HELLO MY SONS AND DAUGHTERS
ACROSS THE DEEP SEA WATERS,
NOW DON’T YOU KNOW THE MOTHER LAND IS HOME?
YOUR MOTHER WON’T FORGET YOU
AND ONE DAY GOD WILL LET YOU
RETURN TO ME NO MATTER WHERE YOU ROAM ~ Verline Gee (Mom)
I went home last week.
I visited Ghana in West Africa. Mother hadn’t forgotten me at all.
“Welcome ‘Home’! You are in Africa…Enjoy it. Make yourself at Home. ”
Home humbled me.
When I think of Home, it isn’t an address.
Home isn’t brick and mortar and living rooms and garages.
Home is the portal through which you enter & then engage the world each day.
Home is the portal through which you enter to decompress from the atrocities of the world each day.
Home is where you look at yourself in the mirror before taking on the day.
And Home is where you never second guess yourself.
Home is where you never have to make excuses for yourself.
Home is where you never dumb down.
And Home is where you are the majority, and majority rules.
Books live at libraries.
Merchandise lives at stores
Groceries live in supermarkets.
But our intact, non-apologetic, irrepressible, culturally-ordained, hence our truest selves, come alive at Home.
Home is not merely where we live. Home is where we come alive!
Home humbled me in Ghana, because I didn’t know I was so “Homeless.”
I was taught in school that Africa was ugly.
I was shown only the atrocities and poverty of Africa
I was warned against the darkness of Africa.
Mother Africa was so strong and so rich and so fertile and so ridden with potential that white explorers wanted to tame Mother, and own Mother and prostitute Mother and reduce Mother.
These evil white explorers and traders wreaked havoc on both sides of the Atlantic.
White traders stopped wanting to trade with Mother Africa and decided to remove the middle-man by colonizing Mother Africa and ravaging her shores and mines and trees and seeds, and sons and daughters and kings and queens. Colonizers raped Mother Africa, her children and her land. Motherfuckers!
Those who survived the evil brutality of supposedly religious slave-traders in Africa ~ then had to endure the rigor of unimaginably inhumane conditions of transatlantic slave ships and its crews. Then those who survived the evil voyage by avoiding sickness ~ or the temptation of throwing themselves overboard to safety ~ were then left to deal with the greedy, lustful white tyrants in the new land. These were white men and compliant white women who had purchased imported “property.” made in the image and likeness of God, mind you, to make them rich in cotton & free labor.
Correction! Slavery didn’t just make slave traders, slave-ship captains or slaveowners rich. Slavery…Correction! Hardworking Black people…made America rich ~ and converted America into a world super power.
Because the strongest of the strongest Africans landed on the shores of the new colony!
For the chance to become American, many white Europeans would deny their mother, their language, their customs and their culture. Being white would suffice, if it meant access, superiority and power in Africa.
Mother Africa’s children weren’t so weak. We refused to deny our Mother!
The new land tyrants wanted nothing to do with the power of Mother Africa, so they attempted to stop her children’s “gibberish”, separated her children further, pit African against Africans and cast shame on Mother’s sunkist skin.
What they didn’t know, because they could not understand, because they’d run away from their home…we were kidnapped from our home and sold into bondage. I don’t know about Ms. Europe, however, Mother Africa called to her children over the waters, in their dreams, in their songs, in their prayers, in their souls and in their DNA!
And because Mother Africa knew that it would be centuries before any of us would see her kind face, or embrace her strong neck, or kiss her warm dark cheeks again, she clothed us with pride, a sense of family, faith, respect and hard work. And she gave us a love for our Mother Africa that made Uncle Sam feel threatened.
How can Sam be our uncle if he refuses to own our Mother as his sister?
So…their insecurities blossomed, thus…
They outlawed our languages,
Monitored our gatherings,
Sanctioned our religion,
Raped our women,
Dispirited our children,
Raped our children,
Belittled our songs,
and owned our bodies…
But never our minds and spirits!!
They couldn’t break us because Mother Africa had put us together so fearfully and wonderfully. And they didn’t understand us and were troubled by the fact that they couldn’t break us. And believe me, those Motherfuckers tried!
When it was unbearable we told our Mother Africa with our sighs and with our tears and with our songs and with our drums. Her frantic heartbeat for her stolen children resonated on the drums of her sons and daughters as they played and danced into the dark sky, the songs Mother Africa had taught them. The syncopation of the rhythmic and mystically majestic drums conjured Mother Africa’s spirit as if the thousands of miles across the sea and thousands of leagues beneath the sea, didn’t stand between us.
We loved Mother Africa, and she loved us, and that it was adequate compensation for being so unloved in the new world.
So 400 years to the month after we first were snatched from her arms, Mother Africa, through her tribal leaders and keepers of culture, welcomed me and my family and 250 others, Home.
Mother didn’t just see her children. We saw our Mother…and our Home.
I didn’t know that Mother had been looking for me to return, because she could not come to where I was.
Home humbled me.
When I think of Home, it isn’t an address.
Home isn’t brick and mortar and living rooms and garages.
Home is the portal through which you enter & then engage the world each day.
Home is the portal through which you return to decompress from the atrocities of the world each day.
Home is where you look at yourself in the mirror before taking on the day.
And Home is where you never second guess yourself.
Home is where you never have to make excuses for yourself.
Home is where you never dumb down.
Home is where you are the majority, and majority rules.
Books live at libraries.
Merchandise lives at stores
Groceries live in supermarkets.
But our intact, non-apologetic, irrepressible, culturally-ordained, hence our truest selves, come alive at Home.
Home is where I can decompress a lifetime of atrocities and unfair treatment so that I can engage the struggle with a renewed sense of self, power and purpose.
Home humbled me in Ghana, because I didn’t know I was so “Homeless.”
I went Home last week and was reminded of who I am. I’m at home in my own skin wherever I go.
Home is not merely where we live. Home is where we come alive!