Thread by @monaeltahawy

“Is there an honorable non-violent means towards mourning and remembering who and what we loved?”

For 9/11 anniversary, I always share this from poet June Jordan’s keynote at Barnard in November 2001 about the attacks. #GriefLiteracy

“What shall we do now? How shall we grieve, and cry out loud, and face down despair?”

And I quote June Jordan in this essay about #GriefLiteracy that has helped me articulate some of my grief since the pandemic began.

feministgiant.com/p/essay-some-o…

“I realized that regardless of the tragedy, regardless of the grief, regardless of the monstrous challenge, Some of Us Have Not Died. Some of us did NOT die…And what shall we do, we who did not die?” June Jordan #GriefLiteracy

In examining how those who survived can best honour those killed, Jordan quotes Holocaust survivor Elly Gross: “I guess it was my destiny to live...To live means you owe something big to those whose lives are taken away from them” #GriefLiteracy #September11th

June Jordan urges resisting a “rally Around Caesar”and instead “rally around an emergency/militant reconstruction of a secular democracy consecrated to the equality of each and every living one of us.” #September11th #GriefLiteracy

June Jordan died June 14, 2002, seven months after giving that keynote at Barnard. The US did the exact opposite of what she urged it would.

Condolences to all who lost loved ones on 9/11 and to all who lost loved ones in the wars fought to avenge it.
#September11th

You can read an adaptation of that keynote as the introduction to this collection of essays by June Jordan. Her words are tattooed on my skin because she is vital and fills me with power.

June Jordan’s questions are just as urgent today, in the midst of the worst pandemic in a century, when the death toll in U.S. alone is hundreds of times that of 9/11 & multiples more across the world where at least 20mln have died so far. #September11th feministgiant.com/p/essay-some-o…