Devotional.
Beyond obsessing over Sinners I’ve been burning candles at both ends… and a little on all sides for good measure. Everything’s fine, though. Both of my bands are picking up speed, and one of them even took me to Lincoln Center—the same place my grandmother first took me to see a Black opera singer when I was five. That night, something inside me sparked. It still burns. But that fire doesn’t put out the usual mess I carry—the depression, the anxiety, the stress that never seem to pack up and leave. So, I’ve been looking for a way to sit with them, to let them live in the same space as the good stuff.
Lately, I’ve found two albums that have helped me reframe my darker emotions: Desert Fairy Princess by Adele Sebastian and Heaux Tales by Jazmine Sullivan. They feel like they exist in different worlds—Sebastian’s album feels like a spiritual journey through a barren desert, while Sullivan’s is raw, blunt, and unapologetically human. But both have something to offer when it comes to sitting with grief, depression, and that uneasy feeling that never really goes away.
Desert Fairy Princess isn’t just music—it’s a slow, wandering meditation on grief. I was put onto the record from a Substack I follow called Active Listening. I have taken my time with this record to allow it to unwrap its gifts. It feels like walking through a desert where nothing is immediately solved, but everything has its place. The rhythms and melodies carry you, like you’re searching for something or someone but never quite finding it. The grief here is spiritual, a loss you sit with, not rush through. There’s a power in this emptiness, a reminder that growth doesn’t always look like progress. It’s cyclical, messy, and quiet—like the desert.
Then there’s Heaux Tales—it’s messy, loud, and real. Sullivan doesn’t hide her grief or pain. She gives it a voice and lets it rage. Songs like “Pick Up Your Feelings” and “Lost One” put heartbreak and betrayal right in your face, but there’s also a reclaiming of power, a voice that says, “I’m still here, and I’m not apologizing for my pain.” Sullivan’s work is about surviving, about realizing that even in the deepest parts of heartbreak, there’s space to reclaim yourself. You don’t just survive—you grow.
It’s also about dick.
Dicked down, dick up, dick what, “I know what that dick said”. Sullivan lets desire sit right next to grief, because relief is needed. She makes room for lust, regret, pleasure, and power, all tangled together.
It’s raw and complicated—she talks about letting go of values, financial independence, even common sense, just to hold onto that connection. But it’s not just about sex. It’s about what the dick represents: relief, escape, validation, and love in a world that often offers none. It always makes me think of Erykah Badu’s “For the D Freestyle,” where the absurdity of the lengths she’d go "for the D" turns the whole idea into a kind of power play. It’s humorous, yes, but it’s also subversive. By naming it, exaggerating it, they are owning it. These women aren’t just talking about dick—they’re talking about the places we go when we need comfort, even when it costs us something. It can be a weakness, sure, but it can also be a way to reclaim agency.
Sometimes I think about texting my ex like, “Hey, just checking in—just wondering, you still out here wreckin’ lives with that same ol’ demon dick or did you finally get it registered as a natural disaster?” Because listen, getting some strange might be better for my emotional health—less baggage, no flashbacks, no spiritual debt. But the familiar? But the familiar rearranges my guts. That dick got generational consequences. That dick had lore. That dick had me Googling “how to sage your soul after goblin mode.” (Just kidding, I know how to sage it. His name is Kalle).
But when the thirst traps fade and the demon dick never texted back, I find myself right back in the desert—with Desert Fairy Princess playing in the background like a soft reminder that grief doesn’t always scream. Sometimes it just sits. Quiet. Dry. Heavy. Adele Sebastian’s music isn’t asking me to be strong or savage or sexy—it’s just asking me to be. That album doesn’t rush healing, it doesn’t perform resilience. It just lets everything breathe.
And that’s the thing—both Desert Fairy Princess and Heaux Tales are devotional in their own ways. One is spiritual, the other is carnal. One prays with stillness; the other testifies through lust and heartbreak. Sebastian’s flute is a call to the divine. Jazmine’s voice? A call to the dick—but let’s not act like that’s not divine too. Because devotion is devotion. Maybe that’s the real magic: learning to hold both truths at once. That I can be the woman who spirals over good dick and the one who grieves with grace. That sometimes survival sounds like a flute in the middle of the desert. And sometimes, it sounds like “I know what that dick said.”
What these two albums have taught me is that I don’t need to rush through my darker emotions. The key is listening—listening to the music, listening to myself. The darkness doesn’t go away, but maybe it doesn’t need to. Maybe it’s just another part of the journey, another place to find meaning.
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