My Great Grandmother's Fork

 My Great Grandmother’s Fork

By Daphne Muse

More than thirty years ago my father, Fletcher Henderson Muse, Sr., gave me my great-grandmother’s fork.   My father had a way of passing on family history and legacies, for he also gave my brother Vincent the knife with which he so deftly carved meat for the dinner parties he served in wealthy homes up and down the Eastern corridor.

Born an enslaved woman in Cuthbert, Georgia and my namesake, Daphne Allen lived to be 97-years-old.  That fork, made of tin and wood, now has a ball of cotton on the prongs which I picked on a trip to Cuthbert about twenty years ago. It sits in the lap of a beautiful doll made by my mother.  The doll sits on a rocking chair that belonged to my great-grandmother when she was a child.  I’m now amazed that she is a part of my life in this way and am reminded of her presence each time I walk past that rocking chair.

          I met her twice: once, when I was about six-years-old and again at Christmas break from college, when I went to spend a very challenging holiday in Cuthbert with my grandparents Henderson Muse and Johnny Clyde Muse.  They argued incessantly about the Bible, him touching her Bible and maddening matters not of a biblical nature.  I thought I’d been sentenced to hell for impure thoughts and transgressions made during early childhood.

While I don’t so much remember her physical presence during the 1962 visit, I have a very clear memory of meeting my great-grandmother when I was about six.  She had on a crisp white dressing gown and had just finished serving my great-grandfather breakfast.  She was a short spindly woman framed in Ebonized skin with no smile, but a solid suit of armor surrounding her spirit.  I don’t recall one word my great grandfather said, as his head remained buried deep in his plate, while he sat alone at the head of the table.  One did not sit at the table with him, while he ate.  I guess he came up out of African royalty of some sort and one needed an appointment to speak with him.

That humble fork is about to be installed in an exhibit I’m mounting and will rest on the page of Ruth Gaskins  A Good Heart and A Light Hand:  A Collection of Traditional Negro Recipes.  Instead of transporting it the three miles from my home to the site of the exhibit at Mills College’s Olin Library, I feel as though I should hire a Brinks trunk to transport that fork.  I’ve been the caretaker of this “family jewel” for more than three decades now.  My great-grandmother’s legacy is integrally intertwined in this fork and embedded with secrets both culinary and personal.  She held it in hands prickled by the thorns from picking cotton and hopefully soothed by cradling the children to whom she gave birth.  I remember being absolutely perplexed upon a visit to the Smithsonian some fifty years ago and seeing George Washington’s teeth included in an exhibition.  I could not fathom why his teeth would hold an esteemed place in a museum, especially one like the Smithsonian.  But I’ve learned from historians and scholars including John Henrik Clarke, Francille Rusan Wilson and Leon Litwack that those teeth are filled with stories about class, race, gender, power, privilege, and slavery.  Her fork tells another kind of story about the same dynamics.  My enslaved great grandmother’s fork is just as important to me and my family as Washington’s teeth, extracted from slaves, are to the history of America.  Her fork reflects the history as well as pain and pleasures of her life long-lived life; she lived to age ninety-seven despite an often bone crushing existence across two centuries in rural Georgia.

While others place rare jewels, trophies of conquest and priceless carpets from vast empires on display, my great-grandmother’s fork has now been cataloged for an exhibition.  As people cast their gaze upon three centuries of iconic books and ephemera in On These I Stand, they will stop and gaze at her fork, learn her name and a little bit more about the relationship between this simple eating implement, my family and the history of 19^th and 20^th century America.  At every turn, we have to find ways to honor our ancestors, their survival against all odds and learn to wear the armor that allowed them to keep their spirits marching towards freedom land.

Daphne Muse is a writer, social commentator and poet.  She proudly lives in Oakland, California and recently completed her fifth children’s book about a squirrel named Leroy.

www.daphnemuse.blogspot.com/msmusewriter@gmail.com

 

“Selma” powerfully reflects black people boldly and defiantly speaking truth to power.  

     "Selma" powerfully reflects black people boldly and defiantly speaking truth to power.  Whatever the range of critiques regarding the film, the courage and dignity with which the people of Selma, Alabama and their allies met their mission to secure voting rights for black people, is riveting in its portrayal.   Despite being whipped with blood-letting, nail infused Billy clubs, having their jobs threatened and friends, family and allies murdered for seeking and advancing justice, they continued to persevere.  Despite my own critique in “Ten Responses to Selma,” I am grateful to DuVernay, Pitt and Winfrey and the others who made this film possible.  The film truly reflects the dignity, strategic thinking, bravery and compassion of black people.  It also reflected the vision of Dr. King and young men including SNCC activist John L. Lewis and SCLC strategist James Bevel.  From his mentor theologian Howard Thurman to activists whose names will never be known, King’s vision also was forged by other movements and voices contemporary to the times.  What was not at the table was the fierce leadership of the movement’s female “architects,” including Ella Baker, Septima Clark and Fannie Lou Hamer.  The presence of SNCC strategist Diane Nash nuanced beyond recognition.  And while the voices of everyday people did not form the primary dialogue, the fierce determination of people including Amelia Boyton, Jimmy Lee Jackson and Annie Lee Cooper was apparent. 

