Dear Ta-Nehisi –
I am truly sorry. I did not know. (And had not searched, researched, or inquired.) I did not know the burden you have always worn – and still wear. I did not know what – or how; or why – your eyes bear witness; your mind carries; your heart feels. And I apologize for being afraid – lost in the humid canyons of Richmond, Virginia – when I did not know what it was to fear.
But you loaned me your eyes; shared fragments of your soul with me. And, perhaps, I began to understand. A little, anyways. Thus, even if I make mistakes in doing so, I had to reach out to thank you – as well as apologize. To say thank you for the streams of tears; the laughed recognition of the similar and the dissimilar; the sympathy and empathy. (It is not hard to make me cry, to feel; but this was something fresh, which filled me anew.)
I used to compare the struggle for disability rights in this country with that for civil rights – for human rights, as Malcolm X would no doubt rebuke me… – in yours (that is, if you feel America can ever belong to you; or you belong to it). Now, you have taught me that to do so was both lazy and arrogant – and I am utterly ashamed. How could I so easily put myself in someone-else’s shoes when I knew nothing of their life, their history; when I could never feel the imprint of all that terror and fear; all that pain?
¶
I grew up immersed in a different order of diversity than yours. But never believed (nor wanted) myself really part of any group; on any side of any divide. In my case, it is Asperger’s that creates otherness; combined with, yes, a firm absence of any God in my heart and mind; and a socialism that places me well outside those around me. Add my broken body into the mix; and I could never be the same; never even be like anyone-else. My only designation, I suppose, is as a member of shared humanity (a classification the majority of which appear to neglect or disregard); what Malcolm (above) designated “the brotherhood of man”.
¶
I can’t let go of your words; your rhythmic poetry of anger, fear, and – eventually – understanding (if not yet total enlightenment). And yet I do not grasp all you say: because you have only just opened my newborn eyes to this centuries-old world: and therefore my vision is frail and blurred. But I feel everything – sentences sear themselves to the root of my soul; pages tear at my heart. And yet…
When people who are not black are interested in what I do, frankly, I’m always surprised. I don’t know if it’s my low expectations for white people or what.
I do not think I believe myself to be ‘white’. Either I am nothing; or I am that everything – held close to this earth we share by more than gravity. You showed me how differences are made: between the same and the different (and, perhaps, the indifferent, too – eventually).
¶
Yes: you can hate injustice; but that hate does not make it fade. You can love fairness; but that love does not make it grow. Sometimes I think your voice is stronger than any such action. It is the voice of all that have gone before; all that are now. It is your voice alone (and yet I believe that if Malcolm had lived – “an expression of black America’s heart” – only two years older than my father – his voice, his vision, would not be dissimilar).
(When I say “vision”, I do not mean “dream”.)
In its reach, its opening of eyes, there is more power, more pain, in your voice, than a physical deed, than a bruising assault. There is also its communication’s longevity and vigour: looming well beyond the finite instance of the hand (or belt) shaping but a temporary staining of temporary flesh: such a bruise only a momentary branding; yet a sequential signifier of some permanent – or permanently changed – relationship. And yet…
We are nonviolent only with nonviolent people. I’m nonviolent as long as somebody else is nonviolent – as soon as they get violent they nullify my nonviolence.
Tied to this earth for its singular existence, with no rapture beyond, the body cries out for necessary defence, for vindication. But this cry may come too late; may never be acknowledged. What use is unarmed innocence against the delinquent, damnable firearm, commanded only by an ignorant abhorrence of divergence, of race, of colour – of that otherness that divides us all?
They don’t want to hear that “turn-the-other-cheek” stuff, no.
Word versus weapon. Ballot versus bullet. Power emanates from both – the preacher-man at the window: rifle in hand – the latter, though, so, so much easier to decode; so one-dimensional (especially in the wrong hands… – and we know there are far too many of those).
¶
Ultimately, your sculpted, considered words are what matter to me. Although my interpretation of them may be flawed, they guide me deeper and wider into what some may say separates us: a fearful history I can never be part of, can never truly share in. But I still can realize and invoke its heavy significance.
Perhaps what then unites us – apart from our various human foibles; our varied shades of otherness – is a joint belief in the value of creation: that to wrestle with words, to shepherd their meanings – constructing blocks of print with edges keen enough to re-open necessary wounds; to cut through history’s over-painted canvas and illuminate wilfully forgotten truths – is as much as can be done, as much as is required; is the best that can be done to ensure the fight continues – even when it feels anchored, chained permanently beyond reach and agitation. I am sorry, though, that so little has truly changed.
¶
There will be more of me, my kind (as much as there can ever be such a thing), I am sure: holding your voice in their hands, grasping your invigorated narratives and piercing insights hard until their hearts bleed; their eyes weep; and their swallowed sobs merge with the muffled voices of the past now amplified by your distrustful but cogent trenchancy.
My hope is that they too will offer gratitude, whilst exploring – as I do – beyond the edges of the territories you have delineated: using your words to guide them there, to enlighten them. That there will be enough of us, one day, for you to believe we, too, should be, shall be, addressed and informed… directly.
Thank you.
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