The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois

by Honoree Fanonne Jeffers

  In June, Geoff brought Belle along to his Wednesday meeting at the community center, a few blocks from their apartment. At that first meeting, the attention was on the cops, who’d grown worse since the riots.

  Belle nested into Geoff’s side, trying not to fall asleep. The behavior of the police bothered her, but she was a young mother and too tired for outrage. She regarded the meeting as a sort of date with her husband. She was grateful for time away from the demands of her toddler, even if her rude, color-struck mother-in-law was the babysitter.

  When Belle looked around the room, most of the women wore matching ensembles to the men’s dashikis, though their dresses hid their ankles, a length Belle couldn’t abide at barely five feet tall. The women sat in folded chairs in the back of the room and clapped their hands whenever male voices were raised. Sometimes they ejected, “That’s right! Tell it, brother!”

  The single woman who voiced a lengthy opinion was Evelyn Dawson. Long-limbed, cocoa brown, and with impeccable diction, she pointed her cigarette at the podium, where Zulu Harris stood. He was the founder of the community center.

  “What’re you going to do about these pig motherfuckers?” Evelyn demanded. “They are out of control!”

  Belle looked at her lap, plucking nonexistent lint from her skirt. Down in her hometown, she wasn’t used to hearing folks curse in public gatherings.

  “We’re working on that situation, sister,” Zulu said.

  “Apparently not, my brother. Last week, one of those bastards stopped me for street-walking! Then, he felt me up! I let him know I was in law school and he didn’t even blink. So then I had to tell him my father was frat brothers with Thurgood Marshall.”

  “Sister, please be patient. In the meantime, my .45 and I would be happy to escort you wherever you want to go.” There were knowing chuckles from the men, as three women in the audience cut each other glances and folded their arms in judgment. Their African cloth maxi dresses matched, and their heads were wrapped tightly in yards of the same cloth. These were Zulu’s three common-law wives, who lived with him in a four-room apartment. He’d introduced them at the beginning of the meeting, asking them to stand.

  Evelyn patted the side of her huge, sculpted Afro. “Keep your gun tucked. I’m not trying to start another riot. But when are we taking these pigs to court?”

  “We have to be careful before rousing attention too early,” Zulu said. “Remember what Chairman Mao said. ‘When waking a tiger, use a long stick.’”

  He introduced Belle’s husband, saying, don’t be fooled by Geoff’s light skin, because he was as Black as they came. A brother, through and through, which the movement needed more of. Geoff was in his second year in medical school, and he was going to read them something encouraging.

  Geoff walked up to the podium and pulled a paperback from the back pocket of his jeans. “I’m going to read a poem by the Black American poet Sterling A. Brown. It’s called ‘Strong Men.’ I like this poem very much, because it speaks to me of the hardship I’ve seen in our neighborhood, but at the same time, it encourages me.”

  Belle saw folks poking each other. They didn’t care what Zulu had said: Who did this proper, white-looking boy who couldn’t even grow a real Afro think he was? She smiled when her husband cleared his throat: she knew what was coming. His voice climbed, the outraged baritone transforming him, and there was clapping, like when a preacher gave a Spirit-filled message, stomping of feet, and Belle was so proud of her husband, though her eyes were closing from exhaustion.

  When the meeting ended, the folks rushed over to Geoff. How wonderful his reading had been! They raised fists or gave him the soul shake, but now that his performance was over, he turned into the modest young man that Belle had married. He dipped his head bashfully. It wasn’t his poem; he couldn’t take any credit.

  And Zulu came over, his plate piled high with the food Belle had cooked, and for the next half hour, in between bites, he pontificated to Geoff on what he considered crises, such as the pigs who oppressed their people in their neighborhoods. Also, that outrageous report by Moynihan, who was trying to say, the Black man was useless in his own community. Obviously, Moynihan was a tool of white imperialism. Zulu was serious about making a change. That’s why he advised the brothers to read the revolutionary classics: Malcolm X and Marx and Fanon. Even Du Bois, as old-fashioned as he’d been, but reading Chairman Mao was key. Read Little Red Book. It would blow the mind, what Mao said about class struggle and Black folks.