     How many have walked even one mile, let alone fifty-four miles, dressed in the same reflections of dignity, self-respect and perseverance? Their feet were not comforted by Nike Air Jordan shoes or Adidas. Many women were attired in church lady outfits and men suits.  Allies including Michigan housewife Viola Liuzzo and Unitarian Minister James Reeb came in a heartbeat and were murdered at the hands of white supremacist.

     Despite King’s decision to turn back on the first attempt to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge and march to Montgomery, the insistence and agency of local people and other activists from around the country, resulted in accomplishing the fifty-four mile march from Selma to Montgomery.  That stride toward freedom resulted in twenty-five thousand people assembling on the steps of the capital at Montgomery and in the same year, the Voting Rights Act was signed by President Lyndon Johnson.  The inherent pride and belief by black people in black people (supported by diverse groups of celebrities, religious leaders, union members and educators) went the distance in that pen being put to paper to make the Voting Rights Act a reality.  In the aftermath of Ferguson and the daily killings of black people across the country, this generation of activists is making Black Lives Matter.  They have the legacies of Selma, and the wells of so many other battles and victories claimed for social justice, from which to draw. 

     The experience of Selma and this film translate differently across the generations.  But, I feel a sense of reassurance now that my forty-one- year-old daughter, sixteen- year- old grandson and thousands of young people have seen the movie.  My grandson loved the film and the closing song “Glory” by Common and John Legend.  Interestingly enough, he was most taken by the FBI tracking notes that came on the screen during the film.  He curiously noted “No one could say this wasn’t real.”  I plan to sit with him this week, using my own FBI file, to discuss how millions of citizens have been tracked across administrations and decades because of their determination to secure what is so inherently ours:  Equality and Freedom.

I highly recommend the reading list noted in this link:  http://www.jsums.edu/hamerinstitute/resources/hamer-inistitute-suggested-reading-list/

Daphne Muse is a writer, social commentator and poet.  Her work has been published in The Atlantic, Washington Post, Black Scholar and aired on NPR.

Conceived, Born, Raised and Living bBlack

Conceived, Born, Raised and Living Black

    By Daphne Muse

I was conceived, born, raised and now have lived as a human being cast in black for almost seventy years.    I’mo die black, too.  And in my next life, I’ll be honored to return in the black.  I refuse to be drowned in the bile of oppression and no racist savagery, pathology or steroids of genocide will stop me from living the authenticity of who I am.  Be clear that efforts to kill off an entire race of people are bound to implode, as our blood spills all over you and the spirits of our ancestors (and some of yours, too) haunt you in ways you don’t even realize.  The ongoing slaughter, murder and economic lynching of my people will not make me turn against them or stop me from seeking and working to secure the freedom that is inherent for every being.  You can kill a person, but the energy of their spirit sometimes has a way of recharging life.  Mine is constantly recharged by those whose spirits continue to rise in power including anti-lynching activist and journalist Delilah Beasley; Mississippi voting and civil rights activists Fannie Lou Hamer; and, Dred Scott, buried a few miles up the road from Ferguson in St. Louis.  Scott launched a legal battle to gain his freedom that went all the way up to the Supreme Court (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dred_Scott_v._Sandford).

Despite the high toll and centuries of efforts to resurrect Apartheid and annihilate us, the ongoing slaughter in the streets is not deterring people like the residents of Ferguson, and their supporters across the country and around the world including St. Louis native and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey.  He is right up in the mix protesting the killing of unarmed Michael Brown.  I refuse to allow the hatred of my people to diminish the love I have for my often brutalized and brilliant people.   Our DNA is historically, culturally, politically and economically encoded on this country.  From rural roads to outer space, our innovations and inventions also drive many aspects of everyone’s daily life. 

If we’re being punished for the election of the first known black/mixed race president and the appointment of a black attorney general, then wake up and smell the Melanin, because millions of us refuse to be pushed backwards off the cliffs into the swells of oppression and racism.  While bold face, refutable lies continue to twists your tongues into contortions of sheer absurdity, ongoing efforts to revise or erase us from history continue to implode:  Truth has both an ironic and empirical way of blooming through concrete; and destroying documents, eradicating images and attempts to vanish reality can have powerful blow back.  We’re also issuing a cease and desist for your racism to remain a revenue stream for municipalities, jails and penitentiaries; that’s off the table.

