I wasn't there when she took her last breath. I was with Mr. Sutton at the bank going through her safe-deposit box looking for her will. By the time I got back to the hospital, she was gone.
After comforting one another, my sisters and I performed a J'naaza, a Muslim burial ritual. Sister Aisha al-Adawiya from our mosque assisted us. She had been there with us from the early hours of the tragedy, praying over Mommy and humming recitations from the Qur'an with a steadiness that came to seem like music, like a fragrant offering to my mother and a balm to my sisters and me. Her daughter, Suhailah, also came from Atlanta to be with us, despite the fact that we had not seen her in years.
Following Sister Aisha's instructions, we gently dabbed Mommy with holy water, salts, and oils. We then wrapped her in white linen and silks, just as Daddy had been wrapped and prepared. When we finished, we tied a crisp, beautiful bow beneath Mommy's breasts, just as our Egyptian and Ethiopian ancestors had done thousands and thousands of years before. Mommy wanted to be buried on top of our father, and we planned to honor her request.
That time of preparing Mommy's body was painful, but also healing for my sisters and me. It was like a sonnet we wrote to her, expressing our love and appreciation for all she had been to each of us. In the actions of my five proud, strong-willed and yet vulnerable sisters that day, I saw their gentility, their love. I saw their respect and idolization for their mother, for Mommy. I saw myself.
When we finished the burial ritual Mommy looked like the beautiful queen she always was to all of us. A beautiful queen dressed all in white who, having raised her daughters and sent them into the world to carry on the fight, was now going to greet her king.
There was a time in my life when I believed that if something happened to my mother, I would crumble, would be completely and utterly lost. And not only would I be lost, but all the projects Mommy undertook, all the people she helped and her continuing effort to advance my father's legacy—all this would also fall by the wayside, because who could possibly step into Mommy's shoes?
But if my mother taught me anything, it was perseverance. Even in the face of adversity. Even in the face of pain.
I remember once asking her how she found the strength to carry on after her husband was taken. She said, “You know, sweetheart, life goes on. You can sit back and cry, but in the meantime life goes on. Society has so many ills and someone has to fix them. We each have a purpose and a mission in life, and our mission is not to sit back and feel sorry for ourselves.”
My mother's mission was to leave the world a better place than she found it and she far surpassed that personal goal. Now it is our turn to carry on—my sisters, Mommy's friends, the hundreds upon hundreds of young people she touched all over the world. We no longer have Betty Shabazz or Malcolm X physically, but we can all carry their spirits in our hearts.
None of us has to live a life of bitterness. None of us has to live a life of despair. Like my mother and father, we all have the capacity to make the world a better place if we only stand up and demand that it be so. If we only challenge injustice and oppression in every shape and form.
A male student attending Medgar Evers College told me a story of my mother that I love. He said he was hanging in the hallway one day with some of the boys when Dr. Shabazz approached. They all became flustered; they didn't know what to say to her. But the student told me Mommy was warm and loving, and she told him something he will remember for a lifetime. She said, “You come from great ancestors. Act like it.”
Life is not a destination; it is a journey. Faith makes everything possible. In order to succeed in life, we must first believe that we can.
About the Author
ILYASAH SHABAZZ holds a master of science degree in education and human resource development from Fordham University. She is the Director of Public Affairs and Special Events for the city of Mount Vernon, New York.
A One World Book
Published by The Random House Publishing Group
Copyright © 2002 by Ilyasah Shabazz
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by One World Books, an imprint of
The Random House Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York,
and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
One World and Ballantine are registered trademarks and
the One World colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
www.oneworldbooks.net
Library of Congress Control Number: 2001012345
eISBN: 978-0-307-52913-8
v3.0
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