Brothers and Sisters

What has been done to the Black man, has been done to other men, in other lands. The hands are different, but the motive remains the same. It has been done to the Red man. The Yellow man. The Afghan man. It has been done in the East, as it has been done in the West; it has been done to the Jews, as to the Gentile, to the Muslim as to the Palestinian. In South America, as in North America. It has been done…and it CONTINUES to be done. And we see it not. It is ‘Divide and Rule’ at its persuasive best. And where mankind allows itself to be deluded and divided by the nonsense that speaks to its differences in Colour (whether of Skin or Philosophy or Religion; whether based on Geography or Culture or tastes and tendencies), we strengthen error and allow Evil to rule supreme…in and over all our lives.

When will we forget the sorry story of our Skin, and replace it with an understanding of the real story: the story of Evil and its many disguises, and its continued praying upon the souls of men and mankind. When will we seek commonality with hearts and minds – forgetting Skin? Then, and only then will the Black man begin to find his way out of his particular dilemma – bringing the World with him, into a new day and a bright new dawn.

When our “Brother” is any man of clean heart and hands and upright mind….When a “Sister” is she who feels every woman’s pain and she who knows every child as a child of her own heart and soul….When we have shed our Skins and revealed our Spirits; when we see with our hearts, and not with our eyes; when we have embraced our Higher-Selves; then, and only then will we leave our sordid pasts behind and walk hand in hand (brown hands holding red hands, holding yellow hands, holding arab hands, holding asian hands, holding white hands…holding hands) to the mountain top and into a new Tomorrow.

Weeping and belly-aching ad nauseam about your “poor black history” and your depraved black past gets you nothing except more of the same. More novels, more stories, more memories from this, or that new perspective; more hurt, more remembered depravities, more history, more of his-story. Just More. But it is only more…of the same. And nothing changes. And the Black mind is lulled into a deep sleep. After a while, it becomes plain (certainly to those who do not sleep) that there is nothing new to be said. Its just the same ol’, same ol’…”Woe is me, I am Black!” And I say…”So what!“

Black…His-story…or a “true story”

We talk too much about the Black skin of ours and sing too many songs about our remembered (and embittered) History. It is kind of a myopic and destructive arrogance – the sheer joy of our recitations on deprivations, misery and enduring cruelty, heaped upon a marked people. And we clutch our tragedy to our bosom, flaunting our personal history of horror, as though it were some bright, jewel-encrusted pin – the envy of every eye that beheld it.

The Black man. His-story. I am the Black man. The reviled and derided. The used and the much abused Black man; sold into slavery by his brothers, separated from kith and kin by the demon white man, who scattered us afar and parted our land. Woe is me! Behold my peculiar suffering… And on and on and on the song , lulling the Black soul into a deep self-satisfied sleep. The self-absorbed sound of the Black men reveling in the sins done to his Black skin. His-story. It’s history, my friend, and like it or not, it’s time to move on!

This continuing obsession of self has already cost us dearly. Our complete self-absorption has blinded us to the world beyond and to the Truth. Our history has nothing to do with our Black skins, per se. Our Black skins were simply a wondrous convenience. If that distinction had not ben provided by Nature, man would have conjured a contrived formula, some definitive external marking, which would help to make their games easier to pursue with some amount of order. A bright yellow star sewn to ones outer garment might have served quite well (as it happens it did!). Red skin might suffice, what? Slanted eyes, maybe? A foreign tongue, crime enough perhaps? Any marking or characteristic would certainly provide adequate excuse for providing a sinister rationale for the  proposed hurt inflicted.

The Black mans history of hurt is not his-story. It is the worlds story! It is the shameful testament of the Evil we have allowed to survive in our midst, unchallenged. How different is the Black mans tale, to that of the Red man, for instance. Read the history of the lies, the hurt and defiling perpetrated upon the Native American Indians, at the hands on the invading hordes…and I dare you not to weep. And yet, its the same old story, nothing new at all. And repeated in the hurt done to all the native peoples in all the other lands that caught the fancy of the aggressor, and upon which he would raise monuments to his glory. Never once sorrowing for the blood and bones of the native sons that lay crushed beneath is impudent drive to power and great glory.

The Black man – lost in his own myopic world view and blind to the wider vision – sees not the painful contradiction, in seeking justice and equity from those who (by reason of grave wrongdoing and total disregard for humanity) established themselves in power by defending  injustice and woeful inequity! The Black man, lulled to sleep by the constant refrain of the songs of his own personal suffering, never for one moment thought to ask: “Do I really want to be the one (and bear equal guilt), with those willing to raise their cities on innocent blood, fearless of a justifying God?”

