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Vida Guerra by Daiva Channing

Vida Guerra by Daiva Channing on purple carpet.

Seen IN Susan

"Inexplicable her beauty is the beauty of her whispering appeal to the spirit. How she embodies these things stings and tickles. Seldom do men find themselves with this privilege in their lives..." - Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories 4/4/17

Susan Sarandon wearing a Fedora.

Susan Sarandon provocative in form and beauty.

Susan Sarandon shoot on the @HighLineNYC (2014)

It is a marvelous testament the best of men say about Susan Sarandon:  

"I have no idea how anyone can be so feminine and sexy while sitting in a folding chair."

"I have always adored you, such a fascinating compassionate luminous actress you are."

"Most any woman who can giggle and laugh is greatly more attractive. The three empty chairs add great compositional elements."

These words speak to the approval men feel about women who are strong in their sense of being. It isn't the tone that women adopt that repels many American men in their declarations about being strong, bold and independent women. What captures men, real men deeply embedded with their masculinity, are the combinations of these elements around the woman's centerpiece: her femininity. How strong that is supported builds loyalty and trust in the strength of bonds, the boldness of being a woman in a man's world, and trusting of the process of being better as a couple, if a man has the privilege of being such a woman's husband. - Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories 4/4/17

Susan Sarandon born 1946 said, "I look forward to being older,

when what you look like becomes less and less of an issue and what you are is the point."

From The Best of Us

The distinct impression of Black American culture is that it is great as a bygone glory, but in fact it is creative, and powerful in its presentation and substance. Today, the 4th of April 2017, marks another year distant from the day Dr. King was assassinated. As the years go by it is easy just go shopping, and was predicted his significance would grow, and the pain of that day would diminish. It has, but it hasn't become part of the way most Americans understand because the deep work taking place across the African Diaspora is not front line news. It is the cultivated work too profound to fit into the pitiful representation of journalism most Americans subscribe to. This work is aligned with the way of the snake beneath the ground directly penetrated by the roots of plants, and moistened by the waters that nourish their bodies.

The question is simple: What are you doing as if Dr. King's words meant something too you?


Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories
April 4, 2017

Portrait of Paul Robeson (1898-1976) American singer, actor, athlete and civil rights activist. Painted by Randall Davey. 1920-25 oil on canvas. In the collection of The Museum of Fine Arts, St Petersburg, FL.

Rites and Reason Theatre

The Department of Africana Studies' Rites and Reason Theatre is a research and developmental theatre dedicated to giving expression to the diverse cultures and traditions of continental and diasporic Africans and the vast Africana experience.

Rites and Reason's unique Research-to-Performance Method (RPM) is a systematic process that organizes teams of artists, scholars and researchers in the scholarly and creative development of new theatrical performances. RPM teams engage in direct dialogue with the community throughout the developmental process from ideas to readings to workshops to mainstage productions.

The Rites and Reason method includes the development of innovative theatrical forms rooted in Africana cultural traditions and expressions. Within Africana cultural traditions art is a creative manifestation of thought and culture. As such, Rites and Reason is a critical space for artists, writers, and scholars to explore and engage Africana intellectual and cultural traditions, translating them into creative theatrical and expressive forms. - Brown University

1910. Negro woman. photo credit Missouri Historical Society.

Cornel West arrested at a protest.

Walk In My Father's Footsteps.

Grandfather-Teacher, Gregory, with a little boy at a park in Bowie, MD

during our annual Men's Retreat in March of 2017.

This little boy captivated us all! His mother, herself, was captivating in her spirit as mother, who knew ancient ways of being a mother, a woman, and later a wife, we discovered when her husband arrived! There is the way of teaching a child beyond instruction. This little boys' mother understood the flow of circles and used them developing her son in a simultaneous series of emotions and movements that led her son here and there; within and without. These ways of being infuse boys' spirits with power during the play of being little... - Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories 4/4/17

Great Grandfather Samuel Issac Montgomery Adair (Pops, as I knew him) 1882-1962.

