Virtual Book Launch
Programme
The Body is Poetry
The Body is Poetry
WELCOME and Introduction of Panelists
Christine Randle, Ian Randle Publishers
POETRY READINGS
Opal Palmer Adisa - Launch Address
Tanya Shirley
fabian m thomas
Natalie Corthésy
The Body is Poetry
The Body is Poetry
The Body is Poetry
"Sundress" and "Up"
Poetry + Voice by Natalie Corthésy
Movement + Direction + Videography + Editing by
Neila Ebanks
Technical assistance and administrative support
Odesha Coates
UPCOMING 13 March 2023
International Women's Day 2023
Allybambooks in association with Jamaica National Bank UK are pleased to invite you to an evening with Natalie Corthésy award winning Jamaican poet in celebration of International Women's Day. 6pm-8pm Monday 13 March, 2023. Entry free. Books on sale at the event.
RSVP allybambooks@gmail.com
Free
by Natalie Corthesy
A free man can
see you in his sun burnt ancestors
yet he does not know his kin,
the names of the slaves that boarded the vessels,
nor the legend of their King.
A free woman can
feel you in her tightly knotted cane rows
but she does not know her tribe,
the rituals for babies born in drought
nor the courtship dance for a young bride.
Somehow, I have known you all my life
because the spirits followed me
through the middle passage, from a watery grave
unto island shores. I rise up
in a New World, free, yet still a slave.
But Mother knows best.
The Windrush that anchored me in Brixton
capsized innumerable souls with my own.
This village crippled folkways
silenced the kalimba lilt of colourful voices into a dull monotone.
I walk past generations
firing up Electric Lane with gritty cultural fare
but shops no longer sell that brand of happiness here.
I want to belong, to go home and come back.
But there is no refuge from being born black.
White Rum and CoconuT water
Extract from White Rum and Coconut Water
April’s curtain call
I am the last guava left on the tree,
a lopsided stage hacked mid trunk.
The missing branches turned firewood are smoking
someone’s heaven on top and hell below
but the cornmeal pone in the middle will not bless my soul.
The birds have pecked and pecked and pecked
racing worms to a pulpy centre
where my sweet perfume masks decay and the lament of my seedy core.
I will not be handpicked for jam or flaky tarts.
I will not be stoned by children, nor slightly bruised before being bitten blissfully.
The sun shined my skin for weeks
until I was a reflection of her golden globe.
The rain wept with me, lightly
kissing droplets on my withering cheeks.
Now I stand alone patiently waiting for applause.
My own roots will shake me from this limb
and cast me to the ground into a crowd of ants.
Soldiers will retrieve my remains to nourish one of their own;
Queens are not born
they are made.
If clay is willing and nature is kind,
memories of me shall channel through the earth
to nascent stems and lime green leaves to nurse a seedling.
I am last in death and first in life;
the fruit and the tree dancing in the garden pantomime.
© Natalie Corthésy 2022
Poetry Reading and Conversation 9th September, 2023
We are pleased to invite you for an afternoon of poetry and conversation with Dr Natalie Corthésy, award winning Jamaican author, supported by The Black Cultural Archives. 3pm-5pm Saturday, 9th September 2023, Black Cultural Archives, 1 Windrush Square, London SW2 1EF. Entry free. Books on sale from the BCA Gift Shop. RSVP natalie@nataliecorthesy.com