I began organizing in 2013 and I remember a time when we could not get Black men to show up on the front lines, nobody wanted to host panels and talk about police brutality. A lot of Black women worked really hard to change that & make this discourse and protest, mainstream.

At the moment, I don't have anything to contribute to the conversation that I haven't said already. It's also very different for me. I have lost and fought in a way that very few have had to.
This is a season of rest and preparation for me. I have already given so much.

Some of you know me because I curated the Basquiat exhibition at the Guggenheim, but my organizing, activism and writing goes much deeper than just that. If you've experienced a highway shut down back in 2013-2015, you've seen some of my work.

In these moments, I think of dear, dear Erica Garner. I miss her. I remember one day when we spoke, we talked of being old women, mentoring a new generation of activists, and reflecting. We knew that we were making history. Keenly aware of that.

1 reason that police brutality is a mainstream conversation in publications is b/c of my work; In 2014 was the first to write about it in a MSM women's pub (Elle), which then opened the gates for other sites to finally cover it. Ferguson raged, yet those pubs would not touch it.

I fought for that, and did not know it, but I was helping to change the game at Elle in a way that also opened the floodgates to Black trauma porn. I certainly didn't expect that & is a large part why I do not publish much ATM.

That was never the goal, what it became.

As a founder of Mother's Against Police Brutality, my work at Elle and then becoming the first Black curator in the Guggenheim's 80 year history, I have already put in a lifetime of work should I do nothing else.

But I would never do that, as that's not where Clinton is.

Black women are why we're having this conversation, and they did it without a lot of money, fanfare or help. Know that you're talking about it, b/c so many (and so few) Black women like me sacrificed to make this country more of what it should be.

This was my swan song to the beat. I do miss her very much & will one day share her recorded words w/my papers, in an archive. I am super grateful that @freeblackgirl held my hand through this, and @fazlalizadeh did gorgeous, gorgeous work for Erica. https://www.bitchmedia.org/article/remembering-erica-garner

I changed a lot of history from the ages of 27-33. I am not out of the game -- not by a long shot -- but I am resting now. I will be back, but I've earned that rest.