  Days later, when Belle bought a copy of the slender manifesto from a street vendor, she wasn’t impressed.

  “This Mao man isn’t saying anything special. And he doesn’t even mention ladies.”

  Geoff told her that she didn’t get the point. Mao was all the way in China, but he was thinking about Black folks. They lay in bed under the covers, and Geoff was trying to get something started. He’d kiss her neck, and she’d push him away. She didn’t have the energy, after dealing with her toddler since dawn. Since Lydia had started walking, that child was a handful and a half.

  “How’s thinking going to do anything?” she asked. “I can think I’m the Queen of England, but that doesn’t make it so.”

  “Woman. Please.” He’d taken to calling her that, and it reminded him of older men from her hometown, how they laid claim to their wives with only one word.

  “I’m saying, how is this Mao man supposed to be so profound? And why should I be grateful that he knows that over here we have Negroes or Black folks or whatever we call them now? I’ve been knowing about China, but nobody’s calling me a revolutionary.”

  “Mao’s showing the brothers how to lead.”

  “What about the sisters?”

  “They’re included, baby.”

  “Included where?”

  “It’s an implicit message. When brothers lead, we bring the sisters along. I mean, where could we go without our women?”

  “Plenty places. My uncle and his boyfriend been living together for years. Whatever they doing, ain’t no ladies involved.”

  Geoff sighed. “All right, woman. I guess I’m not getting any tonight.”

  “No, sir. You are not.”

  * * *

  Belle’s sister-in-law explained that Geoff was a male chauvinist. As a Garfield man, it was in his nature. Actually, chauvinism was in any man’s nature.

  Diane had learned that in her women’s group, a gathering of like-minded individuals who met to complain about their husbands. She needed those regular meetings, too, because the women in her group kept her from stabbing Geoff’s brother in his sleep. The marijuana they shared at the women’s group was great, too, and Diane was going to smoke as much grass as she could, before she finally got pregnant and had to cast away her fun. Grass wasn’t safe when you were pregnant.

  It was a Monday afternoon, and Diane had a day off from classes in her master’s program. Lydia was asleep in her crib, and the coast was clear for Diane to sit on the floor of Belle’s kitchen, next to an open window. She took a bud of marijuana from her purse. She rubbed it between her fingers and sprinkled it into the folded cigarette paper.

  “Our husbands are nothing alike,” Belle said. “Geoff is sweet as candy. I won’t say anything about Lawrence, because I’m not trying to be mean.”

  “You’re not bothering me. Say whatever you feel like, but I’d be careful making assumptions. They’re blood brothers. Also, both Black. That means they’re alike.”

  “Diane, what have I told you about saying things like that? You’re a white woman! You have to be careful, especially in this neighborhood.”

  “Why? I live here, too. I’ve been here for almost two years.”

  “Then I would expect you to know better.”

  “Are you saying I don’t have freedom of speech, Belle?”

  “Not when it comes to saying things like that around Black folks. You saying my husband is like yours because they’re both Black is like me saying you must be like Bull Connor because y
ou’re both white.”

  “I’d kill myself if I was related to that fucking murderer.” Diane finished assembling the joint and gestured with it. “Light this, please.”

  Belle went to the stove and turned on an eye. When the joint caught, she held her breath, turned her head, and handed it to Diane. She didn’t want to accidentally inhale the smoke.

  “And by the way, that Bull Connor shit is a low blow,” Diane said. “Please apologize.”

  “I’m sorry, sister-in-law,” Belle said.

  “I forgive you. Now come to my women’s group.”

  “With all those white ladies? Absolutely not. No, ma’am.”

  “I’ll be there. And womanhood has no race, Belle. It’s a universal class. And I’m white, so what are you trying to say?”

  “You’re different, Diane. You’re my family member.”