Can it be wondered then, that maybe the Black man finds himself lost and stumbling down the dark path. When the holiest book invites us to be “…our brothers keeper“, while yet in the Black mans lexicon, he has allowed his ‘brother’ to mean only himself! “We sisters need to look out for each other…” And the Black woman only means herself! It is Skin-talk. The Native American…is not a ‘brother’. The dispossessed Maori woman from New Zealand…is not a ‘sister’. Nor are any of the hundreds and thousands other men and women who have felt the hand of the same undivided, unerring, unchanging…EVIL.

We are united in our Skin. And thus, divided…living in solitary confinement and separated from the rest of the world and the rest of mankind…separated from their hurt, their pain and their fear…in the face of the same one, continuing, recurring EVIL that stalks. The flesh (our Skin), has become the whole and the all, and the Spirit has accounted for nought. And so we miss the point. We miss the boat. And thereby we allow Evil to continue its mad rampage. Not understanding that our story, is NOT ‘our’ story! It is not the story of Blackness or of Black hurt…it is just a part (and a very small part), and proof of the “true story” of Evil, and its continuing presence and impact upon Life.

Realist VS Naturalist

When the Black woman is no longer forced (by Black Woman) to bear the guilt of her preferred expression of herself (most especially in how she chooses to wear her hair), we will find that we will no more be talking the nonsense about the “…Black woman’s thing about her hair“. The only “thing‘” she has about her hair, is making sure she does not upset the prison warders, appointed to determine the depth of her true loyalty to her Blackness. Strange thing is, even though the prison warders (Black Woman), would have us believe, that only the truly well-adjusted Black Woman is she who has made ‘peace’ with her hair (aka wearing it in its natural glory); it has always seemed to me, that it is almost always these ‘naturalists’ – so to speak – who seem most obsessive and especially afflicted  with this matter of ‘hair-concerns’. And their hair seems to become a badge of something – a badge of honour perhaps? And they feel they must burden other women with their grievous burden of this daily dose of ‘Blackness’! It is as though – unlike other women, whose hair fashion is a delightful and whimsical choice, and an entirely personal expression of self – it is History …writ large; it is separation; it is our photograph of our Past; it is to BE Black! It is a cross to bear, and to be borne with honour…Lest we forget the Past (and build a Future!)

If you want to wear you hair natural, blonde, straight, permed, bald, wigged, woven or braided…who gives a damn, and why should we! Just do it because you like it. And who gives a crap why you like it! Do we always know why we like all, or any of the things we like? And if we don’t know why we like something, is that an invitation to avoid it? And ought we to ponder deeply as to the cause and source of this liking, even when there is no illegality or immorality involved? Do what you like Black woman, without deep (historical) analysis; and you will be amazed to find just how “no problem” is your hair (except to the extent of Every-Woman’s concern… which is vanity).

There is neither law nor reason that would prevent the Black Woman wearing her hair straight or blonde or both. Yet, there are Black women who would (and doubtless have) written tomes the size of The Bible as to what inherent emotional deformity this bespeaks. And why? Simply because it is the ‘Black’ woman, and she may not exercise the same choice as the rest of free mankind. Her choices are not choices…they are issues. She has chosen to streak her hair…she has issues! She has fallen in love with a Latino…she has issues! Why? She’s Black…and the Black woman is not free. She is constrained and governed (in all she does) by her Blackness.

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/african-americans-many-rivers-to-cross/history/100-amazing-facts/madam-walker-the-first-black-american-woman-to-be-a-self-made-millionaire/

Hair Today…Gone Tomorrow

It is time we stopped making an issue of “HAIR“! It is time that we stopped burdening the Black Woman with the nonsense surrounding the ‘how’ and the ‘why’ of her choosing hairstyles…filling her with guilt about foolishness. Why must everything be twisted to fit some supremely Black agenda? Why must the Black Woman live forever confined in the shade of Blackness? Why can’t she be allowed to drop the qualifying adjective from her persona? And, let us be reminded, a qualification – not imposed from without and not enforced by some alien ‘other’ – but manacled to her by none other than her sister-self. Her boundaries patrolled, lest she break free and escape (her Past, perhaps?).

