Poet and activist Kai-Isaiah Jamal on gender, trans identity, and movement
With the project entitled ‘Somewhere, We Dance Forever’, Jamal wrote these poems during his transition, when he started to experience a completely new lease of life in regards to how he “moved, felt, and lived” inside his body.
“What drew me to this project was the need to document this new feeling,” Jamal explains. “There are so many times in which I have to change my presentation of my body and my movements for safety, passing, access but when I dance I forget about gender, I completely disregard the notions of what my body should be, because we defy it in movement constantly.”
The video sees Jamal in a number of different locations – leaning on a kitchen counter writing in a notebook, sitting on the edge of a bathtub, and frolicking under a bed sheet. Shot in soft light, the four minute clip goes on to see Jamal move and dance to the lyrics of his verse.
“Where I’m from they stamp feet and skank while speakers stumble sirens,” the poem reads. “Samples into the street light, where all black boys look blue under the moonlight.”
With the poems focusing on the concepts of skin and grip, Jamal explains how these two things relate to how we live in our own bodies and explore other peoples. “Skin has felt very genderless or more gender non-specfic,” he says, while grip was a “way to start exploring my body in relation to others.”
With an aim to create something that “wasn’t just about black trans bodies and the proximity to violence or pain,” the video, directed by Emily McDonald and worked on by a largely LGBTQ+ team, is a celebration of movement and freedom, a concept that is feeling more and more poignant each day.
“I hope people can finally see why I am always continually banging on at everyone about language, talking, writing, letters, storytelling and documentation,” he says. “For me poetry is just a little safety net and if everyone can find that in a poem that’s ideal but I hope my work acts as that for some at least.”
“When I dance I forget about gender, I completely disregard the notions of what my body should be
Poet and activist Kai-Isaiah Jamal on gender, trans identity, and movement
With the project entitled ‘Somewhere, We Dance Forever’, Jamal wrote these poems during his transition, when he started to experience a completely new lease of life in regards to how he “moved, felt, and lived” inside his body.
“What drew me to this project was the need to document this new feeling,” Jamal explains. “There are so many times in which I have to change my presentation of my body and my movements for safety, passing, access but when I dance I forget about gender, I completely disregard the notions of what my body should be, because we defy it in movement constantly.”
"There’s so much! A person on Instagram commented a photo of me in a tea bath and said it was disgusting that I had hair under my underarms.
The video sees Jamal in a number of different locations – leaning on a kitchen counter writing in a notebook, sitting on the edge of a bathtub, and frolicking under a bed sheet. Shot in soft light, the four minute clip goes on to see Jamal move and dance to the lyrics of his verse.
“Where I’m from they stamp feet and skank while speakers stumble sirens,” the poem reads. “Samples into the street light, where all black boys look blue under the moonlight.”
With the poems focusing on the concepts of skin and grip, Jamal explains how these two things relate to how we live in our own bodies and explore other peoples. “Skin has felt very genderless or more gender non-specfic,” he says, while grip was a “way to start exploring my body in relation to others.”
With an aim to create something that “wasn’t just about black trans bodies and the proximity to violence or pain,” the video, directed by Emily McDonald and worked on by a largely LGBTQ+ team, is a celebration of movement and freedom, a concept that is feeling more and more poignant each day.
“I hope people can finally see why I am always continually banging on at everyone about language, talking, writing, letters, storytelling and documentation,” he says. “For me poetry is just a little safety net and if everyone can find that in a poem that’s ideal but I hope my work acts as that for some at least.”