Millions of us continue working diligently to seed and harvest the awe and wonder of young people of color, for we recognize how much more vital our country would be, as a result of the benefit of the brilliance and creativity many of them bring to the table.  I will continue to working with others to educate and empower young black men and women to earn diplomas and advanced degrees, so they can become skilled workers, 21^st century innovators, strong leaders and even surgeons who skillfully navigate beyond the craters of hatred embedded in the souls of racists to save their lives.  And there are those highly skilled social justice “surgeons” conducting hatred bypasses on a daily basis, an operation that could vastly improve the quality of millions in America.  Even in the dust of my ashes, like millions before me, I’ll proudly align my legacy to stand tall in the power of blackness.

Daphne Muse is a writer, social commentator and the oldest sibling to four brothers.  While navigating the mine fields of racism and oppression, they also have lived and celebrated the joy(s), power and brilliance of being black.

www.daphnemuse.blogspot.com/msmusewriter@gmail.com

Copyright October 2014, Oakland, California

Daphne Muse

Somi: An Ancestrally Rich Voice Electrifying the 21st Century

Somi:  An Ancestrally Rich Voice Electrifying the 21st Century

 “One of the cool things about seeing Somi’s show Friday was that, even while the great voices are steadily falling silent, new ones are arriving – and she’s got one.”

Jon Streeter, Board of Directors for SF Jazz

Imagine yourself at the electrifying, eclectic and global intersection of Lagos Boulevard, Kigali Way and New York Avenue.  Well that’s exactly where I found myself transported from to the Red Poppy Gallery smack dab in San Francisco’s Mission District, on a recent Saturday in September, with an intergenerational assembly of folks who came to feast on the voice of Somi.  Her ancestrally rich and sometimes haunting voice scaled walls, brought blooms onto flowers and poured out into Folsom Street, where it cast a net of light out into the Universe.  In a space not much larger than my living room and seating about one hundred people, she “Gingered Us Slowly” and had us testifying to “Four African Women,” her homage to the High Priestess of Soul Nina Simone.  I first got a “taste” of her voice when she performed at the London wedding of Ashley Shaw Scott Adjaye and David Adjaye. 

The range in her voice crosses deep rivers and cascades right into the ravines of your soul.  She soothed my chakras when she dropped her tall brown frame into tribal movements to catch notes and bring them up out through her vocal chords, right after navigating them right up out of her heart.  Mesmerizingly beautiful in voice and presence, she performed a ninety minute show that transported us through the lyrics of  “Last Song,” Shine Your Eye” and “When Rivers Cry,” a piece filled with moral urgency, that she performs on her CD with the rapper Common.  While “Two-Dollar Day” is a kind of soliloquy challenging the absurdity of making and trying to live on two dollars a day, “Brown Round Things” calls up the nefarious world of human trafficking of innocents.  She is a marvelous singer-lyricist and wrote all of the songs performed on The Lagos Music Salon.

While it is clear that her music is infused with African, R&B, mid-twentieth century jazz and soul influences, an eighteen month stay in Lagos helped her create a powerful and vibrant “New African Jazz.”  There is such a span of cultural history in her powerful voice. The spirits of Sarah Vaughan, Nina Simone and Miram Makeba surely sat up and took notice, as Somi’s distinct style also conjured up theirs.  On “Shine Your Eyes,” her voice also took me into moments with Joni Mitchell with some Sonia Sanchez riffin’ off her tongue.

It also takes great musicians to carry a singer’s vocals the distance and my word did they ever carry—all the way out there to an ancestral shout out to Nigerian icon Fela Kuti and an intergalactic wave to Sun Ra.  Drummer Otis Brown III took the beats way deep across the centuries back home to the “Motherland.”  Ben Williams “burnt” up that malachite looking bass and guitarist Liberty Ellman wove an improvisational touch.  But it was pianist Toru Dodo, along with Tomi, who took my spirit to every corner of the Universe it needed to be in those moments.  Dodo played that piano with every cell in his body and molecule in his mind.  I could have sworn Somi and Dodo’s roots were up out of the same village.  And at some point in the not too distant future, I can just see Bill T. Jones choreographing “Love JuJu#1 or the Alvin Ailey Company performing “Last Song.”  I’m so eager to return to the global intersection of Lagos Boulevard, Kigali Way and New York Avenue and meet Somi there.

To find out more about Somi and her music go to http://www.somimusic.com/.

