Joshua
@busybeingblack.com
Creator, curator and host of Busy Being Black. Writer, poet, creative alchemist.
busybeingblack.com
busybeingblack.com
For listeners playing Kevin Quashie Bingo, that's shot number 3,789. Please drink responsibly 💀
Our Miraculous Hearts with Phoebe Boswell: pod.link/1355469484/e...
Our Miraculous Hearts with Phoebe Boswell: pod.link/1355469484/e...
October 1, 2025 at 1:11 AM
For listeners playing Kevin Quashie Bingo, that's shot number 3,789. Please drink responsibly 💀
Our Miraculous Hearts with Phoebe Boswell: pod.link/1355469484/e...
Our Miraculous Hearts with Phoebe Boswell: pod.link/1355469484/e...
September 29, 2025 at 7:53 PM
A friend messages with a spell / the wind moving through the trees sounds like the ocean / I am hoisted up and flung into the air / a kamikaze of legs and arms / a child adored and alight / sun-kissed and screaming with giggles
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/the-magicians
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/the-magicians
September 26, 2025 at 8:00 PM
A friend messages with a spell / the wind moving through the trees sounds like the ocean / I am hoisted up and flung into the air / a kamikaze of legs and arms / a child adored and alight / sun-kissed and screaming with giggles
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/the-magicians
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/the-magicians
'I think trauma does things to you that are non-linear, and with all the best intentions, and all the will in the world to want to learn from the lesson, you still find yourself putting walls up.'
https://pod.link/1355469484/episode/YjNjNzg2YmEtOTZlYy0xMWYwLThhZGEtOTczMWIyNmY2NjU2
https://pod.link/1355469484/episode/YjNjNzg2YmEtOTZlYy0xMWYwLThhZGEtOTczMWIyNmY2NjU2
September 26, 2025 at 2:00 PM
'I think trauma does things to you that are non-linear, and with all the best intentions, and all the will in the world to want to learn from the lesson, you still find yourself putting walls up.'
https://pod.link/1355469484/episode/YjNjNzg2YmEtOTZlYy0xMWYwLThhZGEtOTczMWIyNmY2NjU2
https://pod.link/1355469484/episode/YjNjNzg2YmEtOTZlYy0xMWYwLThhZGEtOTczMWIyNmY2NjU2
The children, possessed with their survival and rabid with betrayal, covered themselves in the blood of the complicit, set alight what was left of the pretences and disappeared into the woods.
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/the-end-of-days
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/the-end-of-days
September 26, 2025 at 11:00 AM
The children, possessed with their survival and rabid with betrayal, covered themselves in the blood of the complicit, set alight what was left of the pretences and disappeared into the woods.
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/the-end-of-days
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/the-end-of-days
Her decision to illustrate herself in willow charcoal on the walls of the gallery was a gesture of trust that I found difficult to comprehend. I couldn’t understand myself as just as delicate: to my mind, I deserved my pain.
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/you-must-surrender-your-armour
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/you-must-surrender-your-armour
September 26, 2025 at 9:00 AM
Her decision to illustrate herself in willow charcoal on the walls of the gallery was a gesture of trust that I found difficult to comprehend. I couldn’t understand myself as just as delicate: to my mind, I deserved my pain.
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/you-must-surrender-your-armour
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/you-must-surrender-your-armour
When Phoebe Boswell learned that 95% of Black British adults don't swim, she invited couples, friends and family members to hold each other in the water. Their courage called her back to her first love.
https://pod.link/1355469484/episode/YjNjNzg2YmEtOTZlYy0xMWYwLThhZGEtOTczMWIyNmY2NjU2
https://pod.link/1355469484/episode/YjNjNzg2YmEtOTZlYy0xMWYwLThhZGEtOTczMWIyNmY2NjU2
September 25, 2025 at 8:00 PM
When Phoebe Boswell learned that 95% of Black British adults don't swim, she invited couples, friends and family members to hold each other in the water. Their courage called her back to her first love.
https://pod.link/1355469484/episode/YjNjNzg2YmEtOTZlYy0xMWYwLThhZGEtOTczMWIyNmY2NjU2
https://pod.link/1355469484/episode/YjNjNzg2YmEtOTZlYy0xMWYwLThhZGEtOTczMWIyNmY2NjU2
just as you begin to feel you figured it out / you will harden into stone / boy-cum-comet ablaze / and you will plummet / and they will weep for you / in the valleys you felt so trapped in.
