<h1>Making Revolution Irresistible</h1>

BLACK and BLUE

Black scars and blue bruises...wounds open and infected

No. Not physical. Emotional. Reclaiming my identity from all of the emotional abuse.
My emotional personified me. Ha, I became them. I didn't have any control over them.

How did I start this abusive relationship with myself?

Well, believe it or not, it started with lying.
I wanted so bad to be something that I wasn't. I began talking so much that I started to believe my lies, and so did people. Until I couldn't prove it.

After lying it became self pity and hatred from not being able to prove anything that I said.
Then I looked around and saw all of the latest trends. Clothing, relationships, shoes, hair. I realized I didn't have all that I wanted. Stressed. I began dropping out of school. Couldn't stand being talked about from girls and boys lusting after my body.

Today I am still patching up my bruises.

Stay Strong-- Giselle


the things we go through. the things we endure. the people who help us get through. the people we help.

Touching Poetree

you never know what might make the difference - a word, a touch, a hand outstretched- for real, meaning it, wanting to be grabbed and used to pull you up.

sometimes your support is made up of the people you see every day but forget how much they carry you until something hard happens. mothers, aunties, cousins, sisters, friends like sisters.

and sometimes they are people that you have heard of, read about, followed and been moved by. people whose presence in the world keeps you grounded and reaching higher.

we reached out to two of these people, Alixa and Naima of Climbing Poetree, and felt the distance between the familiar and the unknown close in an instant with the force of common purpose, art weapons drawn.

art...love...courage is Giselle feeling black and blue and deciding to put pen to paper - touching others, baring herself and letting us know no matter how crazy our paths may seem, we are never alone. the most solitary experience becomes a tribute to the strength we can all find in the truth. Climbing Poetree also reminds us that everyone's story is our story and that eveyone's pain will eventually be felt by all of us. we are the same.

Climbing Poetree

BlackLight is honored and humbled to be working with Climbing Poetree as they take their two-womyn show: HURRICANE SEASON: The Hidden Messages in Water on it's mind blowing national tour. This multi-media performance will explore the issues we must all face in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. Read on for more about ALIXA + NAIMA and the show (maybe coming to a town near you too).

Alixa & Naima, the acclaimed arts activist duo Climbing PoeTree, present HURRICANE SEASON: The Hidden Messages in Water, A two-womyn multi-media performance that interweaves spoken word poetry, sound collage, contact choreography, shadow art, animation and moving images to explore critical issues facing humanity through the kaleidoscope of Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath. Water, the performance’s extended metaphor, guides the audience on a vivid journey of unthinkable tragedy and undeniable promise from a single drip into a violent storm that culminates in a climactic moment of possibility and resurrection.



New Orleans emerged from the floodwaters as a microcosm of the intersecting forces at play across America and even the world:
- global warming and environmental injustice
- extreme poverty amidst affluence and over-consumption
- gentrification and forced relocation of poor people and people of color
- the police, prison, and military industrial complex
- corporate control over public policy
- lack of local ownership and self-determination
- gross disparity of access and power along gender, sexuality, class,
and color lines

A riveting story about unnatural disaster and a great shift in universal consciousness, Hurricane Season draws vital connections between shared struggles and common solutions in a critical moment in human history.

Rhythmic and uplifting, raw and deeply moving, HURRICANE SEASON seeks not to captivate audiences, but to liberate them.
“Daring and visionary, Alixa and Naima’s multi-dimensional artistry is the thunder of personal and political awakening.” Hurricane Season arouses the power of our creative consciousness to transform destruction into solutions that already live amongst us.

“The role of the poet,” June Jordan said, “is to make revolution irresistible.” Alixa and Naima aim to make it attainable.



The objective of Hurricane Season is not only to stir in people the fervor of transformation, but also to channel that energy into immediate, meaningful, and tangible action. Group discussions will follow each performance where Alixa and Naima will cross-pollinate solutions, strategies, and success stories from communities they've visited worldwide, each battling their own "hurricane seasons." Representatives from local grassroots organizations will be invited to contribute to the dialogs and table at the events to garner support for local movements and initiatives. And audience participants will have the opportunity to contribute their personal manifestos to S.T.I.T.C.H.E.D, a growing tapestry of Stories, Testimonies, Intentions, Confessions, Truths, Healing Expressions, and Dreams collected by Alixa and Naima from audiences nationwide since the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

HURRICANE SEASON will tour the Northeast region throughout the Spring of 2008. The national tour begins on the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina (August 29th, 2008) and ends the last day of the Atlantic hurricane season, (November 30, 2008). Alixa and Naima will travel throughout the country in a vehicle converted to run on vegetable oil recycled from America’s fast-food addiction.

CLIMBING POETREE IN DETROIT SEPTEMBER 08!!!!
We'll keep you posted as things evolve

More info on the creators: click here
Booking and other inquiries
can be directed to water@climbingpoetree.com