Barely Contained By Flesh: Interview with Yodassa Williams
Yodassa Williams is a queer Jamaican American writer and performing storyteller. An alumna of the VONA Writing program and creator of the podcast The Black Girl Magic Files, Yodassa launched Writers Emerging, a wilderness writing retreat for people of color, in 2019.
The Goddess Twins, her debut young adult fantasy novel is now available through Amazon and Indiebound. It is the story of Aurora and Arden, black identical twins who think they’ve settled into normalcy in Ohio after traveling the world. But days before their eighteenth birthday, the snarky twins develop powers in telekinesis and telepathy―at the same time that their famous mother, who’s on tour in London, disappears.
In this interview, after generously sharing the secrets of her magical writing process, Yodassa treats us to an original, fantastic, cosmic love odyssey about Venus and Serena Williams.
What do you love about writing?
Without writing, I would not know the incredible wonder of being in flow with the universe. I feel very spiritually in regards to my creativity. I see my ability to write and weave emotions as a divine gift. I am a vessel, able to tap into the channel of flow from the universe and my ancestors. Writing and crafting transformational healing stories has given me purpose. I remember how very detached I felt from living without it, so I work to maintain and cultivate this blessing. I have found that the way I am in the world, curious, observant, anxious, craving understanding, all of me feels most at use when I am crafting a story.
Describe your writing process in as much detail as you dare.
If I am writing fiction, I like to meditate on the elements of the story, the characters, the setting, the theme and mood I hope the tale evokes. Sometimes I listen to music, sometimes I need full silence. But it always starts with light questioning and listening to what bubbles to the surface.
Sometimes I’ll get visions of scenes or conversations through this, and that will start the direction of my writing. Sometimes I’ll see a full story arc start to develop, and this is when I’ll do outlining and trying to path the points of the plot. But sometimes, none of those things happen and I just wake up with a character or scene fully formed and waiting to be written. To be honest, I am a pretty haphazard style of creator. My inner muse is very flighty, so I try to always have a pen and paper on me just in case inspiration hits when I’m on the train or something of that nature. I’ve just learned to trust that the writing will come, and to be open to the universe’s spontaneous hints of what to create next.
Tell me a story.
Serena Williams is a celestial goddess whose indestructible spirit was formed eons ago from the combined power of three imploding moons and the cosmic love emerging from a field of star clouds.
Once, when Serena Williams was a young goddess star child, she collected stray asteroids and fashioned them into a belt. Later, after napping, she stretched them out and played intergalactic hula hoop with Venus. But then Saturn got all jealous of how fly those sisters are and decided to steal that belt and that’s the real story of how that planet got its rings.
Serena Williams once collected colors across the galaxy by time traveling through the universe’s most beautiful eclipses. She cried at the splendor of the shadows of eons of moons and gathered her tears in a crater on a planet that would one day come to be known as earth, and that body of water is now called the Pacific Ocean.
Serena Williams didn’t have to take on human flesh, to spend even an inch of the immeasurable length of time she has being dazzlingly excellent to live among us mortals. But she did.
And Serena Williams could have chosen any form to reside in as human or take any time in history to grace with her presence, but she chose, in her unquestionable brilliance, to be a young gifted black woman here and now, on this very real planet earth.
And so, we have entered a new chapter in the saga of the all mind, body, and spirit consuming gift that is Serena Williams, in which she is living human history, an athletic warrior who defies all odds with a mere wave of her hand and whose existence in a strong beautiful black female form sends terror to the pillars of the white supremacy patriarchy club. They shake at how her outfits only amplify a living goddess barely contained by flesh. They bristle at her eyes, at her voice, so assured and how she will not cower to their thimbsy power.
But we see the God in her too clearly to be distracted by the envious whispers.
Are we worthy of Serena Williams?
Only the universe knows.
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I coax sexy writers like Yodassa Williams to reveal their creative secrets and processes in writer interviews to inspire you:
Get your copy of The Goddess Twins now.
Which Goddess Twin are you? Take the Quiz. (I’m Aurora!)
Find more of Yodassa’s work on her website.
Watch a live interview with Yodassa on YouTube or catch back-episodes of her podcast.
Feeling inspired? Book a private session with me, The Sexy Grammarian. You always leave private sessions with homework and inspiration, and the first session is always free.
