Words have always been the way I process the world around me.

When my grandmother passed in February 2020, a month before lockdown, there was much to process and nowhere to go. So I escaped into the art and towards the ancestors. I built more of my altar. I pulled cards. I learned reiki. I studied herbs and tantra. I read lots of my friends’ books. I wrote poems like diary entries (which would become Daughter of a Nymph Divine). I fell in love. I started a business.

I also fell out of love. I also became spiky. I had numerous dark days and too-soft heart spaces. I ran to my grandmother’s apartment in New York for refuge. I begged the spirits to take me.

I give thanks to the ancestors and spirits that refused. I give thanks for the gift of the ones they sent instead to hold me when it didn’t feel safe to fall apart. More specifically, I give thanks to Indra—my love, my family, my best friend, and indescribably more. Me do wo papapapapapa. This work is dedicated to Maame and to Grandma L.

The first phase of this work was a lens into my thoughts and space at the time, a peek into my diary and home. This next phase is meant to really pay homage to the space of ancestral memory. Out of grief and into remembrance of who they are. Of legacy. Of the deeper meaning of sankofa, which in Twi means “go back and fetch.” In grief, I’m reminded to go back and gather the parts of me that have always been, in spite of. My ancestors have picked me up, held me and dusted me off; it’s past time to give the spotlight to them.