Unrooted By Anaëlle Gonzalez (20.04.2023) The following narrative poem started from a conversation with my dear friend Paulina Januszewska, about our experiences of living in-between two cultures, two countries, and never fully feeling rooted in neither. I started writing it in 2022 and finished it more than a year after to capture the evolution of my experience a the time. I. I wonder where my life is: Here, there or maybe Some place in-between. Like oil I dive in the clouded waters Of the Belgian-Flemish manners, Half submerged, half sailing Through the shapeless urge To melt the painful borders, To
The object By Anaëlle Gonzalez (30.10.2025) Today I saw a picture of a mountain, its spine against the dawn —magnificent and flat. I heard birds sing through the wind in my meditation app. I saw sunsets rehearsed, forests framed and the moon adjusted for brightness. I frowned at the pain parading the screen —children dying, a school shooting, felt outrage for what happens overseas, posted so everyone could see, then ignored the man in the
Permission to grow By Anaëlle Gonzalez (20.05.2022) I can feel my old skin Shedding and Sloughing into something Unknown and obscure Yet, ablaze and assured. The zebra membrane marbles, Unable to resolve This ambivalent maze. Boundaries blur between Old, current and altered selves. The ego of distant pasts Hoards and holds tightly To the weak certainties And polished identities. The time-worn enamel sheds and sticks to the flayed membrane, Afraid of dissolution, Of memory loss and rejection. The new flesh exposed and unsure Is half chrysalis, half hatched; Coerced to come into But shy to impose its being. The worn
Dreamcatchers The following poetic letter Dear Sisters is a poem on an experience of sisterhood which was written in 2020 for the photobook Dromenvangers (‘Dreamcatchers’) of my dear friend and talented photographer Paulina Januszewska. In her words, the book is “the fruit of cooperation of many women (and some men as well) [who] have posed for portraits, shared their thoughts, experiences, knowledge and creativity. It’s a testimony of what happens when we direct our energy to create, develop talents, support and strengthen each other. We strive for connection, not for perfection.” I was delighted to be a part of this