Root my body grew

April 13, 2022, PUBLISHED BY IN DANCE

This is an imagined and remembered illustrated poem that is composed of sketches and poetics from my recent process journals. The photo is from a recent flight into occupied lands now known as Houston, TX. Root my body grew is in conversation with the upcoming archival and performance project, Memory Fleet: A Return to Matr due to premiere in Houston, TX April 2024.

It references non-linear conversations I have had with Marjani Forté-Saunders, Marlies Yearby, Jo Stewart, Jennifer Harge, Byronné Hearn, Jenna Hearn, Myssi Robinson, Alisha B. Wormsley, Bennalldre Williams, FreWuhn, Victor Le Givens, Urban Bush Women, Li Harris, Lovie Olivia, dani tirrell, Barbara Mahler, and Athena Kokoronis of Domestic Performance Agency.

Sketch drawing with pen and markers with the text, “root my body grew.” — Photo by Jasmine Hearn [ID: Sketch in black pen and turquoise and fuchsia markers of waves and curves. Text in thick black font reads “root my body grew.”]

the way I understand

is to say yes to fear
and all that fear brings

I have been forgetting the left side
the bobbling knee and the ill- situated sits bone

I have been moving myself away from itself
easy
hold on tight and loose lost loose luc sensation sin sensation

like a cliff that crumbled into the ocean a part of what is no longer held

tectonics keep moving keep
kept and then shaken/shared

I have been saying yes to the fear of an uterus the size of a hen
full of inescapable fluid

and a trail of migrating blood in between my feet while walking

emptiness in-between bladder and colon
in- between organs
does that did that would that hopefully not will not

the space collapse?
did the space collapse?
did the church close?
the coordinates empty?
a disappearance a missing and inevitably a forgetting

why do i forget almost every month since fourth grade the acute pain of the descending space too full for feeling the exact coordinates of (you) joy and grief

Colorful Illustration with handwritten text — Photo by Jasmine Hearn [ID: A colorful illustration of orange, blue, neon yellow, red, black, and brown with hand written text in cursive.]

this is question of where the stars are over the church steeple
church as mother
building as mother
structure as womb as cave as forever home

mother can rule her own

is this really a story about the difference between violence and care

or reading tension
or receiving the frequency of vulnerability and it is on all the time with every person

energetic body
i assumed
you to have healed

yourself
even if its plugged with stagnant highly packed fluid
stirring
and pulling up towards the stars

whined and unwind
varying levels of intimacy
with a distinct palate to what got calloused and what hurts and what tastes good.

Photo by Jasmine Hearn [ID: A photography of an aerial perspective of the topography of Houston, TX. Shown are land, buildings, roads, highways, homes, and the river. Teal, dark greens, gray, beige, dark brown, sand, and rust.]

This article appeared in the Spring 2022 issue of In Dance.

Jasmine Hearn was born and raised on occupied lands now known as Houston, TX. They are an interdisciplinary artist, director, choreographer, organizer, teaching artist, and a 2017 and 2021 Bessie awarded performer. Jasmine’s commitment to dance is an expansive practice that includes performance, collaboration, and memory-keeping.