonight I take a different approach

I surrender to the failures that will no doubt outlive my desire
to prove all my private critics wrong this time

I welcome the challenge to outlast my need to win
with my instincts to let the cards deal what was meant for me

And I’ve never been one to gamble with life as barter without a backhanded guarantee
The stakes are too great and there are far too many roads that call for me
to fight for the path that will certainly call for more uncertainty

So tonight my approach resembles freedom

Freedom to fall if I must

To paint the sand blue before the waves come

Freedom to watch how quickly things can spin out of control deliberately falling apart

Freedom to face the days believing that everything…all the pieces are there like a jigsaw puzzle waiting for you to rebuild them again

We need to believe that sometimes…everything that needs you will find you

Whole or broken

Starved and unsatisfied or replenished and confident

Celebrating that this gift of days and seasons perfect in its imperfection and uneven ends

This gift of moments making me crazy

with more love and loss, more pain than I can handle in one breath

This gift of hopeless freedom needs me to exist

more than my willingness to freefall blindly past it

a poem a day keeps

the meaning of irie
Current mood: addiction to the rubberband

And so now I am recalling stories

Of you changing open spaces

From caves to canvases

From a maze
to memorable

I make sure

the shoe fits
more than once~

I pick several moments and watch you wrap into them

Slipping through

A silhouette

Divided

By crazy
and how I believe you're driving me

A kiss reminding me of everything I was afraid of

Including love
including the rest

like death
By the very lips that rehearsed

The same curses that sought

To show me how to cry myself a river
by myself twice in 2 decades.

for now, the punch line is dangling on rebirth

But who's to say run on sentences were created to loose us
in the dust of words deserted by the whirlwind of the minds

and the desire to keep going, keep moving
fear nothing for whatever doesn't get

baptized on the page

gets recycled in the mysteries
of the divine

timing of

everything.

...just allow the ink to dry several times on the same line

i miss the maze
i miss moments of the rat race
i miss time showing me how to remember love

i miss knowing too much
i miss running away when i felt like i didn't get enough

gone are the days i shift from powerful to helpless
gone are the days i follow a path that leads to homeless
gone are the seconds i wasted on whispering my love letters

i want to relearn how to embrace the emptyness
teach the universe how to meditate in stasis
still the mind

resurfacing again as a grain of sand
unknown and anonymous
an orphan of joy

an observer of miracles

iyeoka ivie okoawo ©

poem

I will go my own way

From the madness that sits on the mountain

To the fields that find me weary and weeping

I wish for great love to find me

And down here

We hope we can recognize it when it comes

Down here

We hope not to be haunted by our own impatience and insecurities

Shamed by our reasons for blaming everyone

I will go my own way

From the tumbles and the downfall

From the twilight

And the mist

From the evening and the moment that lasts

That sends a flame

Sacred and intoxicating

I will go my own way

Seeking the same madness I was hoping to evade in the rain

song for the displaced child of war:

10million Miles and More

We have children running through here

Torn shoes on blistered feet

Running with no sleep for the weary

Running for 10million miles and more

They see

Darkness all around them

The bombs do not stop dropping

Tired but hanging on

Singing to their sisters

Don’t you know we can’t fall down

We’re caught in the middle

Somewhere between hell and a holy war

We’re caught in the middle

We don’t know what the fighting's for

But we got to keep on moving

The sun will soon be rising

We got to make it over the mountain

Running for 10million miles and more

Broken Heart’s Anthem
Iyeoka Ivie Okoawo

Funny how a little love could make you stay here
Funny how a broken heart can make you walk away

Well I’m tired of you walking away
Tired of holding on to a closing door

Watching you walk away---walk away----walking away—


Because this is NOT about JUST another song playing
In the background on the radio
Or the memory of faded yellows tucked under a passing rainbow
This is about emotions held under pressure
Pressed up against the melody of the moment

This is about watching you sleep last night
knowing you will never be mine

Knowing that this time our time exists in 20 second intervals
Never mind the delusions of 365 days of a relationship based on perfection
Visions of riding off into the sunset together
Living happily ever after
Holding hands on a beach with white sands on a deserted island

These are the days that TEST you

I’m talking about 3 minutes of sun facing the storm 10 seconds before
a miracle comes that was supposed to save your life
But manage to trap you into falling for him all over again

5 minutes of freedom filled redemption songs Marley would have written if he lived

10 seconds of back breaking toes curling orgasms
That remind you…that it’s just NOT ENOUGH this time

4 hours of begging for forgiveness
These are the mistakes that are forgiven
But the pain lingers for so long you can never forget them
So you surrender to labeling these nights together
As a glimpse into a seventh heaven that will never believe in us

And you risk
falling
head
first

Praying to rediscover the gift of the days
We have been struggling this long to experience…just this once

These are the last notes of a song that reeks of something fragile
Too close to a curse that breaks your spells of loving him
Dreaming with hopes of finding the path that piggy backs on the road to revelations

And midnights bringing us closer

To watching the sun and the moon chase the BLUES on the same sky

Bringing him closer to walking away
and you…to closing the door
Walking away…closing the door…walking away…closing the
door

Take this hand from me
Show me to your world
Bring this dance to life
Your love can paralyze my fears of falling

Carry my heart slow
I swear where you go I'll follow you
I'll follow you...

