by Maya Angelou
“You will be my second wife. I will build you a beautiful house and you will be happy.”
The unusual proposal nearly made me laugh.
“But if you have one wife who is good, why do you want to marry me? And you already have children. What do you want with me?”
I sat beside him on the bed.
“If I need more children I will take a young girl because you and my wife will have no more babies. But you, you are kind and educated. My wife is also kind, but she is like me, she has no education. My family will accept you. I will send to America for your parents and I will bring your son to Mali. Thus our families will marry.”
He had taken my life and the lives of my entire family, except my brother, into his plan. There was no way to explain that not one of us could live within his embrace. He laughed when I thanked him, but refused.
“Women always say no. I will find out what you want, and then I will ask again.”
My emotions, raised on the romance of Hollywood films, might have faltered had he pleaded love, but his offer had the crispness of a business negotiation, and I had no difficulty in refusing to participate in the transaction.
Kojo had been my “small boy” for two months. He had settled into his school routine and was usually available for small chores and swift errands.
“Auntie?” His downcast eyes and softened voice made me tense. He wanted something. “Kojo, what is it now? Clothes? Shoes? A new school?”
“Auntie, there are some people to see you.” He stayed so far beyond the door only a quarter of his body was visible.
“People? Where? What do they want?”
He whispered, “In the backyard, Auntie.”
No visitor had ever come to my back door. I hurried through the kitchen and opened the screen. The yard was filled with people dressed in rich cloth and gold. A very old man, leaning on a carved stick, was surrounded by two middle-aged couples, some young adults, and a few teenagers.
A middle-aged man spoke, “Good afternoon, Auntie. We would speak to you.” I reproached Kojo for allowing the people to stand in the backyard, and said to the man, “Thank you. Kojo will take you around to the front. Please come inside.”
Kojo giggled, and keeping his eyes down, slithered around me and out into the yard.
I went back through the house and opened the door. The people filed into the living room, each shaking my hand and murmuring a name I couldn’t quite comprehend. I offered the available chairs, and the older people sat leaving one chair for me. The younger visitors remained standing. I had no idea what the occasion was, but the formality of my visitors was clearly ritualistic.
I called Kojo to bring beer. When one woman complimented me on the prettiness of the living room, the crowd agreed quietly. A man admired a Kofi Bailey print of Kwame Nkrumah which hung on a far wall. There were faint approving sounds “Osagyefo.”
“Man pass man.”
After the beer was served and Kojo left the room, the old man cleared his throat.
“Auntie, we have come to thank you for Kojo. We are his family. These are his brothers and sisters.” The teenagers bobbed and smiled. “His uncles and aunts are here and there is his mother and his father. I am the great-grandfather of Kojo, and we thank you.”
The family was nodding and smiling. I looked toward the kitchen door, expecting to catch a glimpse of a peeping Kojo, but there was none.
The old man continued, “We have come by lorry from Akwapim, and we have brought thanks.”
By their bearing, clothes and jewelry, it was evident that Kojo’s family was high-born and well-to-do. If they had travelled from Akwapim by lorry to thank me, it was also clear that they treasured the boy.
“Speak, Mother.” Great-grandfather stretched his hand to a woman sitting to his right.
“Auntie,” the woman was twice my age. “The boy, Kojo, is good and he might become better. All the mothers cherish him.” Here the women gave an amen corner response. “He has grown in our family and in our village, so he was sent to the town. And proof of his goodness is he found you and your Sisters.” A new rumble of agreement trembled in the room.
The old man stretched his hand to a tall man who resembled Kojo. “Speak, Father.”
“Auntie, we have family here in the town, but none has the Brioni education.” In Akan languages Brioni meant White. “Our chief and our grandfather told us if Kojo was to become better, he must have that understanding. Now we have talked to his headmaster. We have spoken to his teachers, and we have listened to your steward who is our cousin. Without payment and without knowing his family, you, Auntie, and your Sisters are teaching our Kojo the Brioni ways of thinking, and so …” His voice trailed away.
