Aunt Jemima
Meets Her Namesake in a Dream
Job 42:12-15
I.
Imagined woman
they have given
you my name,
misspelled and
misplaced,
Mammy suited you
better.
First second
daughter of Job,
I came after the
deaths, curses, boils,
the first child
named in his line,
first woman he
wouldn’t lose
at the hands of
the devil.
We were a family
granted
uncommon riches,
more
wealth than
you’ve seen
on any
plantation.
But they have
made you plain.
Your mouth
widened and scarlet
like your
ordinary headdress—no crown,
no regalia sewn
into your hair.
My garments bore
fringes and Egyptian
blue thread. I
wore no sash,
refused to be
girded.
Why is your head
perpetually
bowed?
Why whisper—Yes
suh, Yes suh—
when no one is
behind you
yielding a whip?
No woman smiles
with lashes on her back.
Why are you
stirring and singing?
II.
Imagine the
beauty of my sisters
and I, unmatched
by none.
Guards kept
watch at my window,
stewards held
men at bay near the gate.
I chose the
hands
that strayed
beneath
the folds of my
skirt.
I wanted
the children of
Israel
crowding my
bones,
a man raising
nations
with his hands
and hips.
Men sat
prostrate at my feet,
left the bed
chamber chanting
my name. I was a
prayer to them,
fashioned by an
intimate God.
III.
Imagine the
interpreter’s sin,
the wrath of a
slighted God—
they have
misread the scrolls distorted
‘blessing’
translated ‘servant’ as ‘slave’—
I was born into
ten-fold riches,
adorned in onyx
and gold
and they present
you to the world
at a fair, in a
barrel, on a box
your hands
covered in flour, face slick,
mouth clogged
with oily speech
They have
forgotten
the favor I was
shown
My inheritance
was the same as my brothers’
My legacy was
not this
Birth and Burden , Scotland Neck, North Carolina , 1922
You are bearing
the child of a man
who has given
you nothing
but the fruitage
of his devilish ways.
Even now—as his
child
mangles your
insides, as your teeth
find lip’s
flesh—he is at a gambling house
in the
backwoods, nursing his last lucky hand.
You are used to
emptiness but still
reach out. He is
miles away, cradling
a pot of dirty
money filled by the others—
angry and
itching—around the table.
As a fist rips
your womb, he also suffers
a blow. Fresh
blood races along his temple where a bullet
has skimmed past
reason into night.
This and only
this pushes him back to your marriage bed,
grunting when he
spies his daughter suckling
your breast
under patched, bloodied sheets.
He faces the
coming morning, his back
to both of you,
his aching head attached
to the one body
crowding your peaceful room,
his pockets full
with indifference.
Mercy
Killing
At Big Ma’s, I
stood in the middle of each room,
careful not to
lean on walls or too near closets,
afraid the
vermin—now outnumbering
the hairs on her
head—would find their way
to my purse or
pockets.
When asked to go
to her drawer for antacid, I hesitated
knowing I’d have
to reach in amidst their dark scattering
to soothe her.
These are the sacrifices we make
my mother said
while on the floor at Big Ma’s feet,
clipping her
toenails, using a slipper
to smash roaches
as they came.
My father hated
the dirtiness of any place
yet knelt, in
his finest charcoal suit, near the phone cord—
twisting its
disconnected wires—
surely aware of
the thick dust graying his elbows and knees.
Until he heard a
dial-tone and Big Ma said
I can call
now if I need you, he did not rise.
Hours later, in
public with our private lives well-clothed,
when I saw the
silvery-brown pest slip
from his pants
cuff—remembering my parents’ selflessness,
their hushed
mercy—I used my sharp-tipped shoes
to make a
sacrifice and killed it—quiet, swift—without mentioning
my fear and
without his ever knowing.