This is the place that always
Seems to be better than
Where you have been

So you run towards the
New day rising in the distance
And you walk away from the day
That found you falling

You always seem to hear God when it counts.
Even when it comes from the
Millions of voices that call to you

You make me want to listen for Him
A little bit harder too

You always manage to wake up
From the dreams that drown you
Wide-eyed from the nightmares
That threatens to pull you back in

You are a rose that blooms for a second chance
On the off seasons

With petals pressed against a thorn searching for your place in the breeze
A wave that breaks on sea and shore
Left for decades deserted

You are the calm that arrives on the highlands moments after a storm recedes

You climb the mountains from the peaks to the valleys
And trust the song that teaches broken hearts how to sing
And how to live a little bit more amazing

You make me feel like you waited for us to exist
For we are the translation of a perfection that just is

So...
Take this hand from me
Show me to your world
Bring this dance to life
Your love can paralyze my fears of falling

Carry my heart slow
I swear where you go Ill follow---Ill follow
See into my soul
And Ill take you to my home to love you, love you, and love you

This is a poem for love.

SHINE this way as if 9 lives depended on it the same day your life depended on mine
CHOOSE to face your fears of crossroads that sent you spiraling off the deep end several times
DARE to make a choice for you
REALIZE this is your gift to you
Even if it's for that one chance and happiness you could potentially eventually loose

Now I don't know why we need to believe that confession is reserved for sinners
And I don't know why I feel a need to wrestle with my demons and angels
But I know when I NEED to talk to God sometimes
And I can still remember when he showed me how to how to forgive my deepest and darkest crimes
And how to wake up on a new morning to a feeling that everything is gonna be alright
Not because it has to
but because these steps
And this road is undeniably mine

And I want this to be different...
I want to know what it's like to not feel the same
I want to be freedom
I want to know what it's like to sail away
Today I'll pray to God
And He will finally say
YOU GOT IT RIGHT CHILD
WAY TO BRING THE FUNK THIS TIME
KEEP YOUR HEAD HIGH
AND SHINE THIS WAY
TAKE A BREAK FROM THE PAIN
REALIZE YOU'RE NOT A PRISONER TONIGHT
NO NO NO NO CHILD
NOT TODAY
NOR TOMORROW
YOUR LIFE IS YOUR OWN NOW
COME ON HOME NOW
AND SHINE
FLY YOUR WAY THEN
STAY AND SHINE
SHINE YOUR WAY
SHINE THIS WAY

Let Me Go
By Iyeoka Ivie Okoawo 11/06

Here is a dawn that responds to a soul who is boldly searching
Replacing a stone that will hold when the waves overthrow the breeze
Let me be the girl who reappears into the light
Remember me by the rays of the moon
Where the sunrise is most likely to shine
From drowning the darkness will reopen a world
I never thought could ever be mine

But I can testify this time

That poetry found me whispering one morning…

Teaching me how to reach the spirits of these 3 free falling angels
Showing me how to rebuild a castle
Between Heaven's sand and the darkest hand of the earth's gravel
Releasing the weights of a thousand shackles
Taught me how to bend time beneath my fingers

Then the moment in the poem let me go

So let me be that girl...

Let me be the girl who reminds you of rainbows
Let me be the girl who you see from your bedroom window

Believe in love the same way you believe in what it should be

Believe in the tumble and the glide downstream
And maybe the river will lead to a key that unlocks the impossible dream

Believe in me when the silence invites you to seek
A temple of peace that brings you back
to the fire that fills your prayers
with the promises
of a new
life

Believe in the valley…the valley that lifts your soul into a perfect tempo

Then follow the path no matter how treacherous
No matter how bold
Let it take you there…to pay it forward
Choose to grab hold…
Let it move you towards the fullest potential
Your journey could possibly ever go

I imagined you here
shaking hands
smiling for strangers
Taking pictures
Accepting praises

trying to remember how to be genuine and charming

recalling you when you shine
Beautiful, breathtaking and relevant

Stonewalls Falling Down (Lyrics)

Stonewalls falling down
Lullaby’s breaking spells
The impossible reveals a chance for redemption

Highways lead to skies
Headlights search the night
This new road finds you lost for a moment

