How Do I Tell You My Heart is Broken?
'uncle so you decided to go' || Okorie Compound, Umudiokaukwu, Orlu || photo: Me
One of the hardest things about dealing with the death of a loved one, is the reality that I have to keep on going about life anyway. From the mundane domestic, to the grander endeavors of my own life. Even with a heart that is struggling to stay connected to the rest of me, I have to talk to people. Handle logistics. Earn a living. Keep it together, for the children.
What if I could walk around with my withered heart hanging out of my chest? A badge of my despair. A totem for my brokenness. A T-shirt with bold letters that reads “I have lost a piece of my soul, please treat me with tenderness’.
One of the most fucked up things about dealing with grief in the societies’ we currently live in, is that we are left alone to our own devices to survive. All in all, we are alone. Even as much as people care, the busy’ness of ‘life’ takes precedence. It limits even OUR own ability to thoroughly show up for ourselves.
I’ve been thinking about this a lot. How do I create more spaces, corners, moments that hold and acknowledge how consuming and enduring grief is? How do I say: I see you. I know this is unimaginably painful. Sit here. Lie here. Cry. Rage. Whimper. Yes. Here. Now. in public. With everyone watching. Yes. Here. Now. On the toilet. With no one the wiser.
As you may know, I’ve been seeped in Obi gbawara’m//My Heart Shattered or What happens after I die?’ (OGB), a cultural documentation & multimedia performance project reactivating cultural practices and artifacts rooted in the Igbo traditions of Ọdịnanị and Ọmenala, as a point of departure for examining death and grief as memory and belonging.
One of the ways OGB is coming alive publicly is via the creation of the ‘Mixtape of the Dead & Gone’, a series of performance installations inspired by Igbo elegical songs and poetry, (which I’ve been uncovering in my research). The first section of the mixtape, is # 1-Ahamefula, a live dance, musical, theatrical performance that captures the moments after Ahamefula (‘may my name never be forgotten’) dies in their home and their struggles with what happens next.
I invite you to be in presence, to be, with me, and my performing ensemble Gbedu Town Radio as we emerge from a creative process for ‘Mixtape of the Dead & Gone’ developed while in intentional conversation and ceremony with each other and our ancestors, and in residency at CounterPulse.
‘Mixtape of the Dead & Gone #1’- Egwu Onwu Ahamefula’
by Nkeiruka Oruche + Gbedu Town Radio
A shit-just-got-real Afro-dance-theater mixtape performance about life, death, and what the fuck comes next.
Thursday – Saturday June 2-4 & 9-11, 2022
8PM
CounterPulse: 80 Turk St, San Francisco
Get tickets now at CounterPulse.org/edge2022
Take the Plunge:
To be a part, reserve your tickets
Learn more about the OGB project + engage
Read an interview where I talk about the new work + Igbo culture
Support my work and this project by making a donation to Afro Urban Society
If you want to bring me/this project to your site/venue/institution, let’s chat