Mama May Have...

Women farmers have been holding it down, making groceries as it were, since goddess knows when...Got tired of all that foraging and moving about from from place to place. These days most of us don't even know how food gets on the table and depend on supermarkets and huge warehouses to get our grub on. I come from a long line of women farmers and in summer 07 passed this knowledge on to the young girls in my family. Me, my grandaughter Imani, her friend Rachel and Niara my grandniece pictured here clearing brush as we reclaim some of our land that's been overgrown by Cedars and Multiple Rose. I wrote about our experience--a short story titled "Makin' Groceries" which will be published in the Hunger and Thirst anthology ( forthcoming 2008 City Works Press). The tale I wove is layered...stories within stories-The Ant and the Grasshopper rmxd which my daddy, Chapman Custine Johnson, used to tell us all the time when he had us out in the field pickin' rocks and preparing the ground before planting. It also contains an Anansi story, which is a remix of Anansi and Grandfather Thunder. The moral of the story (there's always a moral) is about the consequenses of greed. In the end Anansi is shamed and runs away. The old ones say that he's been seen where the bush ghosts hakilele on the famished road. I saw some of the harvest, but had to leave as it piqued and return to Cali and teaching. Carole took over distributing food...we had so much after giving it to family and friends in the surrounding area she took veggies to the food bank and her church in Philly. The harvest kept coming and coming until finally the first frost hit the pumpkins and peppers, tomatoes and zucchini. In the story "Nan" who is a
matriarchal character based on none other than yours truly tells the girls that zucchini are magical cuz when you pick em the next day there's a giant one hanging on the vine. Billie Holiday (Strange Fruit) sings, "Mama may have, Papa may have...but God Bless the Child Who has his own." True dat, 'specially in these days and times when we seem to have forgotten the lessons that help us survive in a world focused on greed and consumption rather than preparing for prosperity. There is enough for everyone... there is no need for war. We can tap the sun's energy, change our lifestyles, recycle--if only we remember the cycle of planting and the ensuing harvest that will surely come. Here's a pumpkin for Niara!

A Woman's Gotta Write...

Me and my sister Carole were cleaning stalls on this chilly January morning. It was so cold that she had to hammer the ice in the trough so the cows could drink. There is something about shoveling shit...for me its a glutinous metaphor, representing life in the Diaspora. Tonight after African American Art class, Selina walked me to my office and told me she was @%$*@%# disgusted--couldn't believe the foolishness of Fat Tuesday, not in the Mardi Gras sense but in the sense that black women voted for Hillary because she was a woman. What can I say about platforms--shoes or stages where we don masks for all the world to see? I have issues with a woman who doesn't know what's going on in her own backyard, trying to run a country, yet breaking down in public; or at least seemingly breaking down when its convenient and on various occasions to garner the symp vote. But symp rhymes with pimp and somehow I feel like we been played. I could be wrong, but I come from a long line of African female farmers, teachers, thinkers, doers who can't really afford to shed tears at the drop of a chignon. Like Harriet Jacobs in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, when Dr. Norcom stalks her, Mrs. Norcom turns her head the other way or blames the victim-- young slave women whose children were fathered by her husband, the good doctor. At one point in the slave narrative, Jacob's writes that Mrs. Norcom sold some of the babies fathered by her husband because she wanted new furniture. How easily we forget the relationship between ourselves and white women who find it convenient to stand with Daughters of Africa only when it suits them. Mama uses to say, "It's terrible when it suits." And to quote Public Enemy, "Can't Trus' It" when it comes to old girls tears. 

My sister Carole, our family matriarch, has tremendous weight on her shoulders. When I'm back home I share the weight cleaning stalls,

 burning brush, chopping cedars, recycling, mowing grass, planting the garden during the day and writing at night, which she scolds me for like mama, who warned me about burning the candle at both ends. But a woman's gotta write what a woman's gotta write when a woman's gotta write it.  

