rokia traoré opens her roskilde 2013 set with
dounia
space is where all the good stuff is happening
the first 15 minutes it is hard.
the first 15 minutes when you are still closer to dying than to finding strength again, where it smells of night and no morning, it is later that you wake up again, when your skeleton is on the alu frame,
when the hunger for words comes back, senseless words, connections i dont understand yet but that will make perfect sense some day, i always take a 2 minute detour through that wasteland plot, just to remind myself that there s still soil underneath all this, ice cracks, soft mud,
chance of failure, chance to get stronger, and then the tree that stands for something i understand no more than i understand those words.
flossen, flowed.
discipline in defeat.
strength in bringing sadness home.
new austerity packÂ
“a new standard, a new no,
and if you come close, more than a new no.”
with gentle emptiness our space
we fill each other over the distance.
i own three forks –
when i have guests,
i borrow from my neighbours.
we watch our spaces carefully.
there s apples, chili and pepper
in a wooden bowl.
love and diligence take the place of the big car.
i open things with my hands.
i crack nuts with my hands.
no gym in the wild either.
my bed is white –
let us not rubbish happiness,
just not claim it for our own “i”.
so i will speak to you in the evening
and see you once a month.
we try to never stop learning.
if you only have a no, they will round you up and kill you.
there has got to be more and lower.
uphill our exercise and blessing.
tiny seeds, if rich, enough to feed us.
“and no more sadness than absolutely necessary.”