The Egyptian handmaid Hagar carry’s a certain stigma about her persona as someone who is fleeing the scene of the first ever recorded biblical instance of domestic strife. Sarai deals harshly with her (Gen. 16:6), constantly nagging, pointing the finger which causes Hagar to feel ostracized and run away. Though Hagar became disrespectful towards Sarai during her pregnancy, which she was given no option, feelings of frustration arise and her natural tendency at that moment is to retreat into the distance and find refuge back in Egypt. Hagar’s defiant will doesn’t help her cause to the path of freedom from slavery but only gracefully intensifies the promise that would soon be presented through her child. The racial and gender makeup of Hagar can’t be overlooked but the reasoning behind her flight stems from a response issue and not just from a race or gender-related issue. The Sovereignty of…

More than 46,000 people were on the waiting list to dine at what was billed as London’s first ever naked restaurant this summer – but only a fraction actually got to try the experience.
But those desperate to try dining out in the buff at Bunyadi may now have their chance as the restaurant’s owner has announced plans to open a permanent location in London.

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Bunyadi guests were greeted by staff who were also in the nude, with their genitals only covered by some shrubbery

how are we to reconcile recent events
unable to come to terms why we
scratch and crawl and scratch again
expecting to find something brand new
instead uncovering oft told untruths

with shovel in hand it’s easier to go deeper
much further than digging like a dog
but what can there possibly be down below
that we don’t already know

dinosaur bones or diamonds from another world
mass graves from this past century
and the one before
from every century going back until kingdom come

instead of digging we learn to drill with precision
hitting veins of fools gold or liquid gold
eventually discovering wormholes
leading to china or another world altogether
places unfamiliar in a familiar way
leaving us wondering why on earth
we ever felt threatened in the first place



april two thousand eighteen
copyright j matthew waters
all rights reserved