Are you Black?
Do you make art?
Are you interested in, oh, I don’t know, not the status quo?
Are you not about pimping Blackness to the white art world?
Are you not cool?
But are you cool?
When was the last time you questioned how you look at the world?
What I mean is, when was the last time you were like, ‘Hold on, wait a minute; that’s some crazy white shit I’m doing/coming out of my mouth…’

Do you enjoy long walks on the beach?
Seriously, because back home, some of my best thinking takes place during long walks on the beach.
Or, rather, long runs on the beach.
How do you feel about cross-generational relationships?
Not, romantic, silly, like do you know and count among your closest associations people of all generations?
Are you responsible to youth?
Do you vigorously maintain connections to elders?

Do you posture? You know, with the clothes and the lingo… are you hip?
(I fucking hope not)
Are you, like, not purposefully anti-hip, though? Like, have you moved past style as a lifestyle?
(I bloody-well hope so)

Have you noticed that there’s a lot of being intellectual for the sake of being intellectual and not for the solving of critical community problems? Like, does that un-nerve you? Like, do you wonder what Baldwin would say? Do you wonder what Hansberry would say? Do you wonder what Lawrence would say? Do you wonder what Catlett would say? Would they look at us askew? Would they wrinkle their brow and be like, ‘FTW’ or ‘SMH’. And, I don’t mean to suggest that they did anything more that wrestle with this life, but

dang, yo,

do you struggle?

Describe your relationship with the ancestors and the gods.

Describe your relationship with nature.
Describe your relationship with community.

Tell me about your mother.