When will she be allowed to understand herself as a WOMAN? If she happens to like wearing wigs…let her admit it and enjoy it! Without apology, excuse or guilt. If she likes her hair arrow-straight, let that be her prerogative. Life has chained her choices for long enough already. Leave her alone and let her breathe. Let her become an individual at last, and no more anyones ‘Black’! It is time that the Black lady be allowed to like what she likes…without having to hear how ‘twisted’ History has made her.

How many White women do you know, for instance, who wear their hair in its God-given state and entirely naturally? In all the world, I doubt one could find more than a handful. So what? Are we to understand by that fact, that the White woman is ashamed of who she is? And what of the Chinese women, who favour permed hair? And the White woman, who sees wearing her hair in braids as exotic? Do these women yearn secretly to be Black! Or are they simply Woman, and exercising a Womans prerogative to change…to change her mind, to change herself and to change her look! Doing what Woman does best…creating…reinventing herself! Decorating! Guilding! Dreaming!

Ah, that’s it. Dreaming! She dares to Dream. How dare she! It is not allowed. And not even upon the canvas that is her own personal. private, physical persona, may she lift her artists brush, to paint upon herself a particular fancy, drawing her inspiration from where she will. She is enslaved to the Will of her Blackness and subjected to its voice. Her Blackness, that supremely hard task-master, who would own her mind, body and soul. The Black lady is not free. It is not allowed. The real Black Woman will see to that. She who patrols the perimeter fence of Blackness, making this or that allowable and acceptable within its confines; and declaring this and that intolerable, unacceptable and against the ‘rules’…the rules of being Black!

Other Women may draw inspiration from around the world, and from every part of the universe, to fashion the ‘temple’ of their souls…only the Black Woman must confine her palette to a single shade. No magnificently appointed temples for her; no guilded domes and friezes, no fretwork, no playing with ideas from Japanese costumery or French hair-design…No temples, just the share-croppers dwelling of yesteryear; blinkered against change, eschewing an inheritance in the world at large and limiting her whole existence to the known and familiar. Eyes firmly fixed behind her, fixed in the Past…where her Blackness lives…

“Don’t forget your (nappy) roots, Black Woman! What have you to do with the rest of the world? Don’t you know that you are a being apart, sequestered from the whole? How dare you draw inspiration therefrom. Unblinkered, you fail us. Stay within the lines Black Woman…or have your knuckles rapped“.

 

Dear Black Woman…

It’s not about Colour…its about being a WOMAN; about understanding and honouring the voice and truth of the Sacred Feminine.

In an earlier work (of mine), I charge Feminism with hurting all our children, of whatever race, colour, religion, nation or tongue. In fact, I charge Feminism with costing us all! Full stop! Robbing our children of mothers and mothering; robbing our men of the strength that makes them protectors and providers, and robbing them of the need to be  masculine, strong and supportive; and robbing our communities of the intuitive guardianship of Woman-at-home. Against that backdrop, therefore, it may easily be said that the Black Woman missed an opportunity, that would ultimately have injured the benefit of Every-Woman.

Had the Black Woman chosen (as she had every right to) against taking, as it were, ‘the road most travelled’, and had she chosen instead to recognize and embrace her already plainly irrefutable claim on equality (with all but God), she would have defended the sanctity of her womanhood, protected it jealously, and fearlessly broken new ground and created new and different paths wherein to dwell. After all, the Black Womans display of strength and fortitude (in the arena of her enslavement), her courage and her compassion – even under fire – spoke, not to the race, but to the enormity of the Spirit of Woman. It spoke to its grandeur and its unconquerable depths. We were strong because we had to be…not because we were Black! We were strong…because we are WOMAN! And hence, it may be said (like it or not) that what I (Black Woman) have done…We (Every-Woman) have done.

On that basis, it should be plain that Woman long ago established the truth of her equality – in every endeavor -with her male counterpart.  She had no need to test it, or prove it, or demonstrate it. It had been fully and finally established on the killing fields of the slave plantations. Certainly, our melanin-rich skins provided more than adequate  protection against the ravages of the suns heat (for both male and female), but the ravages of the sun were perhaps the kindest of all the cruelties to be borne, and the least of all the hardships and trials. And melanin played no part in providing courage and strength of character, and strength of purpose; it was no sop against fear and despair and longing, and long hours; it had no part in comforting our young or in sustaining dreams to stay alive to meet tomorrow and tomorrow; it did not endow the body with steadfastness and determination, wisdom, patience and hope…Those were Womans wiles – her special, precious gifts, preserved and brought forth even in that place of abject horror. It was her gifts, more than anything else, that would keep an enslaved people purposed, striving and alive. It was the strength and resilience of WOMAN…in their midst.

