Toni Braxton may be one of music’s most enduring talents, yet “time” is a concept she ruminates in earnest in her blazing new feature for Essence Magazine.

The R&B icon scorches on the publication’s latest cover as she continues her ‘Love & Laughter’ residency in Las Vegas with Cedric The Entertainer. It also lands on the back of her return to screens with her sisters on hit WE tv series, ‘The Braxtons.’

Beyond posing it up, 57-year-old Braxton opens up about how she continues to evolve, navigating health issues, and acclimating to life without her sister Traci – who tragically died after a brave battle with cancer.

 Check out highlights below…

On the Young Generation:

“My fans are loyal, and I know my fans—but the younger generation, they’re just a little different, and I love them,” the 57-year-old star muses. “They keep you on your toes. They keep you young and fresh. I love that, because I’m an old b*tch! I’ve been doing this since 1993.”

On Adjusting to Life Without Traci:

“We’re just trying to navigate our way through it and in it. But learning to live with a broken heart is challenging. I’ve heard people say it gets better. I don’t know if it gets better. I just think you learn how to live with the pain.”

Her thing was hummingbirds. She had five hummingbirds on her back, and we were all a hummingbird. And since her departure, all I see are hummingbirds—and I feel like that’s her way of talking to us. I know I like to feel that there’s life after life. I think life is everlasting. It never ends. But I just miss her, every day.”

On The Complexities of Navigating Her Own Health Issues Amid Loss:

“And even when I think of my health issues. I’m like, God spared me. And then sometimes I go, But why me?”

But I think of the moment where the doctors say, ‘You’re very lucky to be alive, Toni.’  I could’ve had a massive heart attack—something called ‘the widow-maker’—and they caught it in the nick of time. I would have passed and had no warning with that. And then I think about my sister Traci, how scared she must have been.”

As reported, Braxton and Cedric The Entertainer have extended their Sin City residency.

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[Photo Credit: Essence / Deon Hinton]