Turn Me Loose (3 page)

and snickered at all the wrong parts.

If there weren't no women or dogs around,

us men would pile into a truck and ride off towards

the coon side of town, looking for something funny.

You can never turn that word
     around and make it cool….
     It's not a word of love
.

—
CHUCK D

 

Charles Evers

Hearing that word launched

from the back of any throat

brings back the smell

of German shepherd breath

of fresh gasoline

and sulfur air

of fear—both ours and theirs.

I hear nine brave children

walking a gauntlet of hate in Little Rock

and four innocent little girls

lifted up to heaven too soon.

Instead of a rebel yell

I hear a rifle bark.

Instead of a whiskey-soaked yee haw

I hear a window break

and children sobbing for a father

face down in a pool of blood.

I hear all my faith collapse

on the wings of a woman's scream.

I can't hear anything less

and absolutely nothing funny.

Pastoral scene of the gallant south
…

—
ABEL MEEROPOL
,
“Strange Fruit,” sung by
Billie Holiday

 

Byron De La Beckwith

Sometimes it starts with a bonfire

or begins with taunting and spitting

quickly graduating to cursing

and punching and kicking

some body as hard as you can

for the sheer joy of causing them pain

as entertainment for the crowd now

celebrating the crack or pop of broken bodies

showering outstanding individual

violence with applause and cheers.

All you need is some body wearing

the color you've been taught to hate

some body threatening to take

what's rightfully yours

and a little girl with her thighs exposed

held high in the air and screaming.

… there was a sign saying
“Welcome Home De lay” and
when I got in the outskirts of
Greenwood, there was another
one. It brought tears to my eyes
.

 

Mamma's holding a baby

with perfect blue eyes

she drops it when a tea kettle

screams

she reaches for me

but I start to float away

there is a sound like a loud

hand clap and suddenly

I'm floating face up

in a thick warm soup

the air smells like our bathroom

when Willie's on the rag

I drink down all the soup and a crowd

gathers around me singing “Dixie”

If your family's wealth depended on those

you enslaved and the cotton they spun into gold;

if your intellectual superiority depended on

hundreds of years of denying literacy to others

while your color confirmed your right to do so;

if the thought of being responsible for your own

hoeing, planting, chopping, picking, smithing,

raking, mucking, shoeing, milking, smoking,

canning, baking, hauling, cooking, serving,

sweeping, washing, ironing, fixing, nursing,

mending, dusting, and cleaning makes you tired;

then I understand why you love that song so much.

Willie De La Beckwith

He would come home

from evening rallies and secret meetings

so in love with me

I could never see nothing wrong

with what he did with his hands.

I just pretended I didn't know

what gunpowder smelled like

or why he kept his rifles so clean.

If he walked through that door

and said, “Willie, burn these clothes,”

I'd pile them on the coals and stare

at the fire. I'd listen to the music

twix the crackle and calm as we danced.

And while the ashes gathered 'round

their own kind in the bottom of the grate

I'd watch the embers glow like our bedroom did.

Now, I ain't saying he was right or wrong.

He often confused hatred with desire.

But if you ain't never set a man on fire,

felt him explode inside you then die in your arms,

honey, you got no idea what I'm talking about.

It was a touch. It was a look …
It was music playing
.

—
MYRLIE EVERS

 

The right song slow dancing through the air

at the end of a long day full of kids

and no husband, could not only set the tone,

but put the sound of yesterday back in the air.

Smokey Robinson and the Miracles crooned

all the sweet words that his eyes whispered

across the doorframe when he finally came home,

but more often than not, it was Sam Cooke

and Ray Charles or Bobby Blue Bland taking turns

in my ears, reminding me how much I loved that man

no matter how mad or lonely I might have felt.

The right song was like a Kodak Brownie of us cuddling

or an atlas mapping out all our rough spots

and the ways around them. After sweet talking him out

of his suit and tie, after he unloaded the day's burdens,

we melted together in the dark, beneath the covers

and the crackle of the radio. The sound of my guys

singing backup and Medgar's jack hammer heart

finally slowing to match our leaky faucet, as he fell asleep

in my arms, completing the soundtrack for a perfect night.

I was told that the president of these United States

said that film was
truth written in lightning

25,000 proud hooded knights marched

through Atlanta just to celebrate the opening.

What an electric moment it must have been

sitting in a whites only theater

being right there in the balcony, beside Booth

when that pretty little bullet kissed Lincoln on the head

laughing out loud at clown nigger politicians

pretending to run meetings and pass laws

wiping their asses on the Constitution

pissing on the South and calling it reconstruction

How hard it must have been to sit on your hands

and not shoot at the moving pictures when the actors

made up like coons chased after white women.

