The paucity of reliable sources 
 limits our understanding 
 of pastimes and politics,
 not discrete categories of experience.
 
 Chimerical projection of new gendered actors,
 took part in formerly forbidden practices 
 that shocked elders, chiefs, and government officials.
 
 Free from the confines of kinship 
 and community expectations,
 embraced individualism,
 purchased imported material items,
 openly initiated local rhythms,
 ballroom standards, calypso flair,
 countrywide cooperation and 
 collective harmony
 disempowered people.
 
 Not as an embargo of the present,
 the porous boundary 
 between palpable musical energy
 and social change;
 a highly contested realm
 where clothing matters,
 and dress is political.
 
 Musics do not have selves, 
 people do.
 

  * Nkyrinna - This Generation

Those indelible atmospheres:

 crawling naked onto clean sheets
 with a brand new lover;
 
 floating unencumbered, not touching bottom,
 above the salty waves
 before they crash;
 
 sitting in a dark bar,
 the smell of beer soaked wood
 and the sound of pinball exclamations,
 awaiting the what-will-be-better;
 
 the desert at night,
 the back seat of your dad’s car
 parked in the woods,
 that first kiss,
 first toke,
 first time behind the wheel,
 hitting one over the fence,
 an unexpected embrace,
 or hearing
 you did good.
 
 And others,
 that are yours.