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Black African Beads

February 11, 2021 Happy Peaople, Poem, Poetic Justice

“African black ebony beads, so shiny so strong, made from the strong sticky wax of crushed skulls of fallen black heroes. African beads, woven in the antagonizing heat from the black hands of a black gentle woman with light grey eyes, with black sweat and humidity guiding the movement of the sharp thread as it pierced the centre of the nucleus of the black bead. 

The same way the sharp thread of the spear of my uncle pierced and violated my trust when I was a small girl, too small, just a small girl. When I rub my brittle dark brown fingers across my African black ebony beads, I can feel my uncles brittle dark skin pressed against mine…

I can’t breathe, I’m paralyzed, as the fiery scent of the gin in his overpowering breath arrests my soul, as I closed my eyes and imagined that my papa would come back to us and rescue me and kill my uncle the intruder, but every night my uncle came to visit me in my bedroom, nobody could hear my screams, I had no voice, I was invisible for 10 years …..I guess little black girls can wish and dream. 

African black ebony beads, so shiny so strong, tell me a circular history of hard black Gabonese diamonds hidden between my identity and years of strenuous oppression in the dry red sands of sexual abuse, its roots dipped in hazy blue Egyptian honey, humming a distant electric drum beat to the illegitimate and forced coming of age of this little black girl. 

As a black woman, I learnt not to cry, as the tears fell down and scratched my brown face like the strong sticky wax of the crushed skulls of fallen black heroes. Just like poisonous streams of African beads that fell and fell, woven in the antagonizing heat from the black hands of a black gentle woman with light grey eyes, who gave me no voice.

In my broken black womanhood, it is a yellow beehive that masks my insecurities and fears, but sitting dormantly within the centre of this beehive are the eyes of glory, honour and black womanhood.

My black mask, is the circular wind, which wraps itself against my mahogany skin, and reminds me of the illusion I create for myself to co-exist in, for without the mountain of the black ebony beads, so shiny so strong, how can I survive the dry red sands, and how can I become the black woman my mother intended me to be, and scurry the strength to bury the crushed skulls of black men, in this current day genocide of the black race.

Can I remove my wig and weave, and expose the true strands of my brittle nappy stubborn black woollen afro hair? 

My Black mask is formed of many illusive yellow components, similar but distant to the purpose of the African masks my ancestors would wear to evoke spirits and give thanks to our fallen ancestors. 

My contour is my mask. So I ask you black men, who are the holders to the key of my yellow beehive, can I finally remove my mask?

Can I let the soft possessive breeze massage my dark, cracked tired ebony skin? black man will you allow the fiery wind, to blow away the tears that punctuate the heinous rain you see in the bottom half of my subtle eyes? 

             Will you stroke my black hair; will you use your black ivory fingertips to follow the hollow singular lines of my cornrows? and cup my black face with your soft hands, and have me for the African black queen I was born to be?  Would you accept me for me, the beautiful black woman I am?

And not the Hollywood image of a white woman that society has painted as the pinnacle of archetypal beauty, that has programmed your mind and blinded you black man.

Can’t you see that I am angry, because I can’t have you my precious black man, because you refuse to see me. I bleach my skin, wear the white woman’s cologne, wear their make up, imitate their long fluorescent

white silky hair with my weaves and wigs, because you never saw me, even when you were just a black boy. 

                     The same way I had no voice and nobody could hear my screams or would see my pain, when my uncle came to visit me in my bedroom every night. Is just like the disappointment of me closing my eyes and wishing papa would come back to us and kill my intruder, is the same way I feel when you refuse to see me. So yes, black man,

I am angry, I guess little black girls can wish and dream. African black ebony beads, so shiny so strong, made from the strong sticky wax of crushed skulls of fallen black heroes. African beads, woven in the antagonizing heat from the black hands of a black gentle woman with light grey eyes, with black sweat and humidity guiding the movement of the sharp thread as it pierced the centre of the nucleus of the black bead.

Let the link and chain of the black ebony beads, be the heavenly silky umbilical cord which reunites our black tribe, let it be the spiritual link of oppression and pain which causes our beauty and voices to be intertwined in one central beehive of black power.”

End

Poet: Emmanuel Boateng

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