Time keeps time
Roads stay closed if you let them

Follow me to broken places
Set aside 10 destinations
Send me down - down
Chasing tails
Bottoms up
Sleep prevails
Wake me in the morning when dreams are healed
Uncover new roads to begin again

Find me here
Take me home
Lift me higher than you found me yesterday

Hum the Baseline

Take back the hope you gave me
Read between these lines that I feed you
And let it linger in the melody
Sing low with the baritone notes
And surround me with your cold songs and incomplete endings

Today, I will learn to shape me
From thunder a poet shall blossom
Slowly one of us will rise
We will grow like everlasting things do

Will bleed when plucked
Will weep if wasted
Will sacrifice for fate
If fears of never reaching the top are realized
While falling from a cliff
Glimpsing the root of anything that matches Heaven
Will almost die if neglecting the pen becomes permanent
Will survive after almost letting go for an instant
Filling every unforgiving minute
With sixty more seconds’ worth of going the distance
That denied us the bliss of that next masterpiece
But…If I can keep my eyes on the prize
If I can walk with kings
If I can talk to crowds
If I can risk and lose and start again from the beginning
If I can hurt and come back stronger
If I can dream and not make dreams my demons
If I can draw the blade and follow through
With my rebirth that began as a teenage suicide
If I can trust myself long enough
To convince my jury to stop doubting me
If I can find paradise outside my comfort zones
And teach my soul how to control the manic in my delusions
If I can remember to pray monthly, weekly, daily,
More often than I remember to do now
Sooner than two seconds before my next biggest emergency

Then I can give back the hope you gave me
Read between the lines of the last great poems you fed me
Poems that spoke of Momma Ton
Poems that spoke of Speaking the Word
Poems that spoke of Raindrops think their flying until they hit the ground
Maybe I can surround you with softer songs and everlasting beginnings
Maybe I can help complete the almost
You might have heard in your own words
Before you silently swore never to write again
Maybe….
Maybe you would care that tonight in this room
I feel the same way I feel on most nights I take the stage without you
Maybe…
Maybe you will figure out whatever it is you need
To help inspire you to breathe new words again
Maybe you will figure out who this poem is talking too
Then I can give back the hope you gave me
Maybe…
And you will find the urge to talk back
And tomorrow you will learn to shape you
And you will hum the baseline to this song
And you will hum the baseline to this song
And you will hum the baseline to this song

A Poet’s Blessing

Speak to me of our life’s experience
Sing me this song powerful and fearless
Tell me of truths I can not speak yet want to believe

Show me how to breathe between realities of illusions and uncertainties
And I will trust you to move the world with words
Into a sanctuary of balance and brilliant possibilities

Take me to a place where whispers are still roaring
And poetry lives to feed the hope that our stories are only just beginning


Iyeoka Ivie Okoawo

Yesterdays Blues

When summer rain
fills the sky
You wonder why my bluebird sings of sorrow
My tears are falling from a cloud of gray
I wish to never love a Sunday past tomorrow
When I think upon a day away from you
I pray your smile never fades
>From yesterday’s blues

I'm holding on
To your beautiful eyes
You wonder why my bluebird sings of sorrow
When I seem to be flying towards a Techno-colored rainbow
created by you
When I think upon a day away from u...
I pray your smile never fades
>From yesterday’s blues

Behold these lies
When I kiss u goodnight
Is it a crime to sing these songs of sorrow
when I seem to be happy in this time that remains
Caught behind a spiral of confusion and time borrowed
Sleep tight-this moment tends to shade,
The life we never meant to throw away
I pray your smile never fades
>From yesterday’s blues

We Can Never be Superstars

photo by Angela Rowlings

I am not a superstar

But I’m not afraid to share what I got

I don’t have wings

But I have the words that could make you feel

Like we both be flying

I’m not falling apart right now

But I know what it feels like

To feel like I’ve lost it all

I know how to make you feel like you are the one person I have

left in this world

Because you are

You are what is keeping me beautiful

And I am but a reflection of what you are

I am here to show you

That you don’t have to come prepared with me

You can just adlib

And we can create the dialogue

To perfect the solutions

That will supply the fuel for our chemistry

Not everybody can be Angelina Joli

And not everybody can rock a poem from a page on a stage

for you

Like me.

If you feel compelled to get to know me a little better because you

can’t figure me out just yet

Then it’s probably just the energy in this room that you’re looking

at

And with all due respect

That counts for only but a moment's cost of significance

...................

Just two minutes

You and me alone

My eyes will show you everything

You could have never discovered on your own

And lips can do the rest when you get weary of searching

Tongues will do it best when we get tired of talking

Kama will show us how to effectively lick our wounds

While poetry plays in the backgroud pushing us somewhere past

the moon

When your midnight comes,

You can look for me in the sun

This is where I choose to wait for the Blue orchids to bloom

Sweet and Fearless

Living love like life depends on it...

