Covid-19 has impacted all of us in a multitude of ways and Ms. Wanda Sabir, CEO, of Maafa SF Bay Area convened the gathering today to rally and recall our strengths and offer practical tools to everyone as a means to sustain and buffer us where we feel most vulnerable.

Guests at the meeting shared stories of resilience and remembrance, attended an altar or shrine assembly demonstration and lecture. Brother Neter Aa Meri has been building altars for the Annual Maafa Ritual and for other occasions when asked, for minimally 20 years. He shared his practice with us and gave those present the thinking behind the altars they bow and kneel to each October.

With Brother Anyika Nkululeko’s photo essay in slide form fresh in our minds, where we saw images of many present that frigidly cold Sunday in October last year, we listened to Brother Neter Aa Meri followed by large and smaller group conversations. What went on in those break-out sessions, stayed there, but snippets were shared out later.  Guests were given an assignment in advance, to bring to the gathering an object they valued and would perhaps put on an ancestor altar. Another assignment, the first breakout, was to think about what makes them so strong.  The musical prompt was Nigerian-British composer and singer Labi Siffre’s “Something Inside So Strong.”

This is the Blessed Month of Ramadan for the submitters, Muslims, people who believe in the oneness of creation. During this time of sheltering-in-place, we fast – abstaining from food, drink, sex, and acts and thoughts which are contrary to the benefit of all life.

We read 1/30th of the Qur’an which was revealed this month—the first five verses in Sura Al Alaq or the Clot, “Read, in the name of your lord who created; Created [people] from a clot of congealed blood (zygote); 3. Read! For your Lord is most generous.[1] 4.Who taught by the pen. 5.Taught [people] what [they] knew not. [2]

One of the main takeaways from what became Sura or Chapter 96, is that knowledge is power and that answers can be found in texts and also in each other. Our ancestors are texts. They are embodied libraries, which is why when one starts the process of creating an ancestor altar the first step is talking to your elders who hold the stories of our people. Ancestors are Timbuktu libraries held in safe keeping from marauders who would burn down our intellectual and spiritual edifices if given a chance. The ancestor altar and/or shrine is preservation of the African species. Calling the names of one’s ancestors keeps their work from being erased.

Ramadan is a fast which begins and ends with the sighting of the new moon (28-30 days). Ramadan is a time of internal excavation; we turn our gaze inward as we think about our own hearts and souls and how we can get closer to oneness with the all – the source of everything.  Of course, people, human beings have a responsibility to take care of the planet and those who live here with us. Although the human species is more viral than the worse contagion, the optimum relationship with other species is one of cooperation, compassion, and humility.

Yeye Luisah Teish says in “Shift Catalyst: Eartha’s Children,” a story she shared last week on a Wanda’s Picks Radio Show Special (4/19), Mother Earth, sent us to our rooms.

Sheltering-in-Place can be a blessing. We have had to slow down and get closer to those aspects of ourselves we have been avoiding. We have had to contemplate those deep questions, such as life and death and how we plan to live the time we have left. We have also, some of us, had to face loss, lots of loss – missing those hugs goodbye and not even being able to have a closing ritual with loved ones.

Ceremony – these practices, are grounded in beliefs that support the oneness of an evolutionary life cycle that rotates in a way that nothing is ever lost of value and the old is the womb of what is new. This is what ancestors tell us. They live in the earth, at least that’s where we put them, whether that is ashes or flesh—then the worms have a feast and the elements over time transform what was lifeless back into life as our ancestors become clouds and the breeze on our cheeks and the water so precious, and the fire that burns away darkness each morning.

Ramadan Mubarak. Ramadan Karim is the response. Blessed Ramadan. Glorious Ramadan is the response. What can you give up this month— we are a species that consumes more than it needs for survival.

Hunger or the desire for food causes us to empathize with many who are always hungry. The breath of the person fasting is sweet to the nostrils of creator and creation. Ramadan – intentional abstinence is something we all participate in today. There is so much beyond our control. We think we are in control, but are we?

