Between Fathers and Sons: An African-American Story – by Eric V. Copage

THE STARRY NIGHT

That evening, after Grandma had gone to work, I put together a simple green salad – red oak lettuce, fresh oregano, fresh thyme, cherry tomatoes, red onions, apple cider vinaigrette, and a few flakes of course sea salt. I microwaved the spicy Chili Texas style Grandma had made for dinner that morning for the twins and me, and which we eagerly sopped up with hero-sized slices of cornbread – made with buttermilk and real corn kernels. Grandma had made the cornbread in her heirloom cast-iron skillet. Once the twins finished helping me clean up and put the dishes in the dishwasher, I let them watch “Kenan & Kel,” a television sitcom series about the wacky misadventures of a pair of Chicago high school students

that we had recorded on the VCR before it went off the air earlier in the year. At about nine, I checked to see that my brother and sister were washed, then tucked them into bed and made sure to say their special prayers to them.

Once the twins were squared away, I went downstairs and idly channel surfed. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I wasn’t looking for entertainment, I was trying to create a mental blank slate, hoping that an answer to my predicament might magically appear, like a rabbit popping out of an empty top hat. After a few minutes, I turned off the set, walked around the house and checked to make sure the front, back, and basement doors were locked, then headed upstairs to my bedroom. I grabbed the now singed kente cloth Blackmun had given me off the outer doorknob to my bedroom, entered my room, shut the door, and sat at my desk. I casually rubbed the fabric with my forefinger, and as I noted its silky texture, my mind rose from the turbulence of my thoughts. The weight of my body seemed to drift away. I felt myself expanding beyond the boundaries of my skin. I felt myself rising like infinitely fine mist, passing through my ceiling, through the

clutter in the attic, through the shingles of the roof, and into the inky vastness of the starry night. Beyond the starry night, I accelerated through soundscapes of sibilant sighing waves, rumbling desert sand dunes, moaning walls of falling ice, and forests of whispering leaves. As I entered each realm, my entire being shuddered. It was as if someone had swung a sledgehammer and shattered my soul, producing electrifying jolts that reverberated far and wide.

A cloud of red dust flew up around me. Startled and dazed, I lifted my head and wiped my eyes. It was either sunrise or sunset. I had landed on an endless plain of red-colored sun-cracked clay. I scanned the horizonless distance where land and sky merged in the ochre half-light. I squinted and saw a dark round object – a speck in the far, far distance. In half the time it takes to draw one breath, the branches of a baobab tree covered me in a jagged web of shadows. The Ashanti king and his entourage of soldiers now were only a few feet away. The king sat on a wooden stool, his legs spread wide, hands relaxed on its corresponding thigh, a study in authority and equilibrium. He was resplendent in the wedges, spires, and arcs that comprised the jewel-like geometry of the folds of his royal robe. Its colors – ruby red, emerald green, sapphire blue, and glittering gold – were so radiant they made my eyes ache as if I were looking directly at the sun. I had to turn away from their brilliance.

He was flanked by a hundred soldiers, distributed evenly on each side. They gazed ahead, expressionless. They wore Union Army uniforms of the American Civil War. Each had a musket resting on his shoulder. The king faced away from me. Then, almost imperceptibly, something mysterious moved my body, so that little by little, the king’s serene gaze eventually fell directly on me.

A gentle stream of air, soft as a baby’s breath inches from my left ear, surprised me. I caught the scent of something soothing and sweet—some herb or spice, perhaps. The adviser’s voice addressed me. Its tone was calm but urgent and located inches from my right ear.

“I will tell you a story. When I finish, I will ask you a question.

You may not move from that spot until you answer that question. Your life depends on your answer to that question.”

And with that, I heard the clank of metal as the king’s soldiers cocked their weapons and pointed them at me.

A black man guides a half dozen slaves to freedom. At the end of the first day, they make an overnight stop in an empty cabin in a forest. The next morning, when it’s time to continue, the former captives refuse to open the cabin door. They are afraid of the wolves they heard outside during the night.

But the black man tells the group he has made dozens of journeys through these parts. He’s traveled there at dusk, sunrise, and under the glare of noonlight. He’s slept in cabins, caves, and on mountain tops throughout this area. He’s traveled in all seasons – spring, summer, fall, and winter. He has traveled in the area through blizzards, heatwaves, and fog thick as soup – through droughts and through floods. He is intimately familiar with the plants and animals in these parts and has even foraged for them and hunted them for food.

I’ve never seen even one wolf around here, the black man said. The nearest wolves are miles away.

We have traveled in forests like this before, said one of the former captives.

Despite your assurances, we know there are wolves. We know their signs. We’ve been mauled by them in broad daylight and bare those scars.

If there are no wolves in this area, another in the group said, what was that ghostly howling all last night?

Owls hooting on the wing, the black man answered.

What were those shadows moving at the bottom of the door? asked another.

Deer walking towards the nearby pond to drink, the black man replied. What was the scratching at the back of the cabin?

Opossums searching for food, the black man responded.

Yet, despite every reasonable explanation, the slaves remained steadfast in their belief that wolves were right outside the door ready to devour them, and refused to budge. Finally, the fugitives confidently followed the black man out the door towards freedom.

The king’s adviser looked at me solemnly: How did the black man convince the group that there were no wolves?

