LLW Lite: The Moving On...

To move on from this world is a certainty, but to ascend with praise on the lips of many is a life well-lived.

Mother Nikki has said farewell. We have a trove of poetic and prose expressions from this deep soul and those of us who love her for these gifts will hold them close and exalt her name until...

Mother Nikki existed in this temporal landscape as a Black woman, a thinking woman, which was and still is a danger to a society that demands our silence rather than our truth. But through her example, she showed us the way to talk boldly; to love up on ourselves; to love up on each other; to see this Blackness, this womanness as the blessings that they are.

She embodied an unapologetic truth to power, first as a member of the Black Arts Movement, then as her own brave self. We Sat at her feet as she doled out wisdom and funny anecdotes to this thing called living. She did this through her pen and her phraseology.

Through the fire of a segregated land, she rose with a mission that she accomplished. I know she left here empty because we have too much of her to hold in our hearts. She deserves this rest. May it be sweet and peaceful.

Ancestors, she is there with you now and we, who are Earth-bound, are grateful.