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/wild-horses
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/wild-horses
September 25, 2025 at 2:00 PM
just as you begin to feel you figured it out / you will harden into stone / boy-cum-comet ablaze / and you will plummet / and they will weep for you / in the valleys you felt so trapped in.
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/wild-horses
https://thedancingboy.substack.com/p/wild-horses
'All I wanted to do was be a painter, but I was dissuaded by a white man tutor. He said, "I don't get what you're trying to say. What I suggest you do is stop buying paint and instead spend your money on Miles Davis records and go and hang out in Brixton."'
pod.link/1355469484/e...
pod.link/1355469484/e...
September 25, 2025 at 1:25 AM
'All I wanted to do was be a painter, but I was dissuaded by a white man tutor. He said, "I don't get what you're trying to say. What I suggest you do is stop buying paint and instead spend your money on Miles Davis records and go and hang out in Brixton."'
pod.link/1355469484/e...
pod.link/1355469484/e...
'I would take a photo of myself in whatever state I was in, and I would draw that onto the wall. It was in willow charcoal because it can be damaged very easily, and I wanted there to be this sense that I'm making a bid to trust you to protect it, to protect me.'
pod.link/1355469484/e...
pod.link/1355469484/e...
September 25, 2025 at 1:25 AM
'I would take a photo of myself in whatever state I was in, and I would draw that onto the wall. It was in willow charcoal because it can be damaged very easily, and I wanted there to be this sense that I'm making a bid to trust you to protect it, to protect me.'
pod.link/1355469484/e...
pod.link/1355469484/e...
Just in: a tender meditation on grief, healing and courage with Phoebe Boswell, a multidisciplinary artist creating portals that return us to our miraculous hearts.
pod.link/1355469484/e...
#busybeingblack #art #podcast
pod.link/1355469484/e...
#busybeingblack #art #podcast
September 25, 2025 at 1:25 AM
Just in: a tender meditation on grief, healing and courage with Phoebe Boswell, a multidisciplinary artist creating portals that return us to our miraculous hearts.
pod.link/1355469484/e...
#busybeingblack #art #podcast
pod.link/1355469484/e...
#busybeingblack #art #podcast
This comment about Busy Being Black has made my day 🥹😭
"As a Black queer person, I still wrestle so much with knowing my worth in this white supremacist, anti-Black world but it's these conversations that uplift me and make me feel so seen!"
👉🏾 open.spotify.com/show/1sMQ0Tk...
#busybeingblack
"As a Black queer person, I still wrestle so much with knowing my worth in this white supremacist, anti-Black world but it's these conversations that uplift me and make me feel so seen!"
👉🏾 open.spotify.com/show/1sMQ0Tk...
#busybeingblack
December 20, 2024 at 11:21 AM
This comment about Busy Being Black has made my day 🥹😭
"As a Black queer person, I still wrestle so much with knowing my worth in this white supremacist, anti-Black world but it's these conversations that uplift me and make me feel so seen!"
👉🏾 open.spotify.com/show/1sMQ0Tk...
#busybeingblack
"As a Black queer person, I still wrestle so much with knowing my worth in this white supremacist, anti-Black world but it's these conversations that uplift me and make me feel so seen!"
👉🏾 open.spotify.com/show/1sMQ0Tk...
#busybeingblack
“I want to be like jazz. I want to be alive and to be flexible and fluid and queer and curious—and to be ugly. I’m having such a good relationship with ugliness right now. I no longer want to perform morality.”
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
#busybeingblack #podcast
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
#busybeingblack #podcast
December 18, 2024 at 6:34 PM
“I want to be like jazz. I want to be alive and to be flexible and fluid and queer and curious—and to be ugly. I’m having such a good relationship with ugliness right now. I no longer want to perform morality.”
