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Diary of a DIVA

Autobiographical Poetry and Politically Incorrect Statements

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CHAPTER 1

    Disclaimer

    These are my words
    My words are my life
    I bleed through my words
    If you don't understand you are too young
    If my words off end you are too old
    I spare no feelings-mine have not been
    I love
    Hate
    Rejoice
    Grieve
    Bleed.
    If I make you feel what I want you to feel then I've done my job
    Th ese are my words
    My dance, my song, my rhythm
    I give them to you
    To smile, laugh, cry, think, relate
    To heal.
    Take them ... and take heed.


    Drummer Girl

    I feel I'm a person of reasonable character.
    I work, I dream, I love, I get pissed off,
    I'm addicted to nothing, I get naturally high, I admit my wrongs,
    I give no excuses.

    Wherever I go I leave my mark.
    Whatever I do I make a statement
    Whatever I say I give a message.

    I am rarely in fashion ... but always in style.

    I can hear you and not listen,
    speak to you and not see you
    fuck a man and not love him.
    I march to the beat of a different drum
    And I bang my own damn drum.

July 7, 2009

My dearest love,

On June 25th 2009 at 2:26 PM Pacific time, my heart stopped momentarily. It stopped with yours.

When you entered my life in 1974, I knew our bond would be eternal. Over the years you made me smile, blush, scream, cry, dance, but most importantly you told me to sing.

So I did.

You gave me a beat, taught me riffs, and gave me the courage to adlib without fear. You gave my voice a song and I sang with you. Hours upon hours I sang with you and mimicked your style while developing my own. You were there. My hero, my music, and my first love.

I leaned on you through my teen years as a source of strength to keep on singing when life was taking its dreadful courses and painful life lessons were learned. I was able to hold onto you and the melody you gave me.

Then came the media.

You went through so many changes, the nose, the hair, the lips, and it never fazed me. As long as I was able to read your eyes and hear your voice, there was nothing you could to your exterior that could possibly affect your interior or my unconditional love for you. You always remained real to me. My hero, my music, and my first love.

Growing up I always had it in my heart that I was to be Mrs. Michael Jackson. No young lady loved you more than I did. No one had your back like I did. When the kids made fun, I fought. When the media talked trash, I talked trash back. I became your media assassin while I was a member of the media. Regardless of how your look evolved, you were always the man I loved who put the music in me.

Then came the other women.

I understood that they were celebrities and lived the rigorous lifestyle that you were accustomed to. But know that I understood also and I had your back the entire time and I waited for you to come to me ... like every other girl in the world. I just thought I was different and I was correct.

I am different because you made me different.

I am watching your memorial service denial. A part of my being was taken with you as you formed your new body with God. I just wish we had more time. Today I am overcome with survivor's guilt. I am broken. I feel so lost without you. However, I accept that your new form is divine and I'm working to be at peace and it hasn't been easy.

Today I am referred to as a "die-hard." I find that interesting. The same attitude and love I have for you now, is the same love and attitude I've had since 1974. So be it. As always, I have no shame in expressing my love and appreciation for you. After all, you have been my man for over thirty years. I am receiving strange looks, folks referring to me as crazy, laughing at me, shaking their heads, and probably wondering why it is that I am so broken. It remains as it has always been with you and I- none of anyone's concern if they don't understand.

Please forgive me for my selfishness. While all I have spoken of is myself and how your loss has affected me, I can't even fathom the pain that your family is enduring. Trust that I will keep them all in prayer.

I'm trying to wrap this up but it is so difficult for me to say goodbye to you. Guilt sets in as I recall how you were my entire childhood, yet you never had one. Thank you for love, thank you for my voice, and thank you for showing me that I am able to touch and heal through music. Thank you for your smile, your compassion, that moonwalk, the glitter, and your dominant presence. Thank you for allowing me to look into your eyes.

Our heavenly Father has an amazing plan for you now. Goodness, I can't imagine you topping what you've accomplished down here, but baby I gotta tell you what makes me sick is the same deceitful people who called you "wacko" as recently as last week, praise your name today. These are the same self-serving, self gratifying, twofaced bastards who worked tirelessly to deface, demean, defeat, and destroy you. Will they leave you alone now? Will you rest in peace rather than rest in pieces?

I am proud to have your music and your influence melodically running intravenously. I miss you and I am with you for eternity. To simply say that I love you is such a gross, insulting understatement so I'll end with ...

Until we meet again Michael. You will always remain my King and the music in me.

Your girl, Yvette

    Involuntary Abortion

    They say the Lord giveth and taketh away.
    I receiveth and flushed it.

    D'Ciara? Elishah?

    It was so small.
    Just a tiny figure ... in the toilet

    Sort of makes one scared to pee when you're pregnant
    ... wondering what the hell will fall out next.

    I flushed my baby down the toilet tonight.
    Was that a pro-life or pro-choice decision?

    I hurt - everywhere
    Like someone ran a truck through my ass.

    I believe life starts at conception.
    It ended in the toilet.

    I heard "mommy" as I watched my baby go under.

    I cried "baby" as I went along.