There are innumerable accounts in the History of mankind wherein this truth has been self-evident. Speak to me of the Jewish Woman, in the day of their reckoning; the Woman of the French Resistance movements; the Russian woman, the Vietnamese Woman, The German Woman, the early pioneering Woman of America…just WOMAN!

Herein lies the fundamental truth (often misunderstood) about this thing called Life. We are One. One is All…All is One.

In her poem “With No Immediate Cause“, (from Nappy Edges) by Ntozake Shange it is written thus :

every 3 minutes a woman is beaten
every five minutes a
woman is raped/every ten minutes
a little girl is molested
yet I rode the subway today
I sat next to an old man who
may have beaten his old wife
3 minutes ago or 3 days/30 years ago
he might have sodomized his daughter
but I sat there
cuz the men on the train
might beat some young women
later in the day or tomorrow
I might not shut my door fast
enough push hard enough
every 3 minutes it happens
some women’s innocence
rushes to her cheeks/pours from her mouth
like the betsy wetsy dolls have been torn
apart/their mouths
menses red split/every
three minutes a shoulder
is jammed through plaster and the oven door/
chairs push thru the rib cage/hot water or
boiling sperm decorate her body
I rode the subway today
and bought a paper from an east Indian man who might
have held his old lady onto
a hot pressing iron/ I didn’t know
maybe he catches little girls in the
parks and rips open their behinds
with steel rods/ I can not decide
what he might have done I
know every 3 minutes
every 5 minutes every 10 minutes
I boughtt the paper
looking for the announcement
there has to be an announcement
of the women’s bodies fond
yesterday the missing little girl
I sat in a restaurant with my
paper looking for the announcement
a young man served me coffee
I wondered did he pour the boiling
coffee on the woman because she was stupid
did he put the infant girl in
the coffee pot because she cried too much
what exactly did he do with hot coffee
I looked for the announcement
the discover of the dismembered
woman’s body
victims have not all been
identified today they are
naked and dead/some refuse to
testify girl out of 10 is not
coherent/ I took the coffee
and spit it up I found an
announcement/ not the woman’s
bloated body in the river floating
not the child bleeding in the
59th street corridor/ not the baby
broken on the floor/

“there is some concern
that alleged battered women
might start to murder their
husbands and lovers with no
immediate cause”
I spit up I vomit I am screaming
we all have immediate cause
every 3 minutes
every 5 minutes
every 10 minutes
every day
women’s bodies are found
in alleys and bedrooms/at the top of the stairs
before I ride the subway/buy a paper of drink
coffee from your hands I must know
have you hurt a woman today
did you beat a woman today
throw a child cross a room
are the little girl’s pants in your pocket
did you hurt a woman today
I have to ask these obscene questions
I must know you see
the authorities require us to
establish
immediate cause
every three minutes
every five minutes
every ten minutes
every day (pg. 269 – 270)

It is all about WOMAN. Colour?…Colour is the grand illusion. The Grand Lie that hides our common pain, conceals our common joy, denies our common achievement and effectively obscures our Oneness that we are. Colour…the grand illusion that would steal our love (from, and for each other) and destroy our friendships.

Black Woman…do the impossible one last time. Step out of the Skin that holds you (and the rest of the world) prisoner. Embrace your freedom for all our sakes. Deny the illusion. Ordain death on that Lie. Crush the serpent under heel. Claim the Earth – your birthright – and give voice to your song. Dream, Black Woman. Let you daughter be born and call her name: Womankind. We have love enough and heart enough…if we will only Dream. Let your Dreams colour our world anew, and create “…a place for all at the rendezvous of victory“.

Is the Black Mans vision impaired?

The Europe of the late ‘sixties and early seventies’, had little fondness for the perceived brashness of America and the Americans. And I can remember, during that period (as a young University student in Montreal in Canada), Canadian students would go backpacking through Europe for the summer; and they would return with woeful tales of being greeted with outright hostility, in the places like France and Italy, when it was thought that they were Americans! And they had to be at great pains to identify themselves as Canadians. They would make the point that Canada and America were two very different countries. Once the point was made, the young travelers were always guaranteed a warmer, more hospitable reception. That tale would be told repeatedly by returning students. So extreme were the reactions they met; they all began travelling with the Canadian Flag in positions visible enough to deter further hostile interactions.

