Homeless Lives Matter

And other thoughts

Hiii, it’s time for the weekly delight! On this week’s delight, I’m sharing my thoughts after seeing a man carrying a “Homeless Lives Matters” sign, a short poem I wrote in the midst of deep agitation, and some photos I took while walking around the city. Onto the delights…

Homeless Lives Matter

I saw an unhoused person carrying a “homeless lives matters” sign and it took everything in my spirit not to take a photo of the person. I didn’t want to show the photo to anyone or at least I thought so at the time. I also knew if I took the photo I would really want to share it with everyone because it was a beautiful moment of resistance. Standing there, a person who the state has discarded, and proclaiming your personhood. It made me wonder how often we carry out the acts we are told we must partake in to reinforce our humanity or whatever you want to call the state of constant dehumanization that demands we prove our value by being useful to our oppressors. Either oppress or be oppressed are the only two choices legitimized in capitalism.

To choose not to participate in either is to be discarded on the sidewalk then told you cannot exist on the sidewalk because there is no room for existence for those who can only simply exist and live. Those whose only value is their humanity.

I’m currently drinking a Paloma as I write this. I think about the privilege of being able go to a bar and order a drink while writing in my journal. I couldn’t walk in here and write if I didn’t have the money or if I looked as if I didn’t have the money.

A few months ago I was in a bar with friends after my show (you should totally come). A man walked in and asked for money. I quickly gave him money because I was scared the bar staff would kick him out, discard his dignity or worse call the police. It was a very strange moment because here we are in a newly gentrified neighborhood that used to be predominantly Black. And yet the bar staff were white, kicking a Black person out. What do you say about gentrification on stolen land when it drives out those whose ancestors were enslaved and forced to live in a foreign land only to be discarded?

Discarded. Discarded. It’s a word I’ve been writing a lot in this piece.

We discard trash.

We discard people.

So we view people as trash. I say we because we collectively build this society every day. Not by choice, of course, but we still do.

Can we choose to create a different society?

How much agency does a wage slave have?

Saidiya Hartman talks about the agency of the enslaved (chattel) people and every day I question the agency for us the wage slaves.

How much agency do we have if our forced labor is used for genocide, and when we resist, we are brutalized, blacklisted, and deported?