Basic.Instructions.Before.Leaving.Earth: Caribbean Comics

Beaming in from Barbados –Back with the Astro-Caribbean series… The United States has a large comics book industry. But that doesn’t mean other places are not developing their own. As my parents are from Barbados and Dominica, I wanted to feature two comic book creators and publishers making it happen in the Caribbean: Beyond Publishing […]

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: Elizabeth Nunez ‘s Books of Caribbean Magic

Next week, Elizabeth Nunez will be read from her memoir, Not for Everyday Use, at the fifth annual ringShout event, which will be the Brooklyn Book Festival Bookend event. The event will take place September 16 at 7pm at the Franklin Park Bar and Beer Garden in Brooklyn, and also features Bridgett M. Davis (Into the […]

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: Amanda Johnston

Women Writers in Bloom is a literary salon I started attending a couple of months ago and this month’s featured Texan poet Amanda Johnston. Today I feature her here with some of her poetry influenced by science fiction/fantasy films, like Blade and The Matrix. Below are two poems, “Mixed Blood” and “Blade Speaks at Career […]

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: Danez Smith

“I have left Earth in search of darker planets…I have left Earth and I won’t stop until I’ve found a place where my kin can be safe…” I saw Danez Smith‘s “Dear White America” posted on Upworthy and thought it was fitting for here.

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: “The Guide and The Guided”

Update: I took a picture of this poem while I was visiting a cousin of mine and I thought it was fitting for the theme of my blog and afrofuturism that is emphasized with the the images of Saturn and stars in the background, the procession of black people with flames over their heads, and […]

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: Caribbean Futurisms

Thank you Kelly Baker Josephs for calling my attention to this! Conor Tomás Reed did a post describing “Caribbean Futurisms” and listing a few books that would fall under the term as well as other sources for Afrofuturism, in which I was included: “Considered within this conditional crux, Caribbean cultural forms have developed a conscious […]

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: Catherine Acholonu and Molara Ogundipe

Hey everyone! I am back after taking a short needed break. Last week marked the third year that I have been running this blog! Yay! Happy Anniversary! Today I return to highlight a few writers I found out about after reading Bilphena Yahwon’s post on Africa Is Done Suffering, “The Writers I Never Learned About.” […]

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: Books for Healing

Last Sunday, I attended Beatbox Botanicals‘ first Harriet’s Apothecary event. Besides having a relaxing and soothing experience, listening to over an hour of sound healing session, learning how to do tinctures and having a divination reading done, I also gathered a few book titles at the event: * African American Folk Healing by Stephanie Mitchem

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: Digital Griots and Does Africa Dream of Androids?

While searching for random stuff through the internet again, I came across Adam Joel Banks 2011 book, Digital Griots: African American Rhetoric in a Multimedia Age. The book looks at the intersections between African American cultures and community building, and new technology and new media, the intersections between tradition and innovation and the constant search […]

Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth: Langston and Lucille’s Magic of Simple

This month, I attended two poetry events, David Mills’ dramatic performance of Langston Hughes’ works and Elizabeth Alexander’s conversation on Lucille Clifton’s mystical, shaman-like poetry, reminded me that so much magic can condensed into few and sometimes simple words; they made magic out of the ordinary. Below are some poems from Hughes and Clifton as […]