Hard Core: for Tina Campt

for Tina Campt

you make me think
it might be appropriate
to brainstorm with chisels
to rock-climb bare-handed
to say what i mean

when you look up
and nod forward
it's a head-butt to the last thought
and a measured faith in a desired now

as if you intend
abundant stones
to stand on
to test
to break through
to shape down to movement

like spinning a record
but much more
(hard core)

Tina Campt is a key figure in critical black diaspora studies and a Professor in Women's Studies and History at Duke University. She is one of the organizers of the Diasporic Hegemonies Conference Series and was also co-organizer of Reconstructing Womanhood: Beyond Empire, a conference in honor of Hazel Carby.

____
This is part of a series of poems and collages by Alexis Pauline Gumbs. To see the entire series go to The Listening Project.