I'm Adali Mone and this is The Slowdown.

A while back, I remember listening to a grief expert talk on a podcast about ways to

handle traumatic experiences.

At the end of the interview, the host asked the guest what might surprise listeners

about him and the grief expert answered, people don't get I'm actually really funny.

I think about that a lot because I'm the same way.

I've been in the middle of a hard discussion with friends about race, politics, death,

or one of the many ways the world could end and we all start laughing maniacally and

heartily because laughter seemed like the only response.

One of the things I'm aware of as a writer of color is that oftentimes we are asked to

write about trauma or some new awfulness in the news or tragic historical events and

sometimes that work needs to be done and sometimes that work helps enlighten and heal.

But sometimes you want to just live.

You want to be joyful.

You want to eat a goddamn oyster and have a cocktail by the ocean and laugh, laugh, laugh.

What I love about poetry is that it makes room for all those things to be true.

It can hold both the grief and the laughter and make room for the whole human experience.

You can be actively protesting police brutality and still make your lover a romantic dinner.

You can be terrified of the climate crisis and still enjoy staring into the undulating

waves of the sea.

Today's poem works to defy stereotypes and resists a tidy narrative.

I love this poem because it allows for so many possibilities between both rage and pleasure.

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