Life In America: San Ysidro Windsong

for you, my friend. you who paid the ultimate price…for a dream deferred…

It is today in America. And it is tomorrow in Nigeria. The heart aches for Nigeria, for home. Africa comes calling and I must go touch the eaves of the ancient caves that guard my umbilical cord. I am fleeing the darkness of a dying winter, chasing the promise of spring. I am escaping darkness, racing, fluttering heart, to the sun where my ancestors sit waiting for me, I am racing to the sun where my mother stands pretending to tend the cooking pot, eyes roving the skies for the white man’s bird that will drop me, restless son, onto her aching laps. The sokugo, the wandering disease attacks me violently and I must go. I must go bathe in the stream of the forbidden fish. I must drink deep from the palm wine of the palm tree that never dies, air-conditioned coven of witches. I must walk through the little path where my grand father is buried and go feed my mother’s people in the smoky pantheon where dignity fights a ferocious battle with poverty. My stomach, hostel of the white man’s food will collapse in peppery shock, my cells will protest the invasion of harsh peppers, but I will sit down in my mother’s smoke drenched kitchen and eat everything that flows from the pot that sits on the tripod of firewood that cooks wonders. Efuru of the stout bush that cannot be felled, I come to you; your little boy in the blue suit, shivering in the summer sun is back home to you. Efuru of the endless savannah, hold me. Your little boy is back.

My friend, a thousand stories invade my aching head, a thousand stories collapse in my aching head, in my aching head, a thousand stories morph into a giant lie. And they call it fiction. There are no mysteries, only lies. Warriors and poets jump out of digital vinyl in pretty lock step, at ease with the white man’s digital 0s and 1s. Baba the prophet dressed in his underwear and marijuana smoke hangs from the door of the overloaded molue bus, wails his vision in a voice crisp and guttural, voice of the masquerade that just escaped the anthills of the ilo. And with Baba’s horn, you can taste Lagos heavy with the smell of sex, shit, blood and petrol. The poet leans on his solo horn wailing sad sorrow, soaking my cells with songs of promise and sadness, And you can taste Lagos heavy with the smell of sex, shit, blood and petrol. I close my eyes and the women of Africa arise from digital vinyl as one from the river and their dance tells the story that I know by heart. I close my eyes and my heart races to the playground where I performed dark sensuous experiments with Angelina:

if your eyes squint hard

until the blood points the way to the anthill

that houses the cheer leaders of the spirit world

you will see them…

dancing, dancing, dancing.

hear the horns

teasing the envious skies

the drums chasing the dancers’ feet

the dancers’ feet chasing the drums until

the eyes get all confused

and every night

we will go to sleep with the dream that you handed us…

and suddenly things don’t hurt nearly as much.

Many moons have passed through the big river of this life and I have not spoken to you my friend. You are sad and I cannot help you. But you say, it is well. Here, if you come close to me, sit by me, by this fireplace, home of the white man’s fake wood that burns at the flick of a fake switch, I shall tell you of my travels. And maybe, then, you’ll feel better. I have been to the white man’s planet. The white man lives in another planet. And he knows it. But he is not telling us. My mother, Efuru, conqueror of the stout bush told me that the white man knows where God is but he is not telling us black folks. The white man wants to protect God from us black folks because we may kill him in the rage of our condition. We are different from the white man and he knows it. But the white man humors us, assures us that we are the same; we are from the same planet. That, my friend, is a big lie. They are different people, from a different planet, white folks. They come from a planet where everything is different, even their rice is colored funny. We are not one with the white man; we are not of the same planet. But the not knowing keeps us apart from they that know. The white man is an alien nibbling delicately on what is called art in our planet.