The sun and stars completed their circuit twenty-one times when an answer streaked like a comet across the wine-colored sky. I reached up and grabbed it; words like red-hot coals leaped from my lips.

“The black man didn’t convince them there were no wolves,†I said. “Instead, the black man taught them how to vanquish wolves.â€

The king nodded in agreement. I laughed with relief.

“We have another task for you,” the advisor’s voice said to me.

I turned around. About 35-feet away, the length of a school bus, stood a humanoid figure with its back to me.                            Stooped-shouldered and motionless, it wore a powder blue tailcoat and scarlet pants. The backs of its black, spit-shined patent leather shoes gleamed just below the cuffs of its pant legs.

The shape sleepily straightened up as it turned in my direction, revealing a corona of wildly unkempt hair and a face caked with coal-colored mud – a kind of crude blackface. The mud had dried and cracked so that a lacy pattern of skin was visible underneath. A chalky white circle ringed each eye and a thick, crimson parody of Negro lips covered its mouth and rose like a gash on either cheek.                                                                            The collar of his white shirt was obscured by a clownishly large yellow bow tie.

Years later I found out the creature resembled a goliwog – one of many grotesque caricatures devised to denigrate black people. These kinds of images were used prolifically during the Jim Crow era on everyday items – ink bottle labels, ash trays, salt shakers, packages for food and tobacco, for instance. In retrospect, I wonder how the image of a goliwog seeped into my subconscious since it was only in my college years that I learned about them.

The creature before me cast his gaze about the landscape haphazardly, but when his eyes landed on me, his demeanor changed. It became taut and predatory.

I looked at the soldiers, hoping they’d protect me since I answered the question. But they had returned their rifles to their shoulder and gazed ahead impassively.

I was choked by anger, frozen with fear.  This was unjust, I thought. I played by the rules. I answered the question correctly.

I shouted to no one in particular, “This isn’t right. This isn’t fair.”

“You are correct: It’s not right. It’s not fair,” came the adviser’s cold reply. “But I don’t want to die,” I shouted.

“No one wants to die!” the adviser’s pitiless voice thundered in response. “Focus!”

I tried to move my legs to run away but couldn’t. I felt as if I was standing knee deep in sand. I heard footsteps accelerating in my direction. A paralyzing blow to my stomach jack-knifed me, launching my butt several feet into the air, while my arms and legs flew out in front of me.                                                          My rear-end landed on the ground with a bone-rattling thwack. The goliwog had run into my belly, shoulder first, and sent me flying.

He was now a few dozen yards on the other side of me. He hopped up and down with both feet and pumped the air in elation with his tiny white-gloved fists. He stomped – actually, it was more of a victory dance – in a tight triumphant circle. He was happily isolated in his bubble of joy.         I was thankful that he seemed to have forgotten about me when suddenly, he stopped. He pulled out a Bowie knife from its leather scabbard at his waist and let the hand holding the knife hang casually by his side. He robotically cocked his head in sharp angles up and down, left and right, as if searching for something. When he finally saw me, his eyes widened and he smiled like a child impatient to unwrap a Christmas present.

He charged at me. With each step, his facial expression dissolved from one emotion into another — from happiness to anticipation; from anticipation to determination; from determination to urgency. As he ran towards me, he raised the knife high with both hands to multiply the force of the blow he was directing to the top of my skull.

I held up my arms and crossed them at the wrists to defend myself. The blade came down with a swift, swish of efficiency clean through my forearms. The goliwog let out an extended ear-withering squeal of excitement as I felt him deliver two horizontal slashes across my neck, then a blow to my gut as the blade entered my abdomen and tore upward towards my sternum. The pain was excruciating. I saw shards of light as he plunged the knife into one of my eyes. But I was uninjured. No matter how savage the attack, no matter how persistent. My body had the quality of water – fluid, regenerative and resilient.

The goliwog jumped back and walked in a circle around me. He was alert, but relaxed, apparently taking his time in planning his next attack.

“Breathe,” a voice commanded me. I tentatively inhaled through my nose and exhaled through my mouth. A gale-force roar surprised me when it blasted out of my lungs. Upon the gust’s impact, my tormentor stopped in place and whirled ferociously like a top, the color of its clothes – powder blue, yellow and scarlet – forming horizontal streaks of those colors. As he decelerated, and finally stopped spinning, he seemed confused and perturbed for a moment. When he caught sight of me again, he charged in my direction.

“Breathe,” the voice repeated. I took another breath and exhaled with more confidence this time. A long eruption of purifying heat exploded out of my lungs. It pushed him back a good twenty feet. My next deep exhalation shredded the clothes, flayed the skin, and tore the muscles layer by layer of the menace. Finally, the onslaught of the hurricane-force strength of my lungs, left only strips of flapping raw flesh and bloody cloth clinging tenuously to the skeleton, which remained standing for a few seconds before collapsing to form a pile of bones.

I took a deep rejuvenating breath, puffed up my chest and slowly turned around commanding the entire 360 degrees of the landscape. I was ready to take on all comers.

“Anything else?” I shouted, defiantly.

After a beat a distant voice replied nonchalantly, “Not today…. “

. . .and I was alone on the vast, bleak plain. Flashes of lightning in the distance illuminated the ghostly silhouette of the baobab tree. A moment later, I heard the welcome rumble of thunder. I stretched my arms heavenward and opened my hands as the first revitalizing drops of rain fell and ran down my cheeks.