The old man spoke. “Bring the thanks.”
The lounging teenagers came away from the wall. The older repeated, “Bring the thanks.” When they walked out, I smiled, but could think of nothing to say, and since none of the Ghanaians I had met indulged in small talk, it wasn’t surprising that the room became quiet. I was not immodest enough to think we deserved thanks, and I knew my housemates would be embarrassed when I related the episode. I kept smiling. The youngsters brought in a crate of vegetables, then another and another, and it seemed they would never stop. They packed crates against crates until the floor was covered.
The old man pointed to a box of eggplant. “Here are garden eggs. Here onions, plantain, pineapples, cassava, yam, coco yam, mango, paw paw, and outside in ice we have brought you snails.” He meant the land mollusk which was as large as a kitten and which even starvation could not force down my throat. My jaws ached from smiling.
He continued, “We want you to know that Kojo did not come from the ground like grass. He has risen like the banyan tree. He has roots. And we, his roots, thank you.”
The old man braced his cane against the floor and pulled himself nearly erect. The other visitors and I arose.
“Kojo’s family has many farms, Auntie.” That was obvious. “And while we are not trying to repay you and your Sisters, every month we will send you thanks according to the season.”
Each person shook my hand and filed out of the house. The grin on my face had become painfully permanent, and I grinned until I watched Kojo bouncing in the street before his adoring family. They patted him, brushed his clothes, stroked his face, all talking at once. I waited behind the screen until they bade their final good-byes and left him looking like a forlorn puppy against the fence.
“Kojo.” He jumped and turned to me.
“Kojo, come this instant.”
The boy walked to the house, trying without immediate success to exchange the intoxicating security of being loved with his usual disguise of the befuddled youth. By the time he reached the door and opened the screen, he was timid, young Kojo, my small boy and servant.
“Kojo, why didn’t you tell me?”
“Tell you what, Auntie?”
It would sound silly to reproach the boy for not telling me that he had family and that his family was wealthy. And even more stupid, to blame him for being loved.
I lied. “Why didn’t you tell me that your family was coming?”
“Oh that, Auntie? I knew they would come someday. I just didn’t know when.” He looked at me out of Bailey’s eyes and grinned. “Auntie, after I take these thanks to the kitchen, may I make you some tea? White tea with lots of sugar?”
“Yes, thank you, Kojo.” The visit had been brief but arduous. I had been taken further on my search for Africa and, at least, I had grinned throughout the entire journey.
“Yes, Kojo, I would love some tea with milk, no sugar.” I had a half bottle of gin under my bed. Gin with hot tea was just what I needed.
I lay on my bed drinking for myself and for all the nameless orphans of Africa who had been shunted around the world.
I drank and admitted to a boundless envy of those who remained on the continent, out of fortune or perfidy. Their countries had been exploited and their cultures had been discredite
d by colonialism. Nonetheless, they could reflect through their priests and chiefs on centuries of continuity. The lowliest could call the name of ancestors who lived centuries earlier. The land upon which they lived had been in their people’s possession beyond remembered time. Despite political bondage and economic exploitation, they had retained an ineradicable innocence.
I doubted if I, or any Black from the diaspora, could really return to Africa. We wore skeletons of old despair like necklaces, heralding our arrival, and we were branded with cynicism. In America we danced, laughed, procreated; we became lawyers, judges, legislators, teachers, doctors, and preachers, but as always, under our glorious costumes we carried the badge of a barbarous history sewn to our dark skins. It had often been said that Black people were childish, but in America we had matured without ever experiencing the true abandon of adolescence. Those actions which appeared to be childish most often were exhibitions of bravado, not unlike humming a jazz tune while walking into a gathering of the Ku Klux Klan.
I drank the gin and ignored the tea.