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
#busybeingblack #podcast
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
#busybeingblack #podcast
I was also stunned to learn that one can purchase a 15-year license for lynching photographs via Getty Images. The “Add to Basket” button under these photos is a little too on-the-nose for me: the auction block has quite the afterlife 🫠 #AddtoBlackSky
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
December 16, 2024 at 9:04 AM
I was also stunned to learn that one can purchase a 15-year license for lynching photographs via Getty Images. The “Add to Basket” button under these photos is a little too on-the-nose for me: the auction block has quite the afterlife 🫠 #AddtoBlackSky
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
“Images always live inside of other images, and every image of Blackness is also bound up with the carrying of so many other images of Black people. The responsibility of that is huge.” — Legacy Russell
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
December 14, 2024 at 9:04 AM
“Images always live inside of other images, and every image of Blackness is also bound up with the carrying of so many other images of Black people. The responsibility of that is huge.” — Legacy Russell
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
👉🏾 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
"We must become whistleblowers. We must become muthafuckas with messages and a mission. A tremendous amount of common sense, arrogance and defiance will get us through. The promise of a new world lives not just in our words, but in our actions." — Assotto Saint, "Why I Write"
#BlackSky
#BlackSky
November 21, 2024 at 3:41 PM
"We must become whistleblowers. We must become muthafuckas with messages and a mission. A tremendous amount of common sense, arrogance and defiance will get us through. The promise of a new world lives not just in our words, but in our actions." — Assotto Saint, "Why I Write"
#BlackSky
#BlackSky
“Pleasure is political. Seek out the pleasure. Find the pleasure. Even in the difficult, seek it out … because you’re not supposed to.” — Mojisola Adebayo
#BusyBeingBlack #AddtoBlackSky #Podcast
podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
#BusyBeingBlack #AddtoBlackSky #Podcast
podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
November 20, 2024 at 9:09 AM
“Pleasure is political. Seek out the pleasure. Find the pleasure. Even in the difficult, seek it out … because you’re not supposed to.” — Mojisola Adebayo
#BusyBeingBlack #AddtoBlackSky #Podcast
podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
#BusyBeingBlack #AddtoBlackSky #Podcast
podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
"We Are Rehearsing Freedom" is a tender and enlivening conversation about the potential of the Black radical imagination to help shift us out of oppressive landscapes and towards just and dignifying worlds that affirm Black aliveness. #BlackSky #BusyBeingBlack
🎧 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
🎧 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
November 19, 2024 at 9:33 AM
"We Are Rehearsing Freedom" is a tender and enlivening conversation about the potential of the Black radical imagination to help shift us out of oppressive landscapes and towards just and dignifying worlds that affirm Black aliveness. #BlackSky #BusyBeingBlack
🎧 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
🎧 podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/b...
“Relearning” is a much more generative way to think about and engage with the processes many of us employ to show up more fully in the world. “Unlearning” doesn’t actually say much about what fills the space unlearning clears.
April 16, 2023 at 12:03 PM
“Relearning” is a much more generative way to think about and engage with the processes many of us employ to show up more fully in the world. “Unlearning” doesn’t actually say much about what fills the space unlearning clears.
Andreas Weber’s Matter and Desire is touching me so deeply. I’m on my second highlighter and am only halfway through the book.
“To be alive is to surrender to the reality of a bodily existence that is never truly at peace and that gives birth to poetry and beauty out of this uncertainty.”
“To be alive is to surrender to the reality of a bodily existence that is never truly at peace and that gives birth to poetry and beauty out of this uncertainty.”
April 16, 2023 at 7:17 AM
Andreas Weber’s Matter and Desire is touching me so deeply. I’m on my second highlighter and am only halfway through the book.
“To be alive is to surrender to the reality of a bodily existence that is never truly at peace and that gives birth to poetry and beauty out of this uncertainty.”
“To be alive is to surrender to the reality of a bodily existence that is never truly at peace and that gives birth to poetry and beauty out of this uncertainty.”
“Being wild means being uncontrollably alive, means unfolding oneself as part of a network of perpetual transformative relationships.” — Andreas Weber, Matter and Desire
April 15, 2023 at 10:10 AM
“Being wild means being uncontrollably alive, means unfolding oneself as part of a network of perpetual transformative relationships.” — Andreas Weber, Matter and Desire