    Allegiance (age 19)

    In my New York elementary school
    I was made to recite the pledge of allegiance
    And sing the National Anthem
    It wasn't a problem for me

    Back then

    But things are different
    Times have changed
    I've grown up

    "Oh say does that star-spangled banner yet wave ...
    Ore the land of the ...

    What is free?

    Webster's dictionary defines "free" as enjoying civil and political liberty
    not subject to the control or domination of another.

    Again.

    What the hell is free?

    Let's talk about this definition
    "Not subject to the control or domination of another"
    That ranks right up there with "liberty and justice for all."

    Those who had liberty and justice from the get go
    Are STILL fighting to get just some of their land back to which
    they were indigenous
    Don't forget indigenous means NATIVE

    And even the term "native" makes me giggle because these people
    were kicked off and killed off their land.

    ... with liberty and justice for who?

    This is their land. They are our founding fathers.

    Yet we still celebrate ignorance (and honor a holiday) in the form of
    a man who claimed
    "I discovered you ... I found you."

    Response:

    "You did not discover nor did you find shit because my people were
    never lost."
    How can one discover those who were civilized and practiced
    democracy BEFORE you arrived?

    This is stupid to me.

    Unless you are a Native American
    We are living on land which is not ours
    With a leader who ain't no more Native than we are
    Trying to live up to the name we gave ourselves
    We pledge allegiance to a flag instead of a God
    We need authorization from a government (another group of non-Natives)
    to leave this land and return to it

    And the Natives ... please.

    Correct me if I am wrong
    Isn't America all about "liberty and justice for all"
    not just for some
    "not subject to the domination of another"

    Let me state for the record-
    I choose no other place to live than the United States of America
    but
    This patriotic fantasy, and the the perpetuation of ignorance has
    got to stop

    I still sing America
    I always will
    And it still hurts
    Just please remember, there is no holiday, while celebrating murder
    and genocide

    So please don't condemn me when you see me down praying
    rather than standing with you
    Lying
    in tears
    With one hand

    Under God

    ... invisible ...


Katana

    My heroine

    Protection from all that is wrong

    I strive to have your heart, your sensitive soul

    You are grace, kindness and generosity

    Until crossed

    My guardian angel

    May your wingspan know no boundaries


    Kyetra

    You are regal

    My Queen

    Your strength, your spirit- are admirable

    Your determination to do

    Your courage to be

    Through your eyes I view my soul

    I am proud to be of you


    Deadbeat dad

    Sorry, spineless, simple

    How could you not care?

    One has your smile

    The other your eyes

    They are beautiful

    What is your issue?

    Doped up, slouching,

    Such a display of cowardice and

    Dumb as a box of rocks

    Dude, wipe that goofy fucking smile off your face ...

    WAIT ...

    Why am I wasting my words on such an unworthy being?

    ... next page please ...


    For My Girls

    My desire
    was giving you everything I could

    That was my first mistake.

    I worked so hard,
    Taking jobs I had no business taking
    Working crazy hours
    Graveyard combo shifts and all

    I was so wrapped up in a larger paycheck,
    a nicer home, a newer car, Toys R us, ballet and gymnastics
    lessons, your hair,
    and the news that I almost forgot to give you myself.

    You know the simple stuff I miss like singing to you,
    rubbing your back until you fall asleep
    and our family prayer

    So if I may ...
    I'd like to start fresh (I won't say start over because those labor
    pains were a mutha)
    But sorta pick up where I left off before I got so caught up
    ... in what never really mattered.


    [For My Boy

    I feel as if I let you down
    You trusted me
    And my commitment to you
    This melancholy travels through my being like a ravenous cancer
    Uncontrolled
    Relentless pain
    I wish I could have taken it for you
    I'm almost envious
    You were my boy
    I'll cherish singing to you
    While you closed your big brown eyes in my arms
    Our love was happy, unique, Divine, sent
    An attempted explanation would simply minimize its value
    Forever my boy
    As you take on your new body with God
    The bond we have will never be broken
    Rest in peace my Prince

    Mommy June 8, 2004


    On Blackness

    Beauty is my child
    I bathed it saved it and raised it
    To be like me

    I am beauty
    My beauty ain't skin deep
    It's skin surface
    Dark, rich, majestic

    My beauty has tone
    Not "Coppertone"
    Natural tone
    Ebony, honey, mahogany

    Yes, I'm proud of my child
    My gift
    My creation

    My beauty
    (1986)


    Marge' s Soup
    It's the kind of stuff you hide or simply don't tell others (especially
    your kids) because

    you just don't want to share.

    It's insane.

    I portioned it out just enough to last me for another 3 meals before
    I faced that I would

    have to go back groveling with an empty bowl for more.

    This stuff was amazing. I mean really good.

    Chock full of color, flavor, texture, without being calorically sinful
    -if that is even a

    word- but I hid it eating it only after 1am when I knew I could be
    alone to enjoy this gift.

    No one could taste.

    Cause they would love it and I'd never see my bowl again.

    Nothing so simple should be this good.

    My God, it was so good I don't think I even inhaled.

    I just swallowed and hoped there was enough left over tomorrow
    morning's sneak.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from Diary of a DIVA by Yvette Williams. Copyright © 2013 Yvette Williams. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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