Selina wrote a brilliant journal about double consciousness and masking,  which she read in class tonight. The question is... what lies behind the mask? Paul Laurence Dunbar referred to the double consciousness of African people in the Diaspora and the mask "...that grins and lies/that hides our cheeks and shades our eyes/ this debt we pay to human guile/with torn and bleeding hearts we smile/ and mouth with myriad subtlties/ we wear the mask"...still.  And Gwendolyn Brooks writes, I've stayed in the front yard all my life/ I want a peek at the back/Where it's rough and untended and hungry weed grows. A girl gets sick of a rose.  Take off your mask, pay attention to your own back yard...then holla back.

Happy Hollow Daze

Flew into Philadelphia International last night to visit family for the hollow daze. The reason for the synonymous spelling is to focus attention on the hyper-commercialization of big business, backed by slave/colonial fortunes and invested in marketing and advertising in order to slip thier subliminal hand deep in our pockets to satisy the artificial needs/wants of loved ones, of our selves. And we open wide, allowing them to suck after hypnotizing us into zombie like participation by consuming whatever it is they have in stock, on the warehouse shelves....I saw it first hand tonight, visiting my nephew Will's family in Bethlehem, PA. The artificial Christmas tree was lit--dressed with bulbs, garland and tinsel. An agel rested on the treetop, beneath which lay a mountain of presents that had been opened earlier that afternoon. His little girl, Coral, was coloring in front of the tree, but soon decided that she wanted to play with several cans of playdough. Her mama suggested that she wait until tomorrow because it was getting late and playdough can be quiite messy. Coral became angry, told her mama "no" and commenced to pout and then to cry. Then to my surprise, started kicking the rest of the presents and throwing them about until her mama threatened to "get the hot sauce," which seemed to calm her down.

Things have gotten out of hand. No matter what we get, whether we deserve it or not, we want more and more...and more. Gone are the daze of apples and oranges and home made cookies in stockings hanging from a makeshift brick carboard chimney; brand new socks and drawers, coloring books and crayons. Tonight I looked out of the backdoor of our farmhouse remembering how the snow fell across fallow fields. There is a full moon tonight and as I looked up at the mountain draped in the last rays of twilight, I remember the nights of laughter and love in this house; remember mamma coming home from work from the stocking factory or her day job cleaning and cooking Christmas dinner; remember the effort my sisters Pat, Carole and Peg put into making butterscotch and peppermint candy wreaths to hang from the doors; remember days of walking the stream and hunting crows feet to make the wreaths look authentic; remember digging sassafrass roots in the woods to make tonic that we'd need to cleanse our bodies come spring. When we couldn't afford a tree, daddy would come home after work at the brick yard, go to the woods down by the old house and chop down a cedar. And although the branches were oftentimes sparse, we'd make up for it by popping corn and stringing it as garland or making colored paper chains, or handmade ornaments from salted cookie dough. In Stations Audre Lord warns about this never ending hunger, warns about our fear that can never be satisfied. More than likely there are complex reasons for Coral's temper tantrum, but I believe it's a metaphor for a larger conundrum we face in American society. We need to be still on this Chilly Christmas evening, take time and reflect upon the true meaning of this time whatever our beliefs might be. It's time for family. Time for love. Time for small acts of kindness that accumulate, balance, and harmonize what has become the hollow daze of our increasingly complicated lives.

Her Hands in My Hair...

Florence W. Williams crossed over to the ancestral zone on Wednesday, December 12, 2007. Born November 8, 1911 in the Elmwood section of Philadelphia, PA. she was 96 years old. My dear lovely auntie, who used to straighten the thick of my hair on Saturday mornings in my mama's kitchen. I will miss her hands in my hair, miss her stern look when I was actin' a fool, her beautiful smile, the twinkle in her eye when she shared secrets with me that shaped me into the woman I am today. Later, I'd grow locks and she never quite adjusted to the style to say the least.