I tell this tale to make the point that whereas the world knew that Americans were not popular abroad…the only people who did not know, where the Americans! And why? Because the Americans were the best and the greatest…to the Americans! And they would not, quite honestly, conceive of, entertain, comprehend or believe…any other reality. Nor did they court any other reality. It was never their style to see themselves through the eyes of others. What you saw, was entirely your affair…He knew who he was, and he knew he was ‘the greatest’. “I’m American!” For him that was more than good enough. If you had a problem with it, it had little to do with him (and may I say, I concur wholeheartedly).

Why should it be otherwise for the Black man (or any man at all)? How another sees you cannot be your concern. What is, and will always remain material…is how you see you. And although he may deny it – that is the base of the Black mans dilemma. He has not learned to like (or love) what he sees. And in ‘not liking’, is unwilling to embrace the personal responsibility to change what in himself, he does not like; instead, he would make excuses, or blame the world for reflecting back at him, truths with which he would rather not contend. And then allege that the photographer is biased or the camera lens is flawed.

We do not need television stations or television programs to help people to see us (or Africa) differently. What we need are lessons in how to see ourselves differently, and how to be at peace with the ‘self’ one sees. What we need are lessons in how to accept the self that one sees; what we need is the humility to see and acknowledge where we are flawed; the courage to admit the need to change and the wisdom to do just that. In the meantime, let America be an example (instead of fretting and fuming about ‘getting others’ to like you…love you…respect you…understand you…). The (white) Americans spend no time trying to ‘get others’ to see them in the way that they see, and understand, themselves! They see themselves in a particular way, and the rest of the world (even while protesting the truth of Americas vision of itself) goes along with it. They have no choice. The Americans say: “America is the greatest!” And pretty soon – even despite clear evidence to the contrary – the rest of the world is singing the same refrain and treating every American as though this great myth…were the truth.

Let the Black man forget the nonsense of the “….Two new TV channels, recently launched in the USA and Brazil…to change how the world sees Africa and people of African descent” – pg. 64 New African magazine, February 2006. It is not how the world sees the Black man, that is the heart of his dilemma…it is how the Black man sees himself which is the root of all his difficulties. Change that…and he will have changed his life and his fortunes. Change that, and the world will follow.

When Africa knows that Africa is Great…the world will have no choice but to know it too. When the people of African descent love themselves and what their history, their lineage, melanin, and life, have bequeathed them…the rest of the world will love them too.And if they don’t love you…guess what? The Black man (like America) would be the last to know it, so certain would he be (in his own mind) that nothing to the contrary could possibly obtain.

How ‘others’ see you…is only a concern, if you are blind.

 

How Others See Us

It can be no part of our journey to self-discovery, to change (or to concern ourselves with) how others see us.

What is it with the Black man that causes him not to see the utter denial and dismissal of self, in this passionate resolve to change …”how others see us”. What are you doing, looking at (knowing and understanding) yourself, from the vantage point of others? And what ‘others’? Obviously only the ‘others’ that hold you in low esteem. And these eyes that perceive a distorted you; these are the eyes whose sight you share in common. Looking through those eyes , you are able to plan stratagem, to change what it is they see? And in the meantime, where are your eyes? And what do they see? What vision are your eyes beholding…while you ‘watch’ your own despoiling and disfigurement? While you see you , through the eyes of another, I wonder what your eyes would see? Might they not see that the ‘looker’ who sees you ill…is blind like a bat in daylight! And so now you are led by the blind, surrendering to their ‘truth’, voluntarily, without invitation and under no compulsion whatsoever.

Let us suppose, for arguments sake, that (your all-powerful) ‘they’ saw you as wonderful, divine and fine…would that make you so? Their acceptance is the healing balm sought and found in Gilead? Do we really believe that ‘others’ have the power to heal us and make us whole in our own eyes? And to open the doors to eternal bliss, if they would but bless us with a beneficial, loving view of ourselves…in their eyes?

As long as we are resigned to being (or even contending with) what ‘others’ see, then in truth, there is no you and there is no me…we become, exclusively: what others see. Full stop. What has to be of greatest importance, therefore, is how I…see me! What is important is what I know to be true to me! What is important is my judgement of me; my perception of me; my vision of me, and for me. It is enough that I believe in me. I frame my destiny, and I determine who I am, and what I will be, and become. What is important, is my judgement of me, in my own eyes. And where ‘others’ fall in the scheme of things, cannot be my concern. I am entrusted with a duty to be the very best I can be; whether ‘others’ see it or not, is not part of my brief; nor can it be any part of my duty to take the time to discover just what it is ‘others’ actually see, when they look at me.