"This was my Grandfather Teacher. Pops is the one who taught me the Indian way, the Red Road, and other things related to being Crow. In essence I became what he awakened, and how my ancestors manifested in my life came from this relationship soon after I was born..." - Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories  

It is a responsibility: intelligence and knowledge. What do we do with what we know? Is it, our place in society, different from who we are; and also what is the context of why we, Grandfather Teachers, have to give into the spirits of the young? These are heavy things made light by the obligations of our training... - Gregory E. Woods Keeper of Stories 4/4/17

Grandfather-Teacher, I AM. What a powerful role and responsibility. March 2017.

Dark red of Murder in Life

Men dying for murders they are about to commit, have committed and men dying for association with bloody gangs or killing women and children for political causes are not the men of lore that are in the Dream of Life, as any holy book depicted, or are they? How did we dream of men killing as sport, or vengeance, or from a moral code for national security in what is called pre-emptive strikes?  How does a son take up the cause to teach his son to murder with aplomb?

This is daily life in the world. How is it possible a woman's pussy, her love and her capacity for love and sacredness are not enough to stave off the murderous tendencies within men immune to these influences? What grip should a woman have upon her man? These two questions lead up to one powerful examination in the form of a question: "How powerful was sex designed to be a part of women's genitalia?"  

How is it possible sex has no power to soften the heart of stone in a murderer? Perhaps, it is possible for a simple reason: men are not taught about the Sacred from the sacred places emerging from the wisdom Elders come from, or the wombs they seek! This discovery leads to the deeper questions.

If God made man could it be possible Goddess made woman and God took credit for it? If so, did that cause friction between them, or unite them in further development of the study of balance? If balance is not a virtue, or a possibility introduced into the thought life of children does it lead to lack, or insensitivity not knowing how the structure of balance can come about in Life, or emerge from their own inner life? If children don't know how to resist, or better yet fight to maintain their innocence are they guilty of anything if the men they know turn them into killers? If innocence isn't valued how can crudeness stave off the coldness of heart a murderer needs to develop to survive in neighborhoods, families and countries like the U.S. that subsist upon this dark spirit?

These are legitimate questions the higher intellect can ignore, or address, but these are questions of the heart for man's spirit to answer. Unfortunately, for the next victims these questions are not taken seriously enough in a country whose cultural heritage is red with blood and no remorse. Blood shed by murderers has the voices of our ancestors to make this line of questioning thought more poignant. If those voices cannot be heard, or are discounted do they insist on being heard, and does their insistence make them heard in other ways? If so, how and should those voices be weighed and added to the discussions centered around herding the darkness of murder into the Sacred Circles for transformation?  - Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories 4/2/16


FRONT magazine

body art of FRONT magazine model, Amandda Justyne (exceptional) 2016

 

To Think About

Mr. Todd, a timeless quality you captured between eras that speaks very well about yesterday and today for the way Black men had to live and can now chose to live. It is all up to their concept of freedom and the depth of their commitment to unravel the contradictions of freedom. . . - Gregory E. Woods, Keeper of Stories 4.11.16

black photographer Derrel Todd captured timeless image of Damon Fleming
for Fott Print Fotos (2016)

Matthew Alexander Henson, first Black Arctic explorer was explorer, Robert Peary's first mate over a 20 year period to the various places around the globe...

Matthew Alexander Henson was the first Black Arctic explorer. He was Robert Peary's first mate on their expeditions. He spent 18 years on expedition with Peary as his navigator and craftsman. He traded with the Inuit tribe and even learned their language. He is credited with being the first man to reach the Geographic North Pole (although many people dispute this). He is ...the first Black man to be accepted into the Explorers Club because of his achievements while exploring the Arctic. He was taken in by a sailor as a child where he learned to read, write, and navigate the sea. He went to many countries. He was working at a clothing store in Washington, DC in 1887 when he met Robert Peary. Peary heard of his skills as a navigator and took him on an expedition to Nicaragua. Henson became Peary's first mate after impressing him with his skills as a navigator. They then set out to explore the Arctic for more than 20 years. Henson is the only non-Inuit man to master driving and training dog sled teams using Inuit techniques. ~ anon

 

A Trick to the Psyche.



"The rules about opening doors and buying dinner and all of that other 'gentleman' stuff is a chess game, especially these days."
-Anna Kendrick