I can almost hear the crowd whoop and shout

when the heroes thundered into town at the end,

white robes, hoods and guns gleaming in the sun

dispensing an Old Testament justice on the screen

as clear as Revelations for Christian men like me.

Byron De La Beckwith

[White]
Power
,
noun

1
belief in the fact that all white people have the God given and constitutionally guaranteed right to exercise, encourage, promote, celebrate and defend the privilege of being born superior to other races.

[White]
Pride
,
noun

1
a feeling of deep pleasure or satisfaction derived from the knowledge that
all
members of other races possess behaviors or abilities that distinguish them as inferior with the obvious exception of athletes, musicians, and comedians like
Amos and Andy
who make white folks laugh so hard they damn near piss themselves. The same goes for the tap dancing nigger butler on the
Shirley Temple Show
, and that nigger
Uncle Ben
on the rice box. They're all always shuffling and bent over with big ol' dickless grins on their faces. They're the only niggers a white man could ever trust with his daughters.

[White]
Privilege
, see
Colonialism, Apartheid, and Manifest Destiny
.

Synonyms
: Patriot, Religious Right, Conservative Christian, Staunch Segregationist, proud American, active Klansman, card carrying member of the Citizens Council, Mississippi Sovereignty Commission, Redeemers; commonly confused with
racist, xenophobe
, or
bigot
.

Byron De La Beckwith

Long before George Jones and others

had folks all over the country hungry

for a weekly plate of Hee Haw

and the Grand Ole Opry,
TV
pretended

regular, hardworking, blue collar,

proud-to-be-white folks, didn't exist.

Johnny Cash went on Carson in '64

and damn near set the stage on fire.

His songs was real music—not none

of that monkey shine they tried to sell

with white faces on the cover.

But as good as Johnny was and is,

American Bandstand, Rock 'n Roll,

and them long-haired sissies from England

made living rooms full of our young

almost apologize for being born white.

Dick Clark is no better than a nigger to me

and the Jews that control television is even less.

Willie De La Beckwith

My ears were field with cotton.

My throat had been lynched shut.

I was chained to something as big

and long and dark as Mississippi herself.

Magnolia trees were bleeding. The floor

was turning to marsh beneath my feet.

I called out for help, but only laughter

and spit came out of my whip.

When I felt the cold metal hounds

biting my ankles, I sat up in bed,

screaming and chasing my breath,

only to find my husband

grinning and tickling my feet.

Willie De La Beckwith

Like any smart woman

I've stormed out

even divorced him once

to make my point

but anybody

who even stops

takes time

to think about it

and still makes

their lips ask why

I'm so proud to be

Mrs. Byron De La Beckwith

ain't never heard

Tammy Wynnette sing

—and she's

from Mississippi too.

Myrlie Evers

I fell in love with his desire to take his fear

make Mississippi something stronger out of it.

Put my plans on hold to breathe him up close

help him plant his dreams for a better South.

Wove my spine to his so he could stand

magnolia tall and blossom for all to see.

Birthed him namesakes with enough arms

to carry all of his tomorrows.

He spent every penny of his strength organizing

for a hate-free day and we didn't waste a single night.

Rule number one. White is always right.

Number two. Never look a white man in the eye.

Three. Always answer
yes Sir
or
no Ma'am
when spoken to by whites.

Four. Always look for, use or request the colored section.

Five. Never speak to, smile at or stare in the direction of a white woman.

Six. Pretend your name really is boy, son, or worse.

Seven. Ignore all white sexual aggression towards your sisters, mothers, or aunts.

Eight. Always suppress your anger, cynicism, and rage or mask it with a wide grin, pretend stupidity, and silence.

Nine. If a white man says it looks like rain, wish out loud for an umbrella no matter how dry it is.

Ten. If you forget any of these rules, fall back on rule number one.

I am driving a new white Cadillac

but instead of gunning it and kicking up red dirt

I'm joy riding Sunday-slow on a country road

of wooly black heads

I slam on the breaks

and suddenly I can hear them breathing,

when I floor the pedal they start to sing

and the faster I drive the louder they howl

my steering wheel and windshield disappear

the leather seats turn to pine

the caddy rolls right into a church

where somebody is beating

the hell out of a tambourine

and it gets louder and louder and louder

until my woman screams

and we both look down

to see she has given birth

to what we first thought

was a mongrel baby

but after I throw it in the Mississippi

I can see it was just covered with blood.

after Tyehimba Jess