“It’s actually been a crazy week,” Zoe Flowers, author of From Ashes to Angel’s Dust, admits when I called her on a chilly Friday. “My work laptop’s having issues, so I had to take it to the Apple Store. I also had another interview this morning, about black women and domestic violence.” Zoe also notes that she had to write a piece someone else needed for another interview. Yet, she enjoys engaging in this work: “It’s great that I’m having these conversations because it’s helping my ideas to jell.” Her ideas center around how women and those affected by domestic violence and trauma can heal themselves. As a survivor of domestic abuse and sexual violence, she is dedicated to making life better for herself and others. She describes herself as a human being curious about life in general; spiritual, an artist, a content creator, a poet, and a writer.
The first iteration of From Ashes to Angel’s Dust first arose after Zoe left an abusive relationship. As she told her friends what she went through, she realized that many people were having similar experiences. She began interviewing people around her, intending to create a work of fiction, but chose not to, realizing the “need to tell the truth of what’s happening in the community... since it’s happening to so many people.” She went to shelters, put up flyers around the city she lived in at the time, reached out to people to talk about their stories. These stories became the first iteration of From Ashes to Angel’s Dust, originally titled Dirty Laundry.
I had no idea that From Ashes to Angel’s Dust had a different title. Zoe shared her reasoning behind the title change: “I felt that Dirty Laundry had a lower vibration, even though it came from people saying, ‘we don’t put our dirty laundry out, we don’t tell people our business’… just the language, ‘Dirty Laundry,’ I felt that it was low energy, low vibration. From Ashes to Angel’s Dust is more inspirational, like how Black women in particular, take the ashes that we’re given and turn it into something beautiful. We take what we’re often given, which is often trash, and we make something beautiful. So many of our stories are like the phoenix, about us rising from the ashes and that’s what I’m about. That’s what my work is about, that’s what my life is about – about rising from the ashes.”
To see what else Zoe has published, go to her website and follow her on social media: http://soulrequirements.org/ Facebook: Tit2ba Productions IG: @iamzoeflowers Twitter: @divinebydesigne Purchase her book at https://amzn.to/2QjghSX