Ghana was flourishing. The National Council of Ghana Women, which included representatives of all the clans, was beginning to prove that centuries-old tribal mistrust could be erased with intelligence and determination. The Cacao Marketing Board reported huge profits from the country’s major export. Large shining office buildings rose in the cities and the land was filled with happiness.
People stopped in the street and said to passersby, “Oh, but life is sweet, oh, and the air is cool on my skin like fresh water.”
The shared joy was traceable to President Nkrumah, who had encouraged his people to cherish their African personality. His statements were memorized and repeated in the litany of teachers and students: “For too long in our history Africa has spoken through the voice of others. Now what I have called the African Personality in international affairs will have a chance of making its proper impact and will let the world know it through the voices of its sons.” When he declared that West Indians and Black Americans were among Africa’s great gifts to the world, the immigrant community gleamed with gratitude.
For the first time in our lives, or the lives of our remembered families, we were welcomed by a president. We lived under laws constructed by Blacks, and if we violated those laws we were held responsible by Blacks. For the first time, we could not lay any social unhappiness or personal failure at the door of color prejudice.
We shadowed Nkrumah’s every move, and read carefully his speeches, committing the more eloquent passages to memory. We recounted good gossip about him, loving his name, and furiously denied all negative rumors.
Because we were still American individualists, bred in a climate which lauded the independent character in legend and lore, and because we had been so recently owned, we could not be easily possessed again, therefore we tried rather to possess the charismatic leader. His private life belonged to us. When photos of his Egyptian wife appeared in the papers, we scanned her features and form with a scrutiny bordering on the obsessive.
We, the Revolutionist Returnees, danced the High Life at the Lido, throwing our hips from side to side as if we would have no further use for them, or we would sit together over Club beer discussing how we could better serve Ghana, its revolution and President Nkrumah. We lived hard and dizzyingly fast. Time was a clock being wound too tight, and we were furiously trying to be present in each giddy moment.
Then, one day the springs burst and the happy clock stopped running. There was an attempt on the President’s life, and the spirit of Ghana was poisoned by the news. Fortunately, the President was uninjured, but the citizens did not escape. Makola and Bokum markets lost their usual last-day-Mardi Gras air, and the streets were stricken dumb. The African professors, unspeaking, sent messages of befuddlement to each other by their sad eyes and the shaking of their heads. Even the European faculty at Legon spoke in murmurs.
Government officials, always concerned over foreign intervention and interior espionage, were sharpened in their paranoia and began to search for spies in all corners of the country. Representatives of The Young People’s Corps wrote articles, were put on the alert, and those tender faces, filled with anger and suspicion, mirrored the country’s tragedy.
Some newspaper articles suggested that no true Ghanaian could possibly be involved in the scurrilous assault on the President, so obviously the search should concentrate on foreign infiltrators. Nearly all noncitizens fell under some measure of suspicion. The British, former colonial rulers, though still covertly admired, were exempt from accusations because they were considered to be mere representatives of a fading Empire.
After a few days of general inflammatory accusation, the finger of suspicion pointed toward the Soviets. Whispers and rumors suggested that those Communists, with their oblique but decided expansionist aims, had tried to kill the President in order to throw Ghana, the Light of Africa, into chaotic darkness. That swell of conjecture abated quickly. Then, the newspaper brought heady news to me. At last there were denunciations of American capitalism, American imperialism, American intervention and American racism. At last, the average Ghanaian would realize that we, the band of disenchanted Blacks, were not fabricating the tales of oppression and discrimination. Then they, not the politicians or intellectuals, they, the farmers and tradespeople and clerks and bus drivers, would stop asking us, “How could you leave America? Don’t you miss your big cars?” and “Do you live in Hollywood?” Before I could really sit down and enjoy the feast of revenge, the shadow of the pointing finger moved.
