Bertel King, Jr.

Environmentalism, not the word, which is heavy, or even the science, which is in flux, but the ideal, is the closest I’ve had to a spiritual guide. It’s hard to think of myself as a good person when the diapers from my childhood are still decomposing, and somewhere a bird lies dissected with one of my plastic building blocks lying in its belly. Long after my name has left anyone’s tongue, fragments of my dead video games will still float about at sea.

Help me to navigate this world of cups and bags and toys intended for a moment’s use, destined to outlive us all. Forgive me, please, for all the times I stayed silent, attempting to accept a gift as intended, rather than come off as self-righteous. The damage I’ve done from years of using our ancestors as fuel and our cousins as food will haunt me for the rest of my days. Forgive me for treating you as anything other than my home, for not seeing, for forgetting, that you and I have never been apart.

I know the path is unclear, that the panels atop my home and the batteries in my car are made of parts of you, of us, that can never be replaced, but between that and pumping our past into the sky until the future burns away, I choose the route of less harm. Less harm is still harm, and more harm than none, but all I can do is the best I can do, and nothing less. This is my vow.

This morning, my mind was a flutter with heavy questions and light ones too.

Am I my body? Is my body me?

Or am I the space between my ears?

Do I like this? What’s my stance on that? If I don’t know, then who am I?

All these people — who do they think I am?

And what happened all those years ago… Things have changed. Am I still me?

Then I stubbed my toe, and it all went away.

Call it a reminder.

I am where I am.

My son saw a man bloodied and beaten yesterday. His two-year-old eyes turned toward me damp with worry.

I didn’t have the words.

The blows were dealt on a screen, swung from someone’s imagination, made real by the ability to act and create convincing blood.

I wish I did more to protect him.

To make sure he knows that this is not okay.

Boom —

The power goes out.

The lights go dark.

The vents quiet.

The buzzing stops.

Screens drain batteries.

Best to turn them off.

Speakers, too.

The only words now are our own.

Open the windows.

Start fanning.

Pull out blankets.

Huddle close.

As the sun goes down.

Light a candle.

Wide awake

Staring upward

In the darkness of night

Quivering

Wrestling with delusions

It’s vital to keep breathing

But that doesn’t make it easy

I am no stranger to downward dog. My body assumes this position more easily than it takes up a run. Yet it still surprises me when, after I extend my hips up and out, the back of my knees resist straightening out.

There’s surprising tension, like answering the phone when a family member’s face is on the screen. The sensation that arises despite having talked to them the day before.

Like wondering if the neighbors will notice you’ve gone an extra week without cutting the grass. Like stepping out of the car and not knowing if you remembered your wallet. Like checking the news when you already know the story.

My tendons are telling me it doesn’t matter much what happened the day before. This is today.

Stop thinking and breathe.

Everything will settle into place.

There are parts of me that define who I am.

Favorite albums, games, and movies.

Places, hobbies, and friends.

Memories that stick.

  Then years pass, and I forget them.

Have I forgotten who I was?

Do I know who I will be?

Don’t get me started on right now.

  Memories are transient visitors,

As skittish as the thoughts that bear them.

I’d focus my attention on something more permanent,

But nothing seems to last.

All I need

Is wind in my chest,

The rain in my blood,

And food from the earth.

I like life to be comfortable

And free from difficulty.

I like to live with plenty.

But these don’t matter much

If I don’t breathe.

A new day, a new day’s work.

There wasn’t a day that had passed in the last forty years that hadn’t seen Antonio place his boots, skin aged as much as his own, by the side of the back door, rest his hat atop the coat rack that held only one coat, and stop to rest his soul on the wooden chair. There he’d sit for half an hour, sometimes eyes open, and sometimes eyes closed. No TV. No book. No phone.

Cecilia saw him approach the door. She grabbed a glass, held it under the tap, and placed it by the chair. Then she left before the door opened. She did this every day since before she knew such acts of kindness were a special thing in this world. Since before life outside this fenced in land, before peers and tests and puberty. Before the kind of love you weren’t born with, but learned through stumbles and, sometimes, regrets. She did this because no one ever asked.

