Scatter Your Ashes, Alive
Editorial reflection on co-curating Issue 5 of the Wellspringwords® Literary Anthology | To Be a Living Ancestor
It is Issue 5 of this special publication and I marvel at the threads that come together, each time, to create the unique tapestry of each set of stories. These are stories told in poetry, personal narrative, painting, photography, experimental writing. These are stories told through the heart, the mind, the womb, your knowing. These are stories told via versions of you and me that comprise a collective, a sacred “we”. And I don’t use the term “sacred” lightly. I use it with care, but I use it as the free and liberating force it is.
Yes, a word itself can be a liberating force, and “sacred” is such a word to me, especially on this platform.
You see, sacred is a sensation. A subtle sensation. A deep inner feeling that rises from the primordial womb of the deep self and out to the surface of our beings. The feeling of sacred is each of our, and all of our, Divinity. Yes, Divinity is always, it is right here. Some might say, and I tend to concur, that “our ancestors practiced embodied Divinity in their rituals and ways of being”; that it was a colonial wave of evolution that dumbed our consciousness to how GOD is always in and around us, singing through the rain, whispering in the gentle sway of sturdy trees, crying through the mud, and all the sunshine; that colonization—this force of evolution—came and wiped our conscious minds clear of the ways in which we actively embody the Divine, our active and very alive sacredness, and conditioned us to orient to singular God figurehead, us humans rendered wanting in our own creational abilities. Wanting to be externally blessed by an authoritative Divine Force, and only to receive the blessing when we subscribe to this hierarchy.
But where does that leave the sacredness of the Earth and her wisdom? The intelligence of the octopus's three hearts and how that animal mirrors the capacity of our own human empathy? And the way empathy itself is a physiological and poetic miracle? And how we humans, born onto this Earth, this trying Babylon, this idyllic Eden, are living miracles ourselves? Where does wanting for external blessings leave space for our individual creational magic and our collective (re)generation? I have neither seen nor experienced it.
What I have seen, and continue to witness ever more, is the sweet and tangy sacredness singing out from those who choose to submit to, and ultimately contribute to, our Literary Anthology. At this stage, it is clear that through this publication, we approach the tender and expansive themes of humanity with a solidity and grace—and this issue is no different.
To Be a Living Ancestor…
Writers and artists brought their personal experience and flavor to the page, the canvas. This is what we intended. This is what we asked for. In titling this editorial reflection, I was inspired by Mariah Maddox’s “In Flesh & In Bone”, where she muses on the significance of her living “on this Earth, in hearts, across souls.” Many of her sentiments and wisdoms contributed to my emerging mental picture of us humans spreading our own crematorial ashes across life—as we are still living!
We see it in this issue in particular, and then we see it in all issues of our publication, and then we see it in the artwork and literature all around us, and then we see it in our lives, intimate and beyond. The spreading of ashes is sacred. The spreading of a life, the transmission of creative energy is sacred. And now, I am reminded of simple and powerful words by Femi Anikulapo Kuti in the 2025 Wizkid documentary “Long Live Lagos” on music being a spiritual thing. He said not to “play” with music, because we are accessing the energy of Spirit. And by “play” here, I took him to mean to be frivolous, unfocused, and without intention.
Femi Kuti, in these simple words, reminded us of the sacredness of the creative energy imbued within us. Because isn’t music inherent to our being? And if music is inherent to our being, and we are being advised to take the music seriously, take the inner song seriously, take life’s melody seriously, aren’t we being reminded that Spirit is inherent to our being? And to take Spirit seriously? As seriously as we take our breaths that keep us here and alive?
And so isn’t to be a living ancestor to keep creating? To keep breathing? Particularly, with the consciousness that we walk, sing, care, deconstruct, hope, dream, move, weave as Divine creatures? I tend to think so.
And so, dear reader, dear witness, as you move through Issue 5, To Be a Living Ancestor, may you experience the sacred ambiance of ashes, life, being spread at the root of a tree, or into the ocean, gently mixing with the ocean breeze.
And may you remember your sacred creative being into fuller expression.
Gratitude. Asé.
