by Lorene Cary
St. Paul’s gave me new words into which I must translate the old. But St. Paul’s would keep me inside my black skin, that fine, fine membrane that was meant to hold in my blood, not bind up my soul. The stories show me the way out. I must tell my daughter that. I must do it so she’ll know. Then I can go to my own room where the window is open to the black night and fly out unafraid to meet the darkness. I can fly out at dark to rub against the open sky. And ain’t I a voman? I must leave my mother and father. I must leave my husband and daughter sleeping. They will come, too, if they want. The night can carry us all. It is big enough. Others are there already, calling, welcoming. At dawn I will alight on my sill. I can slip into my smooth black skin. It will welcome me. I will stay within it most nights, and sleep next to my husband, but I will return again and again to the sky. The skin will grow wrinkled as the nights come and go, but my husband will not salt it. My skin will know me, and I will not have to fear my skin.
I did not ask for the stories, but I was given them to tell, to retell and change and pass along. (Each one teach one, pass it on, pass it on.) I was given them to plait into my story, to use, to give me the strength to take off my skin and stand naked and unafraid in the night, to touch other souls in the night. This time Izzy will jump of her own will when her legs have grown strong enough to absorb the shock; she will not lie on the ground, splayed out alone, crippled by distrust. She will learn how to jump through life, big, giant jumps. She’ll fall, and get up again. Up, Izzy, up. Paint, dance, read, sing, skate, write, climb, fly. Remember it all, and come tell us about it.
I have never skated on black ice, but perhaps my children will. They’ll know it, at least, when it appears: that the earth can stretch smooth and unbroken like grace, and they’ll know as they know my voice that they were meant to have their share.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Lorene Cary was raised in Philadelphia and Yeadon, Pennsylvania. She was graduated from St. Paul’s School in 1974 and received a B.A. and M.A. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1978. While studying at Sussex University on a Thouron Fellowship for British-U.S. student exchange, she earned an M.A. in Victorian literature. In 1992 Colby College conferred on her an honorary Doctorate of Letters.
In the early 1980s Ms. Cary worked as a writer for Time and as an Associate Editor at TV Guide. Since then, she has taught at St. Paul’s School, Antioch University (Philadelphia campus), and the University of the Arts, and has written articles for such publications as Essence and The Philadelphia Inquirer Sunday Magazine. In 1992 she was a contributing editor at Newsweek. Her short fiction has been published in Obsidian, and her first book, Black Ice, a memoir of her education at St. Paul’s, was published in 1991 and chosen by the American Library Association as one of its Notable Books for 1992. She is also the author of Pride and The Price of a Child. In 1998 Lorene Cary founded ART SANCTUARY, a non-profit lecture and performance series that brings black thinkers and artists to speak and perform at the Church of the Advocate, a National Historic Landmark Building in North Philadelphia. Currently she is a lecturer in creative writing at the University of Pennsylvania. Ms. Cary lives in Philadelphia with her husband, R. C. Smith, and their daughters, Laura and Zoë.