Back at the table, Cecilia ate with Andrea, who placed rice and beans on plates between her and her daughter.

Antonio stepped into the room, nodded to his wife, and made his way down the hall to the shower. He wouldn’t be long. You could just about count the second between his steps, but he was still where he said he would be, when he said he would be there. Discipline and routine had ironed out many of the wrinkles that slowed a person down.

Then he led the family in grace. This, too, was the same grace he had said every day Cecilia could recall. Andrea knew that this tradition started many years before that, back to the days when they had first acquired land for their own farm. Both families had chipped in to make this happen for their children. They had lived on this land for generations, but it was another thing to own a piece to call your own.

For this reason, Antonio always ended the prayer with “Gracias,” not “Amen.”

Andrea asked Antonio about his day and about the field, though the two were one in the same. Then, that day, routine ended. A ringing phone snatched Andrea from the table. There was a hole in a neighbor’s fence and several cattle we’re missing.

Antonio started getting ready before Andrea was even off the phone.

He didn’t return that night.

Or the following morning.

Search teams were able to find the cattle, but not Antonio.

Sometimes even mountains disappear in the time it takes to breathe.

—

Cecilia sits at the bar with Gretchen, the neighbor’s daughter. A decade or so later, they’ve managed to stay friends. Tragedy had put distance between their families, but it had fused these two together. They shared the agony of loss and guilt.

Here at the bar, they both ordered sodas. Cecilia had never tasted the tinge of alcohol. But she found comfort in the company of people who had things they wished to forget.

“They say rain’s coming, but I don’t know.” Gretchen coated her teeth with sugar, then clinked the glass back on the counter.

“God, I hope so,” Cecilia said, a prayer. “Let’s talk about something else.”

“Anything else?”

“Anything else.”

Since those days, which went unspoken now, Gretchen had worked Cecilia’s family land. It was all she felt she could do at the time. School wasn’t enough of a struggle to busy her at home. With three older brothers, her family never expected her to spend much time outside. They thought it weird when she first volunteered to help the Gopez family farm, but their shame kept them as quiet here as it had in other aspects of life. By the time she graduated, they knew the land, their land, meant too much to ask her to walk away.

“I heard a song the other day,” Gretchen said. “Something about all people being good. Do you believe that?”

“That all people are good?”

Gretchen nodded.

Cecilia swirled the soda around in her glass.

“I do,” she said without breaking her gaze. Cecilia stared so deeply into the bubbles that Gretchen pondered if her friend could see the oxygen, seperate it out from the hydrogen the way ony she could see through flaws directly to a person’s worth.

“Why?”

Cecilia took a sip, then, “Let’s talk about something else.”

“I’m beginning to think you don’t walk to talk.”

Cecilia didn’t say anything. Her eyes continued to stare, but the glass had moved. No hydrogen now. Only oxygen. But her right hand made its way up to the table, palm upward. Gretchen placed her hand on top and squeezed.

With her other hand, Gretchen flipped over her phone and checked the time. It was then that she saw the date. As they held hands, it was she, not Cecilia, whose cheek felt the stream of a tear.

—

“Tía Gretchen! Tía Gretchen!”

Gretchen smiled down at little Christina, who, unless she concentrated really hard, could only say her aunt’s name in pairs. Her tía’s name, rather, as Cecilia had taught her.

“What is it, child? Gretchen asked, sounding more like her mother had all those years ago.

Christina sticked an emply plate in Gretchen’s hands, expecting it to come back with a serving of rice or beans or whatever poor Gretchen tried her hands at cooking. It was a shame Cecilia spent so much time in the field, because she was also the one who knew what to do at a stove.

Christina’s father didn’t stick around to see his daughter born. Unlike Antonio, at least he had the decency to tell Cecilia he was stepping out of her life. Over time Gretchen had grown angrier, not so much at Antonio, but at the universe and the men who tried to shake it. Much to her parents’ disappointment, Gretchen never found a man she could trust long enough to love. Or love long enough to trust.

