Juneteenth (10 page)

WHEN THE HEN BREAKS WIND—See, I got you!

They laughed. I tried to grin. My lip wouldn’t hold.

I sho got you that time, Bliss. Hell, you can’t be no preacher, ’cause a preacher’d know better than to git caught that easy. You all right though. You want to shoot some marbles? Man, dressed up the way you is, you ought to be a
real
gambler.

Not now, I have to go to the store. Maybe I can tomorrow.

Say, Rev, if you so smart, what’s the name of that dog who licked those sores poor Lazarus had?

He didn’t have a name, I said.

Yes he did too. He name Mo’ Rover! Dam’, Rev, we got you agin!

I said, you mean
more
-over.

He said, Shucks, how can you have
Mo’
Rover when he ain’t got
no
Rover?

They laughed.

He a nasty dog, licking blood, someone said.

Sho, there’s a heap of nasty things in the Bible, man.

Hey y’all, he said, even for a yella he’s a good fella. Let’s teach him a church song before he goes. They crowded around.

Sing this with me, Rev, he said, beginning like Daddy Hickman lining out a hymn:

Well, ah-mazing grace
How sweet
The sound …
A bullfrog slapped
His grand-mammy
Down.…

He watched me, grinning like an egg-sucking dog. I looked back, feeling my temper rise.

Hey, whatsamatter, Rev, he said. Don’t you like my song?

Man, Bowlegs said, you know don’t no preacher go for none of that mess. Bliss here is a real preacher and that stuff you singing is sinful.

Oh, it is, he said. Then how come nobody never tole me? I guess I better hurry up and sing him a
real
church song so he’ll forgive me. What’s more, come Sunday I’m going to his church and do my righteous duty. Here’s a real righteous one, Rev!

Well, I’m going to the church house
And gon’ climb up to the steeple
Said I’m going to Rev’s little ole church house
Gon’ climb up on the steeple
Gon’ take down my britches, baby
,
And doo-doo—whew, Lawd!—
Straight down on the people!

I looked at him and gritted my teeth. My face felt swollen. No bigger’n me and trying to be a great big sinner. I thought: Saint
Peter bit off an ear but still got the keys. Amen! I looked on the ground, searching for a rock.

Boy, I said, before you were just pranking with me; now you’re messing with the Lord. And just for that He’s going to turn you into a crow.

Shoots, he said.
Who?
You can’t scair me. Less see you.

I said
He
will do it, not me. You just wait and see.

Hell, I can’t wait that long. Goin’ on a cotton-pick next month. Goin’ hear all those big guys tell all those good ole lies. See, he said bending over and patting his bottom. I ain’t no crow. Can’t see no feathers shooting outta my behind.…

They laughed, watching me. I reproached him with all the four horses galloping in my eyes.

Suddenly Bowlegs stepped close and looked him up and down, frowning.

Yeah, man, you might be right about your behind, he said. But while I don’t see no feathers, your
mouth
is getting awful long and sharp. And while you always been black now I be dam’ if you ain’t begun to turn
blue
black!

Man, he said, taking a swing at Bowlegs, you better watch that stuff ’cause I don’t play with no chillun.

Hey, Rev, he said, here’s a church song my big brother taught me. He up in Chicago and this one’s
really
religious:

Well, the tomcat jumped the she-cat
By the bank of a stream
Started howling and begging for that
Natural cream
.
Soon the she-cat was spitting and
A-scratching and a-kicking up sand
Then the he-cat up and farted
Like a natural man
.
The she-cat she jumped salty, looked around
And screamed
,
Said, Hold it right there, daddy
,
Until your mama’s been redeemed
.

As they laughed he joined in with his juicy mouth, rearing back with his thumbs thrust in his suspenders.

Hell, he said, I’m a poet and didn’t know it.

He did a rooster strut, flapping his arms and scuffing up the dust.

Hey, y’all, he said, listen to this:

Bliss, Bliss
Cat piss miss!

He flicked his fingers at me like a magician, taking my name in vain.

