The Gospel Truth
Page 4
bobble three tiny heads all peep-peeping
hungry for their momma.
“Yellow Warblers,” he whisper, and sketch them on his pad
while I hold the branches open.
Warbler. That a new word for me.
But already, I think I knows how it look.
I tuck it inside my mind for later,
alone at my hollow tree.
“Funny,” he say. “The mother usually swoops and shrieks
when the nest is threatened.”
He right. It strange there’s no sign of her.
“They make an awful racket,” Miss Tessa say.
“She’s probably away enjoying the silence.”
Which make me think of Yellowbird.
What if these her chicks?
How long can they live without their momma?
according to Phoebe
W h a t I s
My foot touch something and I look down
at the body of a baby bird,
broken from its fall.
Its bobble head, bald, blue veined,
and buckled in on one side,
its pink skin, ash gray.
It make me wanna cry.
But that strange Birdman,
he squat down
and draw that dead bird, too.
Why he wanna see that ugly sorrow?
Why he wanna know about
what can’t be changed, fixed,
or undone?
Alls I know is some things
is what they is.
Some things best forgotten.
according to Phoebe
W e e d i n g O u t
After he draw the nest,
Birdman sit down and sketch weed after weed,
like he crazy.
Or aiming to drive Miss Tessa there.
She huff and puff,
cross her arms and tap her foot.
But it don’t rush Birdman none.
He just smile.
Draw another sprig or stem.
Taking his sweet old time.
“Wonderful,” Birdman say. “I can’t find this species
in Canada.”
And I get a tingle.
He’s from Canada?
Canada is real?
according to Phoebe
C a n a d a
Will say:
It’s far.
And cold.
But slavery don’t exist there.
Shad say:
You got cotton for brains, Will.
None of that is true.
If there are no slaves,
who takes care of the
masters and missuses?
And if there are no masters,
who takes care of
the Negroes?
He got a point.
Shad say:
Master build our homes,
and give us food.
And he do.
Shad say:
We wouldn’t survive
without Master Duncan.
I s’pose we’d be like this here bird
thrown from its nest.
Shad say:
You older, Will,
but you ain’t smarter,
not if you think things be better
in some cold,
far away place, up north
where you got
no one to care for you.
Your Canada don’t exist.
it just some dream,
a wish for the weary,
a story for slaves scarred by lashing or losing.
Believing in something
don’t make it real.
Will shrug and say:
If you can’t believe in it,
you never gonna see it.
But Shad, being blind to what is,
don’t make it false.
All their words confuse me.
I don’t know which ones is right.
A flock of geese
pass overhead,
a honking V
flying straight and true.
Geese.
Canada geese, I think as I watch them move on,
and smile.
according to Phoebe
O n e D a y
I never told Shad,
but I dreamed it, too,
after Momma left.
On those dark nights
when I reached for her
and felt as cold and empty
as the straw beside me,
I believed in Will’s Canada.
Maybe she there, I say to myself.
And maybe,
one day,
she come back and take me there, too.
according to Phoebe
N e s t
I climb way up the white trunk of the tremble-tree,
and get Birdman another nest I seen
amongst the flutter-leaves,
a tiny cup of twig and straw.
A home once.
It empty now, but he thank me and draw it just the same.
Then that Doctor Birdman
he stick it in his pocket and climb that tree himself.
He inch along that thick branch,
getting his pants all wrinkles and dirt.
He reach in his pocket, stretch out along the limb,
and settle that bird nest right back where I found it.
“Why bother?” Miss Tessa call up.
“It’s just a mess of mud and sticks.”
Doctor Birdman jump down and brush his hands.
“It’s a home, Miss Tessa,” he say.
“And as any good birder knows,”
he smile at me for a second,
“You just never know
when the mother might return.”
according to Phoebe
S o m e t h i n g
Birdman a watcher,
like Momma was—
seeing the world eyes wide open
when most white folk too busy seeing theyselves.
He know about birds,
like Momma did—
listening to the wisdom of wing and feather
when most people stay deaf to the song.
But he still a white man.
Like Bea said.
And like most, he after something.
I can tell by the way he look at me,
I got something he want.