For her, Cecilia and Christina were it.

Like clockwork, footsteps approached around back. Weathered hands reached for aging boots and slid them off, placing them by the side of the door. A hat went atop the coat rack. A tired soul rested on an old wooden chair. Eyes close, with no TV, book, or phone to distract them.

Half an hour later, Cecilia stood up to take a shower, join her family at the table, and lead them in grace.

When I die I will live on

In the hearts I’ve touched

In the places my ashes land

  I don’t expect the world to remember me

But if my face appears in someone’s mind

I hope that brings a smile

I fell in love with a guy once.

This was a surprise. You only love books and school. I thought you were into girls.

This was back before I could have gotten away with saying, “So what if I do?” I don’t. I didn’t. But it hasn’t impacted my life much. I know plenty of lesbians who have been in love with more men than me.

“Are those unicorns?” he asked one day, spotting the cover of the notebook I was doodling in. “I thought everyone gave those up when they were eleven.”

Panicking, I closed the book, which only made it easier to see the cover.

“I guess I hold on to things longer than I should,” I mumbled.

“Hey, I’m not judging. You do you.”

That was it. There was no more to that conversation. Despite what he said, I thought he was judging. But he noticed me. That was enough.

I’m almost ashamed to say he was tall, dark, and handsome. I came to take comfort in being different, and in this way my crush was just like the stereotype. Though he was also black, which in retrospect would have been a problem with parents like mine in a town like the one we lived in. I got out of there, and so did nearly everyone else from my school. Most of those who didn’t now look lost in time. They voted for the president not out of any policy preference or anger at other cultures, but sheer bitterness.

Back then, all of them, guys and girls, looked better than me. I’d say they didn’t like me, but that would mean noticing me. I was fortunate to float through school too invisible to be bullied and, despite my love for books, too average for teachers to love me. Those reactions I mentioned earlier? Those were from the few friends I made in college.

That conversation lingered with me for weeks. Each day we sat next to each other in the class, not saying anything. That was fine, because like me, he spent his quiet time deep in a book. And from that day forward, I noticed what he was reading. Eldest. The Audacity of Hope. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

He, too, seemed to be using books to disappear from this torturous camp the buses ferried us off to each day. He used them to fill every moment that wasn’t filled with busy work.

Some of our interests crossed over. I read Harry Potter and Eragon, though I didn’t like the book enough to bother with the sequel. I sat next to him reading The Two Towers wondering if he would comment. He didn’t, but he noticed. A few weeks later he started reading The Fellowship of the Ring.

I should have said something to him. We sat next to each other for an entire quarter. It was a quiet class, but we could have spoken at any point on the way in and out. There were so many opportunities.

But why would he want to talk to me? No one else did. And I had made it to high school without developing the skills necessary to strike up conversation with someone new.

So that’s where that chapter ended. We didn’t share any classes the next quarter, and I spent that time kicking myself for not having taken a chance. Those few months were among the longest, most miserable of my life.

Next quarter, there he was. Civics. There were lines of desks between us, but while most of our classmates talked in their free time, we sat there reading books. In his hands, Democracy Matters. Mine, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

And despite the agony of the past few months, I didn’t say a thing (my choice of reading sure didn’t help me feel more comfortable around men).

This time, after our last class of the quarter, he stopped just outside the door.

“Hey, uh, I was wondering what your name was.”

I was not expecting this. “Trish,” I stammered out.

“Trish. I’m Jacob.”

Hi, Jacob.”

An awkward pause.

“I noticed you like to read.”

“I do.”

An even more awkward pause.

“I guess I’ll see you around,” he said.

“I guess so,” I parroted.

It was then that I realized he was as nervous and bashful as I was. After he walked away, I waited a bit before walking in the same direction to my next class, smiling dopily to myself.

That next year, I started my first quarter hoping to see him again. It had been a full quarter, plus the summer, since the last time we spoke. But he wasn’t in any of them.

