heather aletha profile picture

heather aletha

"we are women in exile from ourselves..."

About Me


Emerging from Oakland, California, Heather Aletha is blending the fiery passion born of a gritty city covered in the fingerprints of the Black Panthers with the grace of barefoot djeli dancing in the thick sun on wild beaches into a poetry that sings of roots and magic and sweat... She calls us to seek out a truth that allows no expectations or limitations, that is constantly evolving within the organic that is our lives, that dares us to watch suns rise again and again and believe in our power to be mothers to our dreams and reject power over our lives.
Tending gardens for the moment in Brooklyn, NY, Heather Aletha channels a necessity to evolve ourselves and our communities through a faith in our own infinate beauty into a powerful voice and raw poetry.
"The first time I saw her a year and a half ago... she blew me away, I still remember her performance from that one night..."
"Amazing and compelling... You made me write again."
"Her poetry is revolutionary and evolutionary; it could bring a unique change to someone's mind..."

My Interests

Music:

Member Since: 4/4/2007
Band Members: IandI
Influences: questions, early morning sunshine, catching eyes on oakland streets where we're not allowed to look at one another, paulo freire, panther beach, walking barefoot on dirt roads, shi tulu smells on skin, bell hooks, sean burns, conversation on porches, dawn james, wide open oceans and wild waves that speak when you listen, one-way tickets, autumn, shaka nzinga, mali rhythms, west cliff conversations, dunsmuir summers and stars, subway silence, breathing together.
Sounds Like: incarnations of ancient languages spoken in words we understand of languages we do not yet speak.
Record Label: unsigned
Type of Label: None

My Blog

october sun

we make beautiful life. sometimes you need that adventure out into dreams, just to believe again, just to touch the roots you so often speak of with your bare hands, to feel them warm with life and ru...
Posted by heather aletha on Thu, 23 Oct 2008 10:11:00 PST

true colors indeed

whispers psalms to the sunburies handwritten notes in soil soaked in golden moist light    (prayers for his daughters.)on his father's record playernina simone seeps heavythrough the op...
Posted by heather aletha on Wed, 30 Jul 2008 09:00:00 PST

"Father's Day" in Conversation with Barack Obama

Peace and blessings family. I hope this finds you thriving and open. Following is an essay written on Father's Day in response to a speech given by Barack Obama that Sunday. Although it's been a ...
Posted by heather aletha on Sun, 06 Jul 2008 12:10:00 PST

secrets

so one day we will realize that there are no secrets. that those who choose to tell the truth with their words and their eyes and their breath... they are full of the sun. and that maybe being a 'poet...
Posted by heather aletha on Tue, 10 Jun 2008 10:26:00 PST

Farafin...

Amadou... they don't know your name anymore. Recognize the syllablesbut not the significance...Think you were... a rapper?Or these days, with a name like that...a terrorist?Poets ...
Posted by heather aletha on Mon, 19 May 2008 10:07:00 PST

Pro-Life (reconsidered)

Whose life are we considering. Grasping at identity as women earned from semen discharged at randomTo cultivate an identity we've stopped trying to find on our ownfrom children who will lov...
Posted by heather aletha on Sat, 23 Feb 2008 05:34:00 PST

Since Eve (for che)

you are a queen.even if i've watched your glow dissipatingtil light only shines through your eyes and not your whole person.and even then, it's not as often as it used to.we lie on raw california beac...
Posted by heather aletha on Sat, 23 Feb 2008 05:27:00 PST