A high-ranking pundit said, “America can use its Black citizens to infiltrate Africa and sabotage our struggle because the Negro’s complexion is a perfect disguise. Be wary, Africa, of the Peace Corps Blacks, the AID Blacks, and the Foreign Service Blacks.” He suggested finally, that Africans should approach all American Blacks with caution, “if they must be approached at all.”
We saw ourselves as frail rafts on an ocean of political turbulence. If we were not welcome in Ghana, the most progressively Black nation in Africa, where would we find harbour? Naturally we sought to minimize the impact of that painful advice. A few Revolutionists joined the witch hunt, tearing away, with loud protestations, all historical ties to the newly accused. They hoped to deflect suspicion from themselves and to inch closer to the still unrealized goal of acceptance. Many of us kept silent, heads erect and eyes forward, hoping to become invisible and avoid the flaming tongues. Failing the success of that maneuver, we prayed that the assault would pass soon, leaving no scar and little memory.
As usual, I drove each day from my house in Accra to the university, seven miles away, but the distance became painfully perverse. At times, I felt I would never arrive at my destination. Roadblocks delayed progress. They were manned by suddenly mean faced soldiers, their guns threatening and unusual in a country where policemen were armed only with billy sticks. Further on the same drive, it would seem that my arrival at the University at Legon was too imminent. Before I could collect enough composure to calm my face and steady my hands, I would be on campus, where students dropped their eyes at my approach, and professors pointedly turned their backs.
As the Black American community trembled beneath the weight of unprovable innocence, the investigation progressed in all directions. Suspects were imprisoned, and rumors flew like poison arrows around the country. Some Americans and other foreigners were deported, slowly the barbs ceased, the cacophony of distrust quieted. Life returned. The roll of drums and the sound of laughter could be heard in the streets. None of the Revolutionist Returnees had been directly accused, and we were still grateful to be in the motherland, but we had been made a little different, a little less giddy and a lot less sure.
For two weeks I worked myself into a trembling frenzy at the in-town National Theatre. While Efua directed an English translation of a Chinese play, I had helped to sew costumes and coach the student actors. I pulled and pushed the bleachers in the open air auditorium which had to be r
earranged constantly. Rickety sets, made by students with no theatrical background, were ever in need of strengthening. Someone had to synchronize the taped music with the onstage action, and a person was needed in the box office. I chose to try to be all things to all the people at all times. The play’s pomp and pageantry had been a great success. Ghanaians finding a similarity between the ancient Chinese spectacle and their own traditional dramas kept the theatre filled. I was shaky with exhaustion, but I held on to the idea of returning soon to the university, and that steadied me.
On a quiet Monday morning I parked my car at the Institute of African Studies and sat watching the sun light up the green lawns stretching upward to the white shining buildings. The campus was quiet. I was happy to be back in its peaceful atmosphere.
I started walking to the Faculty of Music and Dance and met Bertie Okpoku, the director of dance.
“Hey, Maya, you finally decided to come home?”
We shook hands and ended the gesture with a traditional finger snap which signified best wishes, and walked together exchanging news until I reached my office.
“Oh, yes.” His face became solemn. “One bad thing happened. Sister Grace lost her whole pay packet last week.” He shook his head. “Everybody in the Dance department has been affected. So don’t expect much laughter around here.” Grace Nuamah was the country’s chief traditional dancer, a small, thick set, middle-aged woman who performed a welcoming dance at all state functions and important ceremonies. She was an Ashanti woman, with a ready smile, a soft voice, and a hilarious sense of humor. Grace supported herself, nieces and nephews, and was generous with her friends, so the news of her loss saddened my morning, and when I opened the office door and saw the desk piled a foot high with papers, I was suddenly tired. I sat down to examine the stack and it seemed that each student at Legon needed assistance of some sort, and needed me to furnish it. One student wanted a transfer, another additional financial support, while some simply needed excuses from school to take care of familial responsibilities. Each petition had to be checked against the applicant’s file and the mid-morning sun was beating into my office before I noticed the passage of time.