  “Thanks, I guess.”

  “And didn’t you tell me the last time a Black woman came to one of those meetings, somebody thought she was the maid?”

  “Oh my God! They apologized! How many times are you going to bring that up?”

  “Every time you ask me to come to one of those meetings.”

  Diane laughed, opening her mouth wide. “Why do you have to make me feel so guilty?”

  “High as you are, I didn’t know you could feel anything.”

  “You sure you don’t want a toke?”

  “Smoking reefer is not ladylike, Diane.”

  “I’m going to forgive you for that, too.”

  “I don’t need your forgiveness. I’ve got Jesus on my side.” Belle wondered if she’d caught a contact high, despite her precautions. She hadn’t been to church since before Lydia started walking.

  * * *

  At the next community meeting, Zulu gave Geoff a passionate, complicated soul shake and introduced him around to some of the other brothers. It was rumored that Zulu was a Black Panther, but when questioned, he always denied it, though he smiled when doing so. He’d twirl a finger, saying, be careful. The FBI had spies everywhere.

  “Brother Geoff, we want to talk to you about starting a health clinic here at the center.” Beside Zulu, the other brothers nodded. Yeah, yeah. Right on. Speak on it. They kept their hands folded over their groin areas.

  “I think that’s a great idea!” Geoff smiled eagerly. “Gosh, I’d love that, Zulu. But I haven’t finished med school yet.”

  “You still could help us. Give some talks on nutrition. Things like that. Maybe get our people off this swine. It’s ridiculous how much we love barbecue. But it’s dangerous!”

  “That’s the truth! You are so right.”

  Belle turned her head to the side: her husband loved bacon. He’d eaten three pieces that morning.

  “Also, something else,” Zulu said. “It’s about that noodle thing you brought last time for fellowship. Do you think you could cook some more for next week?”

  Belle discreetly elbowed her husband, but he put his arm around her.

  “Oh, I didn’t make that! My wife did. She calls it—what do you call it, woman?”

  “Macaroni and cheese,” Belle said.

  “Sister, that dish was most delicious!” Zulu said. “Very rich and savory. Do you think you could bring an extra dish of that for the next meeting?”

  The other men nodded again, making affirmative sounds. Yeah, yeah, that noodle thing had been out of sight. Right on.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “I’m kind of busy.”

  “Please, my dear sister?” Zulu parted his full lips earnestly, and despite herself, she felt flutters: he was a dead ringer for Sidney Poitier, her favorite actor.

  “Um . . . all right.”

  He clapped his hands. “Oh, thank you!”

  At the next meeting, Zulu made satisfied noises as he gobbled down his second helping, telling Belle she was truly gifted. Not only a cook, but a chef. No, she was a griot of the stove, telling ancestral stories with eggs and cheese and spices—and by the way, wouldn’t it be so wonderful if could she bring a third dish of macaroni and cheese for the next meeting? Could she fry a couple of chickens, too? The word had spread about the delicious refreshments provided at the meetings, and attendance had increased. Truly, she was helping the movement.

  By July, Zulu was asking for pies—sweet potato, to be exact. Geoff bought twenty pounds of tubers and dragged them up the stairs. When he went back down and carried back up a huge sack of sugar, Belle decided this had gone on long enough.

  That night, she made her husband’s favorite dinner. She didn’t complain that he was coming in late, meeting with Zulu and the other brothers.

  “I need to talk to you about this food situation, Geoff.”

  “Woman, your cooking is so good! Everybody loves it.”

  “That’s nice of you to say, but I don’t have time to do that anymore. I have a small child and a husband.”

  “I thought you liked taking care of people.”

  “I don’t know who told you that. It’s my job to take care of my family. But cooking for some stray Negro who’s screwing three silly women? That is not part of the deal.”

  “We’re African people, Belle. Polygamy is accepted in the motherland.”

  “I don’t believe we’re in Africa no more. Matter of fact, I know your people haven’t been there for quite some time.”