Man, you sho got a fine kinda name to put down a conjure with. If a man was to say your name at two dogs gitting they ashes hauled the he-dog’ll git a dog-knot in his peter as big as a baseball! They be hung up for ninety-nine days. That’s right y’all. You say ole Rev’s name to a guy throwing rocks at you and he couldn’t hit the side of a barn with a whiffletree! Heck, Bliss, you say your name and hook fingers with another guy when a dog’s taking him a hockey and you lock up his bowels like a smokehouse! Yeah, man, the First National Bank! Constipate that fool for life!

They laughed at me. I saw a good egg rock now and looked at him, mad. I was going to sin. Saint Peter, he got the keys.

Since you think you’re so smart now here’s one for you, I said.
Meat whistle
. That’s for you.

What?

He puzzled up his face.

You heard me, I said.
Meat whistle
.

He bucked his eyes like I had hit him. It was quiet. I bent and picked up the rock. Someone snickered.

What you mean, he said, I never heard of no
meat
whistle.…

They looked at us, changing sides now. Ha, he got you! one of them said. Ain’t but one kind of meat whistle and us all got one, ain’t we, y’all?

Yeah, yeah, that’s right, they said.

The whites of his eyes were turning red. I backed away. What kinda dam’ whistle is that, he said. It bet’ not be what I think it is.

He doubled up his fists.

I watched his eyes.

It blows some real bad-smelling tunes, don’t it, Bliss? one of the others said.

I watched his eyes, red. You ain’t the only one who knows stuff like that, I said. Just because I’m a preacher, don’t think you can run over me.

They were laughing at him now.

Tell him ’bout it, Rev!

Ole Bliss is awright!

Watch out now, ole Rev’s colored blood is rising.…

Indian, man! Look at him!

Ole Bliss is awright! Look at him, y’all. He probably got him some mean cracker blood too, man!

He looked angry, his lips pouting. Maybe you know this one, I said.

Clank, clank, clank, I said and waited, watching his eyes.

What you mean, “clank, clank, clank,” little ole yella som’bitch?

Clank, clank, clank, I said, that’s your mama walking in her cast-iron drawers.

Seeing his face looming close I moved.

He came on at me but too late, I wasn’t there. Always switch the rhythm—

Watch out, Bliss! they called, but I missed him not. I struck hard
seeing his surprise as the blood burst from his forehead like juice from a crushed blackberry. His face went gray as his hand flew to his forehead. I looked, then I ran backwards with sin running with me in my eyes. I held the rock cupped in my hand like an egg, feeling his blood on my fingers. On this rock I will build my … Kept it with Teddy, my leather-bound Bible.

You shoulda used some cat piss, man, their short cries sounded behind me. ’Cause he ain’t missed
nothing
. Look at ole Rev run! Zoooom! Barney-O-Bliss, man! Barney-O-Blissomobile.

Put some salt on his tail. You aim to catch him you got to turn on the gas, man.

Man, he may be a reverend but he runs like hell!

Taking it on the lamb chop, man.

Aches, breaks. Crackers and wine, you’re out, Bliss. Out!

No, I’ll be there when he arrives. We agreed … I’ll …

They relaxed in their chairs, the whiskey between them. Only the air-conditioning unit hummed below their voices. O’Brien was intense.

Listen, he said. Dam’ it, Senator, we’re losing your state and my state and even New York seems doubtful. You’ll have to lay off the nigger issue because the niggers and the New York Jews are out to get us this year. They don’t have to take it and they won’t. Here, try one of these. No, smoke it. There’s plenty where that comes from. But you restrain yourself, you hear? We want you to curb that mouth of yours or else
.…
Make me whole, patch my sole.… It hurts here and here and there and there.

We made every church in the circuit. Lights! Camera!

Suffer the little children to come suffer the little children to come sufferthelittlechildrentocome Sufferthelittlechildrentohospodepomeli—

Why don’t they hurry and open the light? Please. Please, Please Daddy!