What do you say to a woman who has low self-esteem, who insists that it is because her husband does not value her…why she lacks self-confidence and does not value herself? If you wish your husband to value you…you must first value yourself! One cannot offer a valuable antique possession for sale, at the paltry sum of two hundred dollars…and become seriously annoyed and deeply offended that no one had the conscience to stop the sale, nor did the purchaser have the decency to offer to pay more for this plainly valuable item! You set the price…and you got the price you set. So with the woman and her husband. You wish to be valued? Value yourself. And it may transpire, that having learned to value and admire yourself, the you realize those with whom you continue to associate , remain unable , nonetheless, to dignify their association with you, or to bestow upon you some kind treatment  you feel you deserve; you find it necessary to remove yourself from their ambit. After all, people are free to feel about one as they wish, and one is under no obligation to stay around to endure it.

How different is that from the relationship that might exist with the Black man and ‘others’? So he despises you! SO what? What of it to you, at this stage, how the White world (or any world) sees you? Does it matter  to the Japanese how the White world sees them? The White man doesn’t understand them anyway. So what? Should they make movies to help the white man to ‘see’ them, as they see themselves? Why? To satisfy what urge? Does not such a trivial concern smack of mental enslavement?

Like the woman who wont get it through her head that the relationship it’s over and she needs to move on…But instead keeps thinking she can ‘fix it’. “Maybe its my dress he didn’t like?…or maybe my cooking…maybe it’s how I walk…or how I talk…Maybe if I explain why I am the way I am…Maybe that will make a difference?” NO! Lady, don’t you get it? He’s just not that into you, as they say. Leave it! Get a life. Move on. And, while your are at it, do yourself a favour, and work on yourself! Develop some self-esteem, pride and self-love. And would ones advice to the Black man be any different? His dilemma draws the same response : “Get over it! The White man just isn’t into you! Get a life! And while you are at it, learn to love yourself”! For, at the end of the day, its not about changing how ‘others’ see us…its about changing how we see ourselves.

The Prison House – letter to a Black Man Part 2

Living in our Skin, and according to the dictates of the memories of the hurt done in its name, we will only be encouraged to do again that which has been done; to foster old hurt and harm, which causes us to perpetuate the deadly wheel of error. It cannot be so. We, who should know better, must undertake to do better. We must step out from behind those qualifying walls of Colour, those walls of flesh…and inherit the Spirit of our being. We must make friends…not ‘Black’ friends! We must call all men “Brother”, not just those that look like us. Our History must not be our excuse…it must be our mentor; it must be our firm resolve. We must not make the mistake of others, by becoming the very Evil they thought to resist.
Consistent with this new resolve, let us cease the oft repeated tales of “what the White man did…“. We know the story. Of what value is it now – the continued recitation of the old? Let us give birth to a new crop of young ones, of African descent, yet unburdened by the age old stories of his alleged ‘inferiority’, in the world of men. Let him not have heard these ‘has-been’ tales from our lips; not let him hear of our rage against the White man. Enough! Let us leave the Past where it begs to be left…in the Past! Let it rest…In Peace. Let us write a new story for the young ones where their History begins with you and with me, right here right now, amid our considerable achievements. I cannot think of a prouder landscape from which to come forth…if we simply resist the urge to tarnish it with references to the Past, long dead and overdue for burial. We fought that war…and won. Let us give our children the benefit of the victory in a Tomorrow from which its ugliness is entirely expunged. They deserve it. As do we.
And what, I hear you ask, if he (our young son of Tomorrow) should, in his time, behold for himself some form of ‘White’ ugliness? What then? How do you answer his questions? I answer you thus:
“Only show him how ugly is ugliness…and resist the urge to ‘colour’ it. It is part of the myth we foster, that a mans rudeness (or goodness) is somehow attached to his colour – or his religion, or his country of origin, or his customs, the list is endless – but nothing could be further from the truth. A mans rudeness is him…not his race; it is always individual and particular to him…so let it remain there, and let us not be tempted to distort or defile an entire nation and people. There are well-mannered White men, as there are brutish Black men; there are vulgar Oriental men, as there are sophisticated men of colour. It is when we fail to honour this truth and to live it…that we succeed in building prison walls around ourselves and deprive ourselves of the chance to attain wonderful new friendships and exciting new experiences. All because we would prefer to cling fearfully to our obscene little raft of Colour(s).”
Ebony and Essence magazines have done a yeoman’s service (I honour them)…Kwaanza…Black History Month…the splints applied to broken wings to allow them to heal adequately, and so allow the little birds to claim the skies once more. But we must rid ourselves of these crutches now – at least in their present form – for they have outlived their use; they work to underscore separation, not incorporation. They no longer hold the promise of flight, but merely assist to ground us. O (The Oprah Magazine) provides wonderful examples of where we may go. It is indeed, among other things, an example of ‘colour’ really being a small (and quite irrelevant) ‘c’. The Proprietor of the Magazine is a woman of colour…so what? The Magazine itself, however, is simply that…a magazine. It is a magazine for anyone and everyone, without distinction. So, already we take baby steps toward our goal…recognizing a world peopled by Humankind; possessing human feelings…human desires…human aspirations…human fears….human ideals…human needs…human hearts….In whatever Colour…human.
History, similarly, is only History. There is no such thing as ‘Black’ History. It is the History of Mankinds sojourn in Earth…the good, the bad, the great, the small. the majestic. It is all of it our History. Pushkin was Black. Septimius Severus was Black. They were, first and foremost, men, and part of a nation that spawned them and their genius. ‘Black’ is not a nation…it is a Separation. It has been a lie. A lie, which has served as a kind of palliative, which I understand and accept. But we are well and strong now. Our broken wings are mended, the cage door has been opened… We must find our Spirit and give it Voice. Find our Truth…and let it soar.

