A Nina by Many Names: a response by Keyierra Collins

Keyierra Collins responds to a prompt from PRJ2.0 presented in conjunction with the “Deconstructing Language: Liberationist Writing for Performance” workshop series during PRJ’s satellite residency in Summer 2021 with the National Center for Choreography at the University of Akron.

Call me the get down

One who slaughters functions without exception

Left ruin, every dance floor my feet touch

Call me tempo and flow

My voice projects in rhythms

Coinciding with the rhymes in my thighs…instrumentals be my playground

90’s r&b be my walk

Mama Simone be the tones in my complexion

Call me unruly child of God

I’m not beneath sin

Don't take my muscle light

I pray God checks my heat

Get hold of my impulse to Iay waste

Call me midnight

Watch my brown turn blue under moon luster

Turn purple with glee from a full night of motion

Turn gold…so elated by the sun

The same sun that applauded my foremothers on African soil

The same sun that met them through their journey

I feel home in my body

𝆕𝆕 AFRICA is hooooome 𝆕𝆕

Black assurance be home like Black thoughts and Black twang

Like Black throwbacks and Black 2 steps

Like Black laughs and Black side eyes

So call me ready or not

𝆕𝆕 Here I come𝆕𝆕

Call me on sight or toes down

Call me worship

Admirer of all the holy of dance

Call me RHO-mance

I get swooned by the bass, lay slain vibrating on mellowed floors

Easily submitted to move

Got no shame in putting on

Call me journey

Call me again and encore and replay and just a bit more

Call me showtime

And don’t call me to waste my time

Call me who I am

An acknowledgment of THEM [mutha]

Call me shadow, something you can never disturb

Not on life can this thing die, be consumed, or smoldered away

Call me soul

Call me until it’s done

Call me just now, yesterday, and endlessly

Call me who I am, no other option

I am again and encore and replay and “no please, once more”

I am known as…

I go by…

And I am called.

[Writer’s Note: This series is based on my latest work in-development, How I found my feet again which is an explorative journey of me rediscovering myself as a movement artist. I use process, dance/movement, writing, and routines as tools for discovery. My NOW body, values, and current stage in life inform who I am now, in this moment in time as a movement artist. I utilized the tools offered by Brianna Alexis Heath during her “Deconstructing Language” workshop.]

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Keyierra Collins is an international dancer, choreographer, and teaching artist based in Chicago. In 2020 she was awarded the 3Arts/ Walder Foundation Awardee grant. As a dance artist Collins worked with artists like educator, international performer, and choreographer Onye Ozuzu as well as France-based Rwandan artist Dorothee Munyaneza. She also has had the pleasure of working with many Chicago based artists like Paige Cunningham, Emily Stein, Anna Martine Whitehead, and Sonita Surratt to name a few. Collins’ work explores how dance and movement can be used to heal trauma, particularly the collective and individual trauma experienced by people of the African diaspora. She graduated from Columbia College Chicago in 2016 with a BA Dance.There she studied various dance forms, including West African, modern, jazz, ballet, hip-hop, and improvisation. Having toured and worked with artists in Haiti and Nigeria, Collins wants to continue to travel and collaborate with artists around the world.

You can find Brianna Alexis Heath’s “Deconstructing Language” workshop here.