And my friend, I shall die and come back, Phoenix, king of the ashes of exile and there shall be no nations, as we know it. There shall be no boundaries. Relationships will be strung tightly through lines that transport 0s and 1s to the conscience of liquid crystal displays. Relationships will pop at your monitor-mirror of a thousand uses, seeking warmth, seeking solace. There shall be no nations and no boundaries. And no moats, no waters will hold the flight of fear from the lands of shame and terror that bore us tore us violently from our mothers’ umbilical cords. And you have not seen the flight of the fleet-footed from the cold and the heat of evil lands. The worst is yet to come, my friend, the worst is yet to come. Agbaza!

And so, I am trapped in the white man’s capsule that flies a billion times faster than the angry catapult of my childhood. We are going west, chasing dawn, like a fool chases his shadow, I wonder if we’ll ever catch dawn. I just had breakfast in the east, now skinny little white women in uniform are offering me breakfast again. I gain a breakfast, gain three hours and I lose everything else. Deep in the bowels of the white man’s bird, I regale my fellow travelers with stories of exile in America’s delta. I tell them of my days in the delta, trying to be a black student in a white school. Of the racist professor who literally patted me on the head and called me a handicapped child who needed special ramps into the highway of academic success. Because I am black. Of the professor who would not talk to me in class even though class participation accounted for most of the grades. Because I am black. Of the fear of soiling my trousers as pot-bellied middle-aged white men in white sheets and hoods gamboling on the lawns of the white fraternity houses at 2:00 a.m. as my ancient car threatened to sputter to a stop right before their salivating selves. I was afraid. Because I am black. Deep into the night, as the scotch hissing through the rocks raced through my arteries to calm my nerve cells, I held my fellow travelers hostage with tales of horror inflicted on me by their forefathers. The shame on their faces was enough reparations for me. There must be a God.

Dinner at the Gaslamp quarter in San Diego. Our dinner hosts have more money than they know what to do with. The prices on each of the appetizers will buy two month’s supply of egusi soup for my entire family of six. Our hosts push the menu in my face and they say order whatever you want. They show me the wines, with prices that drop my jaw to the floor and they say order what you want. It is a food lover’s heaven if you are white and love eating artwork. Me, I am dreaming of a big bowl of hot steaming foofoo and ogbono soup choking in the wealth of stock fish, smoked fish, cowfoot, tripe, oxtail, and snail bigger than the ears of an elephant. But I am in San Diego, having dinner with wealthy attorneys who want to sell me what I don’t know and I must look sophisticated. I choose “pan-seared escargot and roasted fingerling potato” as my appetizer and “steak au poivre, pan seared 8 oz steak, cognac and white peppercorn sauce, pommes frites” as my entrée. For dessert, I ask for a glass of cognac. My friend, the African American is moaning his displeasure; he doesn’t like the food and he wants to go to Burger King with me and wrap his gentle fingers around the biggest and juiciest burger that he can find. With French fries. And he wants to wash it down with fresh moonshine (American ogogoro) from the plains of St. Petersburg Florida. “Where are my fries,” he wails softly as the expensive artwork that passes for food is placed delicately before us. In the presence of expensive food that tastes like plastic credit cards, my thoughts race and I am thinking of my fate in my old age. Will my American children dump me in an old people’s home to die a slow death from eating alien meals? Will my “counselors” serve me pounded yam, with egusi and all the trimmings? Or will my meals come in the measured manner that lab rats are fed in biochemistry labs?

We are two Americans and we are going to do brunch and margaritas across the border in Tijuana, Mexico. We shall stop at the restaurant just across the border. They say we may cross the border without visas, without passports. We are Americans they say. All we need is our American driver’s license. I don’t believe it. I carry my American passport just in case my Nigerian accent mocks my claims of American citizenship. My friend, the blonde one teases me about carrying my passport. She doesn’t have to worry, she is a pretty blonde American, she will travel the world naked and American marines will die defending her right to be naked. I am a different issue altogether. I am American on paper. And I am black.