The Prison House – letter to a Black Man Part 1

She walks to the podium, and in a voice charged with emotion, tears of pride glistening, unshed, in her eyes, she speaks :

“…And it’s for every nameless, faceless woman of color that now has a chance because this door tonight has been opened. Thank you….”

I stop listening.

…………………………………………………………..

We are willing prisoners – on lockdown – in the fortress of our Skin. We have established our Skin-walls with careful ardor, and we have organized to encourage a stern separation, between ourselves and the rest of mankind. So that while we engage the unholy pretense of being “locked out”…the truth is that we are in fact “locked in”! Locked behind our Skins, and by our choice. We want to be here, locked in our Skin-tomb. We strengthen the walls and repair the breaches. We honour it. We celebrate it. This Skin of ours and its History of cruelties inflicted, that bind us to one another.

No one anymore enforces our captivity, at this place of Skin and Colour. By ourselves, and under no duress of whips and chains, we continue the long incarceration behind the prison walls of our Colour. This almighty Fortress. From which is heard not even the whispered rumour of planned “Escape”. Even though this dense black-hole, is as much a slave-outpost as any that ever existed, built by the same hands, to serve the same purpose and for the same reasons. It was after all, our captors who first insisted, that behind the walls of the Black Skin, lurked a fearfully different being. In the event, Slavery did its job well. And the man who emerged from its harsh grip, would indeed wear the image that his captors had pressed upon him. And whereas a ‘man’ (however brutally beaten and disfigured) had been enslaved…a ‘Black’, would be freed!

The ‘Black’ did not remember that he had not in fact been created as a being apart; nor did he seem to remember, that his perceived ‘separation’ from the body of Man, was a thing contrived; a thing ordained by mischievous men with ugly intent. He did not remember that he was the natural equal of all other men. Neither did he remember  that equality was not a ‘gift’ one applied for, but a reality that came unasked and unsought with the God-given territory of man.

“…until the colour of a mans skin is of no more significance than the colour of his eyes…until that, the dream of lasting peace and world citizenship and the rule of international morality will remain but a fleeting illusion to be pursued but never attained.” Extracted from a speech given byHis Imperial Majesty, Emperor Haile Selassie I, October 4th 1963, United Nations General Assembly.

This noble pronouncement from the pen of His Imperial Majesty can be quoted verbatim by any Black man over the age of 25. The sentiment, moreover, has been immortalized in song and has often been lauded as providing hope and courage in the struggles mounted by oppressed peoples the world over. It is thus, an anthem of sorts among the Black race of man: and he will insist – and quite properly – on the dignity enshrined in this immortal truth. But do not be misled. Do not believe that for one moment the Black man understands that the finger he supposes is pointed at the rest of the erring mankind, is also pointed back at him. He chants “Amen” to the sentiment, and with fist held aloft, anger and impatience blazing in his eyes, he is sure that someone else, somewhere else, is responsible for making a change. But the Black man thinks only of the White man. It is the White man who must change; it is the White man who must not see the Black mans colour… But what of the Black man himself? The Black man who continues to celebrate his ‘Blackness’ and his separateness every chance he gets. The Black man who insists, not that he is “… a man, and proud”, but rather that he is “...Black and proud”. Yet, he is the same who would chant “Amen!” where it is writ …..