I learned to rise up slow, the white Bible between my palms, my head thrusting sharp into the frenzied shouting and up, up, into the certainty of his mellow voice soaring isolated and calm like a note of spring water burbling in a glade haunted by the counterrhythms of tumbling, nectar-drunk bumblebees.…

Teddy, Teddy! Where’s my bear? Daddy!

You bear as you’ve sown. A growl.

Then, he appeared out of the brilliant darkness, dark and handsome.

You must not be startled at this blessed boy-chile, sisters and brothers, he intoned. Not by this little jewel. For it has been said that a little child shall lead them. Oh, yes! Where he leads me, I shall
follow
. Amen! And our God said, “Go ye into the wilderness and preach the Word,” and this child has answered the sacred call. And he obeys. Suffer the little children. Yes! And it is said that the child is father to the man. So why be surprised over the size, shape, color of the vessel? Why not listen to his small sweet voice and drink in the life-giving water of the Word …?

Listen to the lamb, he said. But I heard the bear a-growling. Teddy! Teddy! Where? Gone on the lamb’s chop.

I used to lie within, trembling. Breathing through the tube, the hot air and hearing the hypnotic music, the steady moaning beneath the rhythmic clapping of hands, trembling as the boys marched me down a thousand aisles on a thousand nights and days. In the dark, trembling in the dark. Lying in the dark while his words seemed to fall like drops of rain upon the resonant lid. Until each time just as the shapes seemed to close in upon me, Deacon Wilhite would raise the lid and I’d rise up slowly, as he taught me, with the white Bible between my palms, careful not to disturb my hair on the tufted pink lining. Trembling now, with the true hysteria in my cry:

LORD, LORD, WHY HAST THOU …?

Mankind? What? Correct. Lights in. Camera!

Donelson, the makeup is too pasty. The dark skin shines through like green ghosts
.

Yeah, but you tell me how to make up a flock of crows to look like swans
.

Donelson, you can do anything that you really try. In the beginning is the image. Use your imagination, man. Imagine a nation. New. Look into the camera’s omniscient eye, there’s a magic in it. And the crows shall be …

Whiter than swans? Balls! Let’s change the script and make them Chinamen or Indians.… What do you say, Karp?

And in the confusion birthed by women that world rolled on like rushes on a Moviola. There’d be shouting and singing and that big woman in Jacksonville came running down front, looking like a fullback in a nurse’s helper’s uniform, crying, He’s the Lamb of God, he is! And trying to lift me out and Teddy coming up with my legs and my cap pistol catching in the lining and Daddy Hickman grabbing her just in time to prevent the congregation from seeing, saying sotto voce, Deacon Wilhite,
git
this confounded woman away from here even if you have to put a headlock on the fool! She’s about to upset
everything!

He took Teddy and refused to buy me a soda and the next night I refused to rise up. I refused the call, just lay there in the throbbing deathlike stillness with the top up and my eyes closed against the brilliant light and him looming with outstretched arms above me, until he got them singing strong and came down and promised me I could have Teddy back.… When?
Beary me not in lone Calv’ry.…
Then standing there above me the shadow leaving and the light bright to my opened eyes, saying, This boy-chile, brothers and sisters, lies here in a holy coma. No doubt he’s seeing visions beyond this wicked world. Ah, but he shall rise up as all the saved shall rise up—on that morning.…

But I didn’t budge, demanding an ice cream cone with silence. Vanilla I wanted.

Suffer the little children to come …

Flora was in the alley picking sunflowers. We were alone. I’ll show you mine if you’ll show me yours, I said.

What! Button up your britches, li’l ole boy, she said. You ain’t even old enough to dogwater.

But I just want to
see
.

You goin’ see stars, that’s what you gonna see ’cause I’m goin’ to tell my mama if you don’t go ’way.

Nine stitches saved Choc Charlie, or so they say
.

One morning as he was shining his shoes in Georgia, I heard Daddy Hickman singing:

I’m going to the Nation, baby
,
Going to the Territory
.
Says I’m going to the Nation.…
Going to the Territory …