Only I don’t know what that something is.
according to Tessa
M a k e H i m
Enough of this nest nonsense
and wandering through woods.
“We’ll lunch by the fields, Phoebe,” I announce.
Linking my arm in his,
I pace him to my stride—
make him linger,
make him listen,
make him long for me.
Mother was right.
Any man can be led like a workhorse,
if you take the reins.
Of course, as soon as we leave the woods,
birds sing.
Doctor Bergman whistles back, note for note.
“Spot on,” I say, as though it were a useful skill.
It makes him smile.
And that makes me blush—
a glow that draws men as surely as moths.
“But the mockingbird’s got me beat,” he says.
“It can mimic over a hundred songs.”
If he’s impressed by that, wait until I tell him
we have almost a hundred slaves.
according to Tessa
S o n g s o f W o o d A n d F i e l d
I lead him to the knoll,
eager to show him the richness and beauty
that is my home,
that is me, really.
One day, this will all be mine:
rolling fields,
long, lush rows of tobacco plants
where a hundred slaves
cut and tie,
and cut and tie,
leaving bundle after bundle in their wake.
“Here.” I stick my parasol in the grass, staking my claim,
signaling to Phoebe to set out our luncheon.
Hoe, Emma, hoe.
A song, rich and slow, carries on the warm breeze,
from the fields below.
Hoe, Emma, hoe.
You turn around, dig a hole in the ground.
Hoe, Emma, hoe.
“Now there’s a song I bet you don’t know,” I tease,
and this time, it’s me that mimics:
Lord send my people into Egypt Land.
Hoe Emma hoe.
Lord strike down Pharaoh and set them free.
Hoe Emma hoe.
according to Phoebe
M i m i c k i n g
One young picker fall behind
as the line move from stalk to stalk.
It Ella Mae.
Brutus loom over her, crack his whip,
make the song skip a beat,
when she fall,
but the workers move on without her,
else they next.
Hoe, Emma, hoe.
A small boy run the line with his water bucket.
With his bad leg, he must be Nate.
Poor Nate, only a few weeks gone
since I seen him at the trough.
Still, I’s glad to see him kneeling by Ella Mae,
giving her water.
She hateful mean, she is.
But even Ella Mae don’t deserve what Brutus give.
Miss Tessa explain how slaves work
from sun up to sun down:
planting, pruning, or plucking hornworms.
Leaves all thick and green, now,
time to cut, bundle,
and thread them on sticks
for hanging in the curing barn up the hill.
She talk like she done it all herself.
“Brutus does a good job keeping them in line,”
Miss Tessa say,
mimicking her daddy now.
“They’re known to be lazy, like that girl.
Others just can’t be trained.”
Birdman don’t say nothing.
Just stare at the field where Ella Mae
drag herself up and back in line.
“We buy, breed, feed, clothe, house, and train them,”
Miss Tessa parrot.
“And if need be, we sell them.
But we take good care of our property.”
“Your people,” he say.
“Oh, Doctor,” she roll her eyes,
and say what master always say,
“they’re not people …
they’re Negroes.”
according to Tessa
H a n d - M e - D o w n
Phoebe silently
sets out sandwiches, lemonade, and sugar pie,
flicking crumbs off our tartan blanket
with her soft, brown hands.
“That will do,” I say,
dismissing her to sit nearby
in my hand-me-down dress
to eat the broken pie crust
and a small cup of lemonade;
a treat I said she could have.
Where would the poor girl be
without me?
Without me,
she’d be on the line,
hacking leaves under the noonday sun,
instead of watching from the shade.
Without me,
she’d be sleeping in some crowded cabin in the Quarters,
instead of having a pallet all to herself,
in the hall outside my room.
Without me,
that girl would have no purpose. Plain and simple.
No training. No nothing.
I’ll admit, Phoebe works hard—
but the work isn’t hard at all.
How hard could it be
to take care of little old me?
With all I hand-her-down,
Phoebe’s got it easy.
according to Tessa
D i v i n e R i g h t
“Slaves are born to serve us,”
I explain to Doctor Bergman.
It says so right in the Bible.
Verses preached from pulpits
since before I can remember.
“Why … it’s our divine right.”