“until the colour of a mans skin is of no more significance than the colour of his eyes…”

The Black Mans Journey

I have no wish to be misunderstood, and so I have thought it prudent to provide a sort of backdrop, against which these essays may be understood. An allegoric outline, as it were, of the authors apprenticeship in the place of her “Blackness”, and her journey from thence into the maturity of (Hu)Manhood.

I have spent the last fifty-six (and more) years being Black. Depending upon ones world view, it might be truer to say the last fifty-six hundred years! But by anyone’s record and with knowledge of History and the black mans place in it – whether for fifty- six or fifty-six hundred – the cumulative hurt is undeniable; the generational memories of pain, loss and shame; the resonance of inadequacy, inferiority and fear that is so immediate and so devastating, it has a taste.

No one is born Black who does not, at some point in his existence, descend into the abyss that atavistic memory alone – if nothing else – would have ordained. For those of us who come forth wearing this hue marked by the suns favour, will understand the true emotion.

We fight for every breath.We fight our fears. We fight the illusions that History has bequeathed us and attempted to cast in stone. We fight, even when we strongly deny there is a fight happening in us…or around us. To be born Black, is to be born part of a dynamic, evolving experience. There is nothing passive here. To be born Black, is, in effect, to be introduced into Life via a dark vortex of chaotic motion, a churning whirlpool of events and actions and noise, which, without consultation with you, will nevertheless engage you and will for the most part defy reason, good sense and order. You will be left breathless and with the feeling that one is always “running to catch up”. Everyone else will seem to have inherited firm ground, a clear organized space with a place to stand and cut a path to walk on; with family and friends and systems that seemed to have anticipated ones arrival and happily made allowances for ones advent upon the scene.

The Black child’s birth is not so! He comes to a world that always seems to have been taken completely by surprise at his arrival. Nothing seems to have been designed with him in mind. He seems always, either to have been caught wrong-footed, or to have caught others wrong-footed. And saddest of all, if he is to find his way through this mad, unintelligent maze of his inheritance, he will most certainly be required to hack his way through desperate paths and treacherous wastes. Along those paths, leading out of the gloom of his inherited space and into the light, there are all kinds of dark demons, urging him to linger and inviting him to feed upon their cruel and ugly propensities. ‘Hate’ beckons, as does ‘anger’ and notions of ‘revenge’ and ‘payback’; ‘inferiority’ whispers her blandishments, as does the sinister ‘insecurity’. They have to be faced, fought and overcome…if one is to inherit the Light. And Tomorrow.

I do not wish to be misunderstood concerning my perspective on the subject matter of these Essays. Therefore I record my gratitude to so many of those angry Black men who fought the good fight, Who spat their early anger into the face our would-be oppressors. Those who dredged through history to find our recorded presence and contributions and who never wearied of emblazoning them on the pages of our minds and writing them in tongues of fire against the sky.

I do not wish to be misunderstood…But, we have done it! We have walked the maze. We have solved the riddle. We have untied and severed the Gordian Knot. We have shattered the illusions and destroyed the myth. And yet, now, we have become like the caged bird. The bird that sings continuously about “Freedom”; promising never to give the ear rest until it’s set free. But when the captors finally relent and open the cage, the bird – unwilling now to take flight – remains inside the cage…still singing for its freedom.

His caged existence had become its raison d’etre. Who was he without his cage? What would he sing? What was his life, without that fight? So, with the doors wide open, our bird would continue to sing his “Freedom” song. about the hell and incarceration and about the bars that held him cruelly separated from the winged life. This it seems to me, is the predicament in the which the Black man finds himself today.

Against this backdrop, DIALOGUES IN BLACK is born.

We have fought. We have won. We are to be commended. But to rest here upon our laurels (such as they are) is to lose the fruit of Victory. There is one more step…We need to walk through the open door and leave our cage (and our Past) behind.

“Won’t you help to sing, these songs of freedom? ‘Cause all I ever have

Redemption songs

Redemption songs

Redemption songs”

Bob Marley