Because it has to.

poem by Iyeoka Ivie Okoawo

Political Conspiracy Theories

photo by Angela Rowlings
Bury the Prophets and Silence the Poets

Birth of a POEM

I had a conversation with God last night
The dialogue was an uncommon one...

I was told that I got most of it right

....and I have always believed
that there has GOT to be more to ALL OF THIS
than rationalizations
and bullshit that everything happens for a reason.

He told me to find it.

He told me to find it and let that be my DAILY TESTAMENT
That ANY person I MEET at any point
can play a role in MY LIFE that can CHANGE the DYNAMICS
of EVERYTHING.
That every DAY I breathe is another days' opportunity left to
dream.

He told me to dream.

Dream of thunder and lightening
And coincidences that saved my life
And strangers that helped me get by
And failures that pushed me to FLY
And MOMENTS that will CHANGE me in the BLINK of an eye.

Yellow flames behind the Bluest sky

I'm thinking of words to inspire a new poem...

Got Words?

(After Publishing a title and asking for inspiring words for a poem, Iyeoka and three of her fans ended up with this product...It's a cool Collabo)

Pops...
sometimes i rhyme slow
sometimes i rhyme quick

Liz...
...sometimes i don't know
why my words won't stick.

sometimes the page swallows them,
leaving me blank
other times it embraces them,
asking me for more.

Iyeoka...
...Sometimes little things just don't seem to add up quick enough.

Sometimes I find myself substituting bullet holes and violence for more irreversible forms of emptiness.

So...without time, without patience, without hope, without love, without trust

Where does that leave us.

Jennifer...
Leaves us left
like stranded on dark empty highways on late and moonless nights

Leaves us left
Like left alone left behind so far that nothing feels right

I've been driving down one-way streets pulling left turns against the light
I've been calculating crosswalks to quantify insight
I've been drafting schematics showing that the sum of the times
that I drop sometimes slow and quick rhymes equals nothing more than the number of intersections I've left behind

I've been street sweeping, adding up the little things
Like those slick and brutal bullethole spaces left gaping when words won't stick
when time/patience/hope/love/trust won't pick
me

I've been sometimes left subtracting substitution from reality...

April 28, 1975 to Present

We are 25% through a year that is halfway through a new decade, in a new century and new millennium...

I remember when I used to think 30 was old.

I remember 10 years ago, I used to watch this TV show thirty-something thinking how much I could NOT relate to their lives at all.

Now...thinking back on that TV show...
I still can't relate.

I remember being a freshman in college like it was yesterday.
It was so easy in those days to find others born in 1975.
It wasn't a big deal, or a major topic of conversation...it just WAS.
Now if you find another one, it becomes an instant connection.
A MOMENT if you will...
You understand their journey a little bit better and for some reason they understand yours. You pray that they are
comfortable
with their directions and decisions and progress and purpose.
No regrets. Never regret.
You're still too young for that.
There is still so much TIME to turn anything around that may appear backwards in the mirror.

It's nice to be able to reminisce from time to time with my girls,
my crew, my peeps
and talk about college 12 years ago or high school in the "80's".
It sounds like a long time ago, but it still feels like yesterday.
Keeping friendships is a good thing.
It reminds me that it happened.
It reminds me of how far we've all come.
It reminds me that it is Ok...
to turn thirty today.

"This Is Your Life"

It's Possible for a time to come in your life... when you can
get everything you probably didn't deserve. You achieve 75%
of a greater fragment that 5 yrs ago you thought was
impossible to reach.
You realize that you are a part of an amazing canvas of
family & friends that will always be there when it matters.
Somehow you have managed to stumble upon these
diamonds. Somehow you have managed to discover these
paths that others are also willing to walk with you. Somehow
you have finally realized just how loved you are... And you're
still not exactly sure how any of it happened or why it
happened to you. There are so many things in our lives that
we have absolutely no control over----like the How's and the
When's or the Why our parents gravitated towards each
other, or when they chose to make a love that eventually
became you. I know that in the grand scheme of things, 30
years is barely even a blink, a wrinkle, a whisper...and it
sometimes comes and goes unnoticed. Well, yesterday my
family and friends made sure that my 30th day in this life
would not pass by them unnoticed. Yesterday was more than
a surprise, more than a whisper or a wrinkle, more than a
blink. Yesterday they reminded me of my own words..." I can
be famous in my cipher and NEVER have been known to the
world...and never have been seen through the eye's of the
universe...but be important, in spite of all of this ...to
someone."

moment of truth

It was one of those moments
When you catch eyes with a beautiful woman
and you say to yourself

"Well, I'm not a lesbian...but i could have been."