Transcending Tenderness
Transcending Tenderness| July-13-26 | Oil on Canvas 18×24 | Sanai Reign
Tenderness
I don’t always get up or go out. My solace is in the unraveling, alone. I feel uncomfortable all the time. My body is a live wire ——don’t touch! The energy I gather up to eat flares me up. So no I’m not really planning ahead, but if my doctor calls don’t be peeved when later really comes. Life with a disability rarely moves quickly the moments of ease slide by sluggishly past fatigue and a nauseating headache. I do prefer outward contentment, I’ll lick my wounds at home. I wonder what it would take for the masks to drop completely. Maybe in obscurity or enveloped in a quilt of confidence.
I must stretch and roll out my body. I only function well when the tightness has transformed into something manageable. These last couple of weeks have been informing me of my needs. I don’t have much capacity to travel far from my bed so when I get too, it is rewarding. I went to the office to stretch and a dragonfly landed on a chair outside the window, its wings catching a glimmer of the sun. It stayed there while my phone malfunctioned fluttering about. I was so honored for the encounter I decided to paint one. Moments of reflection inspire a tenderness in me.
In these moments I relate to disabled women and writers.
“All that you touch you change, All you change, Changes you", Octiva Butler.
We create as humans that is the goal. Stories, Families, Libraries, we wield our will to inspire change.
I hate symptom checking, but honestly being real about how i’m feeling allowed me to honor my fullness. I respect my complexities. I over-criticize my art and under edit my marketing. Not because I don’t believe in myself, I want to succeed but what if my bodily systems can’t handle it? I was cocooned for months, shaking, in pain, refusing to speak or spread my wings. I felt fatigue in the stem of my brain, nothing was okay. I really didn’t believe I had POTS the symptoms irregular, but when I passed out for the first time alone, all doubt vanished.
Lately painting has become a learning curve. Knowing when to stop, listening to my body, stretching, are still being ingrained into my routine, and I’m grateful. My body recovers from stress slowly. I don’t regret space from people, alone time sat me on the alter of reflection. I was desperate for friends, yet ignoring my reality made me feel like an awful friend to myself. I didn’t understand good days and bad days before, now I do. I didn’t understand reverence before, now I do. Life with POTS can be expanding and demanding, a galaxy shifting and rearranging.
Transcending
I notice when my body shifts I can feel the tendons tighten under my skin. I practiced perfection, I thought I could polish the pain to form connection. I started becoming a witness, living in liminality. I live like a live wire— unpredictable as a summer rain. I don't hold onto the shame distance carries, though I know not all pain is temporary. I feel like I’m at the edge of existence. Left foot social, right foot unapproachable the Hokey Pokey of disability.
I don’t appreciate the term “invisible disability” because the right eyes can see. Those close to me can tell when my circulation has chagned, because my hands are pale and cold. They can tell when something feels off because my bodies symptoms are loud. I do use mobility aids when I need them. I isolate because the pain is so intense I can’t unravel in public. I’ve been processing this feeling this threshold is yet another boundary we’re bound to break.
Uterine Conditions
A poem and painting about generational uterine pain
I want healthcare that’s worth more than a
doctor’s stare when I’m suffering. My ancestors are
still seeking freedom through me. The spiritual is
ever developing. Most of the ladies in my family
have uterine conditions. Like endometriosis,
fibrosis, and pelvic varices. Even cancer has caused
pain in our family tree. A lot of undiagnosed family
who suffer endlessly. The diagnosed spent years
battling for their bodies to be seen as worthy of
care, only to denied treatment when they get
there. Why is the medicine for endometriosis like
$400? Why are they bleeding internally they’ve
seen too many doctors? Black women’s bodies
were the commodity that supplied this country
capital and in 2024 we’re still treated like we’re
disposable. Yes, it may be generational that my
periods were horrible, but no where does it say
that the cause of these pains can’t be changed.
I make people uncomfortable. Someone came up to me filled with hostility and demand I take out a post about Palestine. Saying it would ruin my page or take away from my work. Humanity will never bow to respectability. I had to learn to steady myself in my dreaming. My Grandma would take my dreams seriously. When she would dream of you, say your name accidentally, or your picture falls off your wall, that would prompt a call. I now examine my dreams with a microscope. I was inspired by Assata Shakur’s Poem ‘Affirmations’ for this next poem.
Connection is the key
I believe I’m connected to the Earth. I believe I’m connected to the earth .
My head feels its wrath. I scream as the sky, cries in agony, what a wondrous way of life.
I see the shifting moon I feel emotional, even the cosmos are under control.
It’s all going to plan.
The contents of this mysterious shift?
I don’t know, for the wailing wind and the pelting rain go hand-in-hand.
The birds fly, God holds them up by the wings.
Cicadas spend majority of their life, waiting for the perfect time.
Everything’s going to plan.
The storms may rage and people will crack the cages they’ve been placed in.
The only thing true is change systems always slide into disarray.
Permanence is a fictitious slight of the human mind, why linger at the lackluster silo of eternity?
Feel you’re one, you and me to the body of humanity!
When you bleed, I cry when the bombs burn your bodies!
I wonder why I wasn’t placed where you were.
When all the trees die dismembered by weapons of mass destruction, I wonder why the place I went to have lunch in profits from your home being blown to bits.
Do you see how we’re connected?
What harms your environment in turn harms my environment!
It doesn’t matter how much institutions spend weighing down, the pockets of environmental scientist to lie about what kind of crisis were in.
Politicians lord over profits, to hoard the contents of their thievery.
Putting bodies of Black and Brown people on the line.
System’s cycle until forced to break.
There’s no need to recycle their, abusive structural violence, who I wish wouldn’t wake.
Some things must die.
Systems that coerce and restructure peoples lives aren’t the ones were willing to reshape.
I know I’m connected to the Earth, and know I’m connected to the Earth.
My body feels that chill, moments before any downpour, I feel the atmosphere will me to gear up for environmental change.
The Earth and our connection is interchangeably strange.
Guiding me, leading me directly on my way with out my input or say.
God leads the frightful into bountiful fields, showing the power that only God wields. I see it every day.
Witnessing the restlessness of a depressed society, whilst presently being in the happenings of my own own body.
The dichotomy hunts me. I feel I don’t deserve the change.
Why do I deserve to heal when many can’t say the same?
Morning, every night, I work to fight against my habits of disarray.
The one that rips me of connection, the one the lures me into field of depression, the one that profits off of oppression.
I work endlessly to rid myself of the violence I was born in.
Magical Moments - July-7-2026| Oil on Canvas 20×24| Sanai Reign
Finding yourself while your body is changing and living with chronic illness is a whirlwind. I have dealt with this majority of my life, yet I’m new. I never thought I could create with confidence, let alone share my art. I never allowed myself to dream of opening night at a Museum. Not only is it possible it happened. The practice of dreaming positions you at the door of choice. I thought I had to wait for complete healing, when all I needed was to learn to be rooted in belief beyond.
Affirmation: I am worthy of more than I can give, my gifts guide space for grace, I love to go at my own pace.
Thank you so much, for listening, reading and for sharing your support and encouraging words. I’m Sanai Reign. Artist, Conduit, and Poet. I am an explorer of minds, I dedicate myself to understanding my art, understanding my heart and understanding the world and my part in it. Thank you so much!
Peace.