She promised me one night while I was sleeping, to sneak into my room with scissors sharpened and cut off one by one my twisted locks. Her guilded instrument, seal and deliver the Cyclops. My crown lopped and falling beneath shoulders, bare ropes tangled. My strength cascaded round my head as one eye opens--splay the wounded mane, a trophy in the darknes. Steal the lambs lost, dare the dead. What did she know of summer shadows draped on bedroom walls? Of cracks that sing soprano under floorboards. Splintered rough and calloused claws of sparrows, small breasted summoner of twilight vigils beneath towers crumbling covenants with God? Still I loved her irons that curled the blackness. The sizzle of blue unguents and green pomades that tamed wild roots. Ordered them lie down, preserved in smoky parlors, shoot by shoot on steamy Saturdays. "Be still" and enter Shirley's temple, refined with offerings of singed rags and burnt sacrifice of earlobes elegant on protracted afternoons of beauty. A list of stylized possibilities that were never mine.

Come out, come out wherever you are...

I returned to teaching this fall. Didn't realize how much time it takes, especially away from the research. I feel like I've enlisted in the "darkness visible." The hypergraph in me is excited for the semester to end. Love teaching, just like I imagine LDB loved spreading the word, healing the spirit. Got multiple writing projects--irons smoking in the ink & fire and it's time to come out and play. . One thing that I was able to accomplish during the semester was launching Blacksong, the digital archive of my matrilineal family history. I worked with Otim Oloya--one of the best as far as graphic designers go; an all around creative genius doing dirty deeds on the Left coast. We worked together on weekends and in mid-November launched Blacksong which can be accessed at www.djamsay.net. It's a work in progress, like the genealogical study of the Blackson Clan. During the hollow daze the plan is to complete the first phase of the archive. Big Ups Oteezy. I couldn't have done it without you baby.

Tu Madre

Happy Mamma's Day to All My Girls. The holiday's spiritual history dates back to ancient Kemet (aka Egypt). The celebration of the African Goddess Isis as the original mother of mothers of the pharonic line transforms and translates to others as well. Popular culture attributes the holiday's origin to the Greeks celebrating Rhea and the Roman Cybele as the first observed holiday. Most images on cards, web sites and magazines picture a European-type woman with suckling child, which is a striking resemblance to Isis cradling her infant son Horus. Why the sublimal erasure of history venerating women of color? "Bom-chika-wom-wom"-- the "Dozens" is a trope, figure of speech, or game of verbal sparring. It also refers to slaves who were auctioned by the dozen because they were elders or were mentally compromised. Rooted in west African traditions, during slavery playing the Dozens becomes a highly developed language arts skill, especially when it came to "Yo Mama" or "Tu Madre." Making a verbal come back when someone insults "yo mama" is a sign of wisdom, social grace and advanced mental wit, necessary for survival in a society where mothers, aunts, grandmothers and sisters could be beaten, raped or sold on a whim. As previously noted in his sketch, LDB mentions his mother Hannah's father (Palice Abrutas Darram) and his two children who were stolen from Africa and sold into slavery. He doesn't mention his grndfather Darram's wife nor her fate. Was she killed during a village raid? Raped on the slave ship that brought her to the Caribbean? Did she commit suicide or die from one of the infectious diseases in the ship's hull? Whatever her fate, Mama Darram, I celebrate your ancestral presence and all other women who work endlessly to protect thier family and extended family today.

Africans Resist

African rulers were coerced into selling thier own people or neighboring tribes into a very different slavery than what was practiced on the continent (Equiano). The choice: either raid villages, kidnapping your neighbors' wives, children and elders and sell them to European traders whose ships lay anchored off the coast, or to be sold themselves. This was not the case for all rulers, most notably Nzinga an Angolan warrior queen who resisted the Portugese in the early 17th century. She met with the governor, representing her brother the "ngola" (king). Here's another case of name switching or misinterpertation of names by Europeans who dubbed the entire country "Angola." Nzinga arrives at Luanda decked out in royal finery. She peeps game, realizing that the only seat in the room belongs to the governor. She calls over one of her girls who falls on her hands and knees and Nzinga takes her place on a human seat in the history of African resistance. She could not be moved, even though the governor tries to dehumanize...tries to debase her royal status and thow her off center. The governor's plan backfires, and the meeting results in a treaty on equal terms. Leaders like Nzinga are inspirational and like her predecessor Joan of Arc, who struggled against British oppression, her fight against the Portugese should be included in a curriculum marking African people as human agents of social change.