Testimony 9

Also known as: the ones from Sargent City greet the ones over the hill at Montgomery, tip their hats, and turn to face their old captors:

We are barely past our butter pecan days
Hung in trees, pickanees,
Picnics set beneath the trees
Watered with our blood
We watched your melon smiles
And pantomimes
And the clock
We remember

We remember those red lips
Parted posthumously
To reveal the broad teeth
You devoured us with

We remember the broad hips
That gave birth to us
That you sold into slavery
Mother Africa was not enough

[to think, you made fun of us
And we were afraid of you
And all we did was pray]

We remember the bright smiles
And Sunday school dresses
Starched and white, shoes shining
Never to be tainted by someone else’s blood
Or the soot of a burning cross
See, we wear the same white cloth
For two different reasons

Did you not see us? You will see us now
Behold us in all our splendor, eternal
Get right before our lord, which was never you

You could not capture us in our sacred spaces
In our sacred spaces, hallelujah
That is why you tried to block our way to them
That is why you burned us at the stake
Of your long-foretold desire

The whole land belonged to you
The earth, it gave, it yielded
Yet still you birthed death untold
Instead of life for your children, so yes-
Up here
We call you dead

For you are overdue
But we are librarians, patient
Destined, always, to collect

-Mississippi (ancestral authors)

There is something about Alabama. Something about what unfolded on August 5th, that stirred something across ancestral lines and lands. We remember, they say. We remember.

And as I consider the other things that stand out - the reference to minstrel shows, for example - I realize how freaking far removed I’ve felt from that period of history because I simply had not talked to my relatives about it. This wasn’t some obscure thing that white people did; my ancestors saw that shit. They remember. The monkey references, the charcoal black skin, the cartoons - folks thought they forgot? They did not!

There are other bits and pieces of this poem that reveal parts of my family’s history that I hadn’t been privy to. For example - the desecration of churches, and how that impacted us directly. We are praying folk; I’ve known for a while how long people have feared prayer warriors, been terrified of Black spiritual power actualized in ways they could not control. And that line “all we did was pray” has multiple meanings. Which goes to show you - ancestors can speak in 5D. 7D. 9, if we can hold space for that. Those words literally lift off the screen.

I also note the extremely subtle - but fucking deft - use of tree imagery. I have personal thoughts about that, but I invite you to sit with it also.

I wondered why they wanted the standard-form title - “Ancestral Testimony” - shortened to “Testimony” for this piece. So I asked, because I wanted to correct it so badly.

Because we are not dead. We are here, they answered bluntly. I could feel an ancestor fold her arms.

We never left.