We think we are the most intelligent species because of our ability to have choice, but are these really choices or just responses to stimuli in a maze we did not know we were trapped in? Who or what holds the strings to our lives?

Our African ancestors are people who lived before us, some we were able to meet before they moved onto another realm, which is accessible. These ancestors, like the architects of landscapes from death: City of Bones, are examples of creativity and tenacity of spirit. Black Betty speaks of ancestral songs – “mouths burning with song.”

We know the Nommo is an Africentric term that identifies the power of words to speak life into being. Dr. Molefi Asante “characterizes nommo as the process undertaken in community to foster transformation in that community by naming the current reality and re-imagining a future. Nommo are the ancestral spirits of the Dogon (Mali) and are derived from a Dogon word meaning “to make one drink”. Nommo implies the power of words to create harmony and balance in the face of disharmony”.[3]

When I think about the City of Bones in August Wilson’s “Gem of the Ocean,” I see spirit beings that occupy the space between then and now, now. What Black Betty describes to Citizen is ancestral terrain. This landscape is filled with beauty and wonder. The ancestors are on our side.

Energy cannot be destroyed. It only shifts or shows up in a new form. We are the dirt beneath our feet, the water falling from the clouds, the sand from the ocean, the breeze on our cheeks, the butterfly just out of reach.

Think about our friends and loved ones who are locked in cages who have been sheltering in place for days, months, years, some in county facilities held because they missed an appointment with probation, or couldn’t pay a fine – who now wait scared that someone from outside will bring the virus inside. I am writing 14 women in two state prisons: Central CA Women’s Facility in Chowchilla and the California Women’s Facility in Corona. The women tell me about infected staff who are walked off the site and prisoners who came in contact with staff, sent into quarantine or solitary confinement.

One woman has stage 4 cancer, another has heart problems and anxiety. Liz tells me how she is so thankful the nurses come to work to take care of her, because they could take sick leave and leave her and others locked up without medicine and support.

Another woman whose three daughters have had to grow up without their mom shares how two weeks ago today, the women in cells had sandwiches for dinner because the shift who prepared meals had a sick guard(s) and the institution had to quarantine that housing unit. Many of the women think what if the Correctional Officers or COs just stop showing up and they are locked in these cells and left to die?

I assure them that there are those of us outside who will not allow the state or federal or county government to forget them, but I am not there. I am sheltering in place in a two-bedroom apartment walking distance from a beach. I am privileged and I thank the creator for my blessings. I can drive to my daughter’s house and look at my grandchildren from behind the window. I can see my youngest grandchild crawling and pulling up in WhatsApp video calls and texts. It is not the same, but it could be a lot worse.

We hold on to the rope that the creator has extended to us, the same rope our ancestors held, the same rope that we grab as we exit the “Doors of No Return” at the Maafa Ritual each year in October, symbolic of the connection that never breaks between us and those who have shape-shifted whom we know still exist. We are never alone because all that ever was resides with each of us, a little piece of a vast and conjoined universe.

I want to close with another Sura or chapter which Prophet Muhammad (SAWS) found comforting, and I love as well. I recited it when I was in labor with my first daughter, Bilaliyah.

Inshirah, or the Expansion (Sura 94)

Bismillah Ar Rahim, Ar Rahim

Have we not expanded your chest
And removed from you your burden
Which weighed down your back
And raised the esteem in which you are held?
Surely, with every difficulty there is relief
With difficulty there is relief
So when you are free from immediate (anxiety or harm), work hard
And to your lord give all your attention

Ashay, ashay, ashayo.

[1] “He has blessed humans with the capacity to learn and teach” (Dr. Shabbir Ahmed, translator, “The Qur’an as It Explains Itself,” 6th Edition, July 2016, Florida).

[2] “The Pen symbolizes the transmission and exchange of knowledge through written records, unique to man. Since this is a Divine gift to mankind” (Dr. Shabbir Ahmed, translator).