  “I can’t help that I’m light-skinned, Belle. This is how I was born.”

  “Do you think that nasty rascal can please those three women?”

  “Belle.”

  “Just tell me that and I’ll leave it alone.”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “It’s not my business, but you want me shaking a fanny ’round the kitchen for him!”

  He put a palm down. A soothing gesture. “What you’re doing is so important for the movement. And it’s appreciated.”

  “Okay, Geoff. Fine.”

  “And I’m trying to help, too, along with providing for my family.”

  Actually, his parents were still paying his med school tuition and his living expenses, facts that Belle’s mother-in-law made sure to broach at least three times a month. But Belle couldn’t wound his pride. She had to stay on message.

  “Is the movement why I don’t even see you half the time?”

  “Baby, all I’m doing is going to school and meetings. That’s it.”

  He scraped up the last bits of food and held out his plate. She cut into the meat loaf and gave him another serving.

  * * *

  “It’s not so bad, I guess,” Belle said.

  “Yes, it is! It’s incredibly male chauvinist! You should threaten to leave.”

  They walked aimlessly through the neighborhood where the women’s group met. Diane was telling her, wasn’t this a nice place? Didn’t she want to come to the next group meeting? But as Belle pushed the baby in her stroller, white people on the sidewalk stared at them, and she knew her sister-in-law wasn’t catching on.

  Belle laughed. “You want me to leave my husband over macaroni and cheese?”

  “No! Because he is disrespecting your position as a woman in American society! I thought you said Geoff was nothing like his brother. But he is. I knew it. He’s just as arrogant.”

  “No, he’s not. He’s an excellent husband. And he knows I’m not having our child become a welfare baby, like one of those kids Moynihan talked about in that report.”

  “That wouldn’t happen to you, Belle. You’ve got a college degree.”

  “And no job experience. And no money, except my mad fund. I’d have to move back home.”

  “Better that than putting up with this foolishness. Don’t you want to be a liberated woman, Belle?”

  “Sure I do, just like my cousin. She’s real liberated. Every month, the social worker comes by to lecture her about her illegitimate kids. Only thing is, my cousin used to have a husband before he got killed in Vietnam. Her kids have the same father, too, but she’s scared to talk back because sh
e needs that welfare check.”

  * * *

  At the next community meeting, everyone was talking about Oscar Bradley. His friends had been with him when the police stopped them. They weren’t even smoking weed, only drinking wine on the corner. The police let the other two go, but Oscar had been arrested and held for seven days so far, though not yet charged. They wouldn’t even let him see his mother. Irma Bradley was too upset to come to the meeting and talk about her son, but she’d given Evelyn Dawson her proxy to make her case.

  That evening, there was no cigarette in Evelyn’s hand and no cursing. Instead of her usual dashiki dress, she was attired much more formally. Elegantly, and her purple jersey dress clung to her long frame, her unrestrained, firm breasts and hips.

  “We need some donations for this young boy,” she said. “He needs a lawyer, and I haven’t passed the bar yet. But this is an outrage! Here we have a mother who doesn’t know what happened to her child! Doesn’t Mrs. Bradley deserve her son back?”

  The other women nodded. A few dabbed at their eyes, and Belle thought of Lydia. She’d only been walking for a few months. What if somebody took her away?

  After the meeting, Geoff told her he wanted to talk to Evelyn about building a neighborhood legal fund. Surely, they could gather some donations. Belle stayed at the table, serving folks who came up with their paper plates, but she kept looking across the room. The smoke from Evelyn’s lit cigarette climbed around the two of them. Evelyn looked so fresh. Free, while Belle had to wonder, was there too much salt in the macaroni and cheese? Was the chicken done to the bone? Did the pies have enough spices? Belle’s hair smelled like old grease, but there hadn’t been time to wash and press it again.

  Belle looked around. She was the only woman in the room who still straightened her hair. Instead of African garb, she wore a skirt and blouse with pantyhose and slip underneath.