There is a poem by Toni Morrison called “Eve remembering” that I’ve been reading over and over for a couple of days.
It brings to my mind the fierceness of doing “wrong” things for the right reasons, of breaking all the rules to build rules that matter. It reminds me of how much we owe to women, and sex workers, and disruptors. It calls on us to cherish the harvest of our actions.
I read it again this morning crossing the bridge onto The Island, and I couldn’t project that cherishing through the gates I was about to cross. It’s a question I walk with often: was it worth it? Can we cherish the harvest of darkness and dehumanization, and what does that even mean? Where does the righteousness of an action cease to be worth the suffering?
How far is the summit we are trying to be?
Towards the end she says “I would do it all over again”. What if that’s a measure of happiness? That whatever I did, I would do it again, because it was worth it, even when the harvest was poisoned?