 Naked and Unafraid
My first book, UNRULY, hit the virtual shelves on January 21, 2025 and on the cover is a naked Antoinette.
The first time I realized I had a problem with my body, and my body being visible, was when a roommate walked in on me coming out the shower. We were both grown women. A nanosecond of time elapsed. I started screaming. With apologies, she immediately closed the door. I kept screaming. I don’t know when I stopped screaming but my poor roommate, afraid to talk to me afterwards, mumbled, “It was a mistake. I don’t know why you kept screaming so long. Even after I was nowhere around, you kept screaming. I mean, we have the same parts, but you just kept screaming.”
I got stuck in that scream. Even I was surprised how I kept screaming. It was endless. I can joke about it now, especially after I saw myself in Homer Simpson’s endless scream.
My scream, though, felt ancestral.
My scream held stories I didn’t know how to tell. Stories about consent. About who gets to see us, and when, and how. Stories about slavery as an act of violence against our “no.” How saying “no” as a little Black girl meant I was being rude. How the legacy of anti-Blackness presents itself as the erosion of boundaries permitted for the Black body. As if our place in the world is to be naked and afraid.
This is my body. For UNRULY’s book cover I researched NYC photographers who could hold sanctuary for a Black body that is always remembering while moving towards freedom. The photographer had to be Black because I couldn’t handle any other ancestral stories being in the room. They had to have a portfolio of nudes that showed how they brought reverence to their work. I emailed each photographer to share about my unruly project—writing about endometriosis and other violences against the Black female body, always towards freedom. Because UNRULY requires consent, I asked if they are aligned with their work being part of these sensitive topics. Theik responds immediately. Shares his personal connection to endo stories and that he’d be honored to support a project that gives voice. He’s an endo warrior. His email feels spiritual. I give thanks. Before our photoshoot, we talk, his cat greets me, I meet his girlfriend, told me she watched my TEDx Talk on Endometriosis, we talk more. She leaves and Theik begins taking photos of me fully clothed so that my nervous system can be in agreement. When it is time to disrobe he turns his back and waits until he receives permission before facing me, camera in hand. I whisper to my body, “I AM safe here.”
This is my body. And she has stories to tell. |