The trolley takes us rolling past San Diego and gently coughs us up at the border in San Ysidro. I leave America behind just by the bridge where the one-man mariachi band trolls for dollars. My pretty blonde friend holds my hands as the taxi drivers hurl themselves at us hustling for fares. I hold her hand. She is afraid. I am afraid. We are both afraid for different reasons. We eat lunch in Tijuana, a meal that looks like the raw ingredients for rice and beans and stew. A mariachi band comes to our table and we request a song. The bandleader looks at us and asks if we want a song for lovers. We say no, our spouses would not like that. We want a happy song. And they sing for us a sad song.

We take the taxi back to the border. My friend has her driver’s license. I have my driver’s license and my American passport, just in case. When we get to customs, the American asks my friend, “Are you an American?” and she says, “Yes” and waves her driver’s license at him. He waves her into America. My friend the pretty blonde is still holding my hand hostage when the American asks me, ‘Are you an American?” I hold on to my blonde friend’s hand and I say, “Yep!” and the American waves me into America. I am an American. I am a Nigerian. I am a human being. Let me in.

I am happy to leave Tijuana. In Tijuana I saw my past, my present and my future and my heart wept. My conscience died many times as little children, offspring of beggars tugged at my shirtsleeves and heart pleading for quarters. I reached out to hold one, just big enough to be my little boy and he scampered off, running from the alien intimacy and warmth of another human being. I think I shall go home and hug my boy.

So my friend, this is the season of the sokugo, the wandering disease. It has infected me and I must travel all over seeking solace in cold and hot places, looking for answers that elude me at home. In the grip of this disease that sends my restless soul shivering, I have been to places the beauty of which will haunt me forever. I have been to places, the sadness of which will haunt me forever. Be strong, my good friend. I must leave you again. I am going on this journey to where we came from. They have lampposts that have no lamps. They have telephones that have no voices, and roads with potholes that swallow cars the size of elephants. And all over the land, marauders roam the land masquerading as policemen, soldiers, politicians, robbers, dinosaur-size mosquitoes and locusts, robbing and pillaging the sweat of our people. But it is still a beautiful place, the land of my birth. I shall eat simple meals, drink ogogoro from recycled soda bottles and if I am lucky I shall dance on the streets with Rex Lawson and Celestine Ukwu. Wait for me, I shall be back from this journey when my glands break free of the fever of the sokugo. And I shall come back for you, lion cub. Farewell, lion cub, I shall miss you.. And I wrote this song for you. I shall miss you, lion cub.

and…

it is sun down at the ilo

follow the dust storm

and you can’t miss the ilo…

the poetess with the flute

chases the masquerade

with her flute…

now…

the flute taps a solo wail

points the masquerade’s feet

to the right address

on this tired, tired, earth.

and…

eze agadi nwanyi…

veteran of all dances

that wet the eyes

she is the conductor

of this feast

at the ilo…

listen…

listen to the air

the air is an orchestra

horns insistent

piercing the crisp silence

of an evening gone to bed.

now…

hear the air wail…

the air… phoenix

is a talking drum

can you hear the air?

now…

listen to this…

the drummer’s insistent beat,

truth lands on concrete

bounces off nonchalant ears

but the truth has landed…

now…

close your eyes 1967

can you see him

masquerade…

breathing the fumes

of the anesthetic?

now…

hold this Fanta bottle

of ogogoro

to lips in shock

hold…

this last stick of Galleon

does the smoke shield your rage?

now…

lean on this last wall

of dreams gone awry

belt out this last solo

song of the masquerade

music of our forefathers…

now…

the trumpet must travel

burrowing through bridges

draped in the morning dew

of dawn… paying toll to no one…

and i held you

under the lights

nairobi… at the carnivore…

i held u close

in the darkness of the lights…

what is this

that washes my chest wet?

and why won’t you

look up at me?

are you crying?

so…

tell me…

when did this happen…?

these dreams shattered

along with crumpled souls

tell me when will you come home?

they say it is all over.

and…

the children

they sat at your doorsteps

ears hoping for the footsteps

that will never walk this way again

never.

and…

the children

they sat at your doorsteps

ears hoping for the return

of the trumpet

that sells ogogoro.

– Nnamdi