The next day, I saw him in the cafeteria. It was my turn to overcome my nerves.

“Mind if I sit here?”

He looked up from his book, Call Me by Your Name.

“Trish,” I added.

“Huh?”

I gestured toward the book.

“Oh,” he smiled, embarrassed. “Sure. I’d like that.”

That was as close as we ever got to flirting. We barely even seemed like friends in those first few weeks. We mostly read side by side. Small talk was not something I had ever needed to know before.

By the third month, we had figured out how to speak. It was nice, looking back, to know someone who moved at the same speed.

Unfortunately, there weren’t enough days left in school. Soon we were looking at colleges and receiving acceptance letters. We both chose schools that were out of state, probably out of a mutual belief that we both needed to get far away to get a fresh start on this whole people thing. We said we’d keep in touch, but we didn’t. That’s okay. I’ll never forget the last thing he said to me.

“You were reading Rocket Boys the first time I spoke to you.”

“I was?”

“It was sitting on your desk next to that unicorn notebook you used to doodle in.”

“You remember that?”

“It was seeing you with all those books that made me interested in reading. I mean, I read just fine, and I got good grades, but it wasn’t something I did for fun. But you were always in a book in a way I had never seen before.”

“You read because if me?”

“I read because I like it. But it’s thanks to you that I found that out.”

“Thank you for noticing me,” I said, though I wasn’t sure if it came out right. I couldn’t put into words what it meant to have had that big an influence on someone’s life, but more than that, his noticing me changed mine. He pulled me out of my shell. Not completely out, but at least my head and neck, like a turtle or a snail. Enough to engage with the world.

We went our separate ways. I voted for Obama in the fall. I jumped at the chance to see Cornel West when he came to my school. My parents and extended family members, who never talked to me all that much to begin with, started talking to me even less.

A decade has passed. Many old classmates surely have had kids by now. Some have probably gotten divorced. Me? I’ve still yet to date anyone, but I don’t hesitate to say I’ve experienced love.

Everyone in the United States is an African American. Some of our ancestors took different routes to bring us here. They left home so long ago that they, and we, forgot that we come from the same mother.

Up here

Surrounded by the expanse of space

Reminds me of back home

Nighttime

On the 28th floor

Where all I see are shooting stars

Above and below

Down this long and winding road

Corn fields line both sides

Stalks stand in rows like soldiers

Oblivious to how little time they have left

Tender frames stand tall and tan

Heads scorching under the summer sun

Ahead the reaper draws blades

To pick them off in mass

Their remains join those that came before

Around the corner a plaque honors those who have fallen here

The tightness in your stomach The tension in your neck The heat that flares up through your lungs and out your nose The flutter in your chest

You’re not alone.

The people who live in the house down the street And the people they call mom and dad The people who have shared your bed And the people who made you never want to leave it The people who have stolen things they shouldn’t And the people who put them away The people who love the world so deeply that they dedicate their lives to others And the people who rather watch it all burn

Have all felt it too

I dug my shovel into the ground the other day, moving dirt around, clearing away the plants I didn’t want to make room for the ones I did.

By accident, I drove my shovel through an earthworm. It stopped squirming.

My heart stopped. Did its?

I knew the earthworm didn’t have a heart quite like mine, but that was my fear.

A moment later, the worm went back to the work of living. So did I.

I looked away, shaking

A deep ache in the center of my chest

The tears were hot and heavy behind my eyes

But they would not fall

  The next day,

My neighbors went off to the office

And the store

And on with their lives

  They fellowshipped in church

They prayed

They loved

  In the days to come,

Families were torn apart

As airports became frontlines

And borders extended outward

  Rivers wept

And the ground shook

  People marched with hate

People marched with hate for the hate

  Screens, airwaves, and pages flooded

With a barrage of scandals and lies

  The entire world watched

as our country became a mockery of itself

  After my neighbors filled ovals with ink

And slid pieces of paper through machines

  Yet, each day, we still greet one another with smiles

What a cruel culture we share,

That we hurt strangers and neighbors alike

Doing our civic duty