“Teach slaves
to be subject to their masters
in everything,
to try to please them,
not to talk back to them.
That’s from Titus,” I say,
“but I know them all.”
He smiles. I love his smile. “Things are different up north.”
“But the Bible,” I say,
“surely that would be the same everywhere.”
“Yes,” he says, “but some people
… misinterpret
even God’s truth.”
Fools, maybe.
The good Lord put it right there in black and white.
Who am I to argue that?
“Well, here at Whitehaven, we do right by our slaves.”
I look with pride across the lush field.
Let the song fill my head.
“And they’re happy.” I sip my lemonade.
“Just listen to them singing.”
according to Phoebe
S e c r e t S o n g s
Will told me about that song one time.
He learned it from his daddy who worked the fields.
It code.
One of the secret songs that
say one thing and mean another.
Most field songs is.
Sure they keep pick and hoes in time, or spirits up,
like music do.
But I know something Miss Tessa don’t.
Something Brutus don’t.
Something even Master don’t know.
It ain’t about slaves in Egypt.
And the Pharaoh they strike down
ain’t no Egyptian neither.
Miss Tessa know the words
but she don’t know the truth.
’Cause if she did,
she might not wanna eat her sugar pie
and join the chorus of
a hundred sweaty workers
singing secret songs
about killing her daddy.
according to Phoebe
D i v i n i n g W r o n g
Miss Tessa know the words,
from the Bible,
from the song,
from her daddy and his daddy before him.
But she wrong—
they ain’t singing ’cause they happy.
And they ain’t singing ’bout Moses neither.
Makes me wonder if there be other
truths
she got wrong.
according to Doctor Bergman
W h a t I D e s i r e
Fair hair and skin.
Bright blue eyes.
Slender of arm and waist.
With a flirtatious smile ever on her lips
and a fortuitous inheritance on her horizon,
Miss Tessa truly is every southern gentleman’s dream.
But I’m no southern gentleman.
I will endure her incessant chatter
as she brags and preens
and struts about,
flapping fans
and fluttering eyes,
so eager to show me her
southern hospitality.
She’s not built for birding.
Or heat.
Or walking.
Or waiting
while I draw weed after weed.
She’ll give in, soon enough,
and then I’ll finally have
what I truly desire:
time alone with Phoebe.
according to Phoebe
B l a c k - E y e d S u s a n
Miss Tessa in a snit.
Missus told her she can’t go in the woods to
morrow
with Doctor Birdman.
It Tuesday.
Missus say she gotta do her lessons with Mr. Cooke.
“You treat me like a child, mother!” She stomp her foot.
But there’s two of them in it.
Missus do treat Miss Tessa
like she still a young girl in braids.
But most times,
Miss Tessa act like one.
I set the vase of flowers on the dining room table
like Missus ask,
while Bea pour the tea,
like Missus ask.
“Arethusa bulbosa,” she say to her daughter,
as she cup her hand around a purple blossom.
“You know, this orchid only blooms for a month,”
I don’t has to look at Miss Tessa to know she sulking.
“It’s valuable. Highly sought, because it’s rare,” Missus say.
“Not some Black-eyed Susan.”
She take Miss Tessa’s hands.
“You need to decide what you are, sweetie.
No man is going to believe you are a delicate orchid,
something rare and sweet and precious,
if you are acting like some common weed.”
Miss Tessa clench her jaw.
But even I know, she gonna heed Missus,
like she always does.
I follow Bea back in the kitchen
where she start buzzing as she baking.
“Arethusa bulbosa,” she snort. “I ain’t never heard of that.
It’s called Dragon-mouth ’cause it look like a dragon,”
she mutter,
“and it come from the swamp.”
She slam the pastry dough on the counter
and pound it with her fist.
“Hmph! Give me a Black-eyed Susan, any day.”
according to Phoebe
W i t h o u t M i s s T e s s a
The woods going to be awful quiet tomorrow,
without Miss Tessa.
Doctor Birdman
can draw all the weeds he like
and all the nests he like
for as long as he like
without Miss Tessa.
He might even see that Cedar Waxwing
without Miss Tessa
talking and squawking,
scaring all the birds away.
Still,
I’s awful nervous to be going in the woods,