Daphne Muse is a writer, social commentator and poet.  She blogs at www.daphnemuse.blogspot.com.

Oakland: Polishing A Jewel in the Crown

For those of you discovering and gentrifying Oakland, know that there are those of us who have lived here for decades and worked relentlessly to make the city what it has become.  We realized it was a jewel in the crown and that’s why we chose to live here.

Oakland:  Polishing a Jewel in the Crown

By Daphne Muse

As beautiful and magical as the scores of cities I’ve worked or traveled in are including Paramaribo (Suriname), Costa Carayes (Mexico) and Capetown (South Africa), I’ve found my way back to Oakland thrilled to be here, despite the ills plaguing her.  On land once inhabited and controlled by the indigenous Ohlone peoples, Oakland became a city made up of late 19^th and early 20^th century immigrants from Germany, Italy, China and African Americans who arrived from the Deep South during WWII.  In the last three decades, the population grew to include immigrants from South East Asia, Mexico and Central America.  In the last fifteen years, a growing number of people from the Middle East, Eastern Europe and West Africa have taken up residency in the city, as the Native American population has been diminished mostly to a cultural legacy. 

I’m one of the more than 390,000 people who call Oakland home and reside in one of its fifty neighborhoods.  I just so love me some Oakland, especially the way the morning sky unfolds as its seasonal layers display new possibilities and the sun closes out over the Bay each evening so purposefully.  The ascension of the Moon over the hills pierces the transitioning night sky, as satellites dance with the stars;  casting a regal glow over the city, adding to its so underestimated charm. 

I’m overjoyed to be on this ever evolving journey from Chocolate City (DC back in the day) where I was born to living on what I refer to as the East Oakland Riviera. I became an urban pioneer in 1977, when I bought a rehabbed house on an eighth of an acre in the flats of the Fruitvale (Da Hood).  Some mornings, as I rise to a classic photographic and panoramic view of the Bay and beyond, Red Tail Hawks are perched on my deck taunting feral cats scratching up a handout, while others from the ornithological world bop and chirp Doo Wop.  Deer, raccoon, fox, wild turkey and possum also claim their territory in neighborhoods across the city.  The Meyer Lemons, limes, tangelos and blood oranges in my orchard are ripening into their calling, as my rescued orchids scream their way into bloom, in January no less.

On my block the sounds of a Tongan mother gathering her children up for church, El Salvadorian matriarch using her machete to prune trees or a second generation Norwegian American cranking up his truck to go off to work are part of the daily doings.  This is framed by the music of an Irish fiddler practicing for her next gig; and a Puerto Rican union organizer chillin’ on a Sunday afternoon listening to Cuban Descarga music, eclipsed by the treble beats of rap from “caboomalatin’” car stereos.  There are still far too many times when the night sky is rife with bullets piercing a kind of sobering stillness, brought on by the economic downturn.  Across Oakland and in many other urban enclaves, people sleep behind fortresses armed with all manner of alarm systems and weaponry at their bedsides.

As you sweep up a mile or so from my neighborhood across 580, the tone and tenor change; the Mormon and Greek Orthodox Temples ascend, back lit and holding court hillside.  Up above the Temples are sometimes over built mansions with surrounding acreage, horse stables and swimming pools.  There are even homes on gated private roads requiring codes to enter.   In some of these homes, big decisions and deals are often made about how and who will develop and run the City.  And above all of that is Redwood Regional Park crowning the city with a regal forest of 150-foot tall Sequoias, serene streams and more than 1800 acres of other evergreens and wildlife.  Along with the reassuring sounds of silence, I go to Redwood to inhale and infuse my heart and mind with the blood enriching oxygen (especially before I fly).  From Mosques, cathedrals and temples to ashrams, churches and natural habitats, there are diverse sanctuaries for engaging in worship and spirituality. 

Markets are filled with artisanal oils, vegetables whose names require a pronunciation guide for me to say and stuff I didn’t even know the ocean contained.  The abundance of culinary venues from food trucks to upscale restaurants and pop up places makes it possible to savor the flavor from old school, taking it back to your momma’s table, to fusion and sometimes confusion on a plate.  In neighborhoods throughout the city, I can read, eat and shop the world from independent vendors and small business owners.  I buy flowers from an Iranian in the Glenview; an African American dentist in Eastmont keeps my teeth tight; my “ride” is kept smooth by a Vietnamese mechanic in the Laurel; and the therapist who kept my “dome” from cracking when my husband died was a Latina. 

Local iconic poets, novelists and social commentators including Avotcja Jiltonilro, Ishmael Reed and Helen Zia, capture the many dimensions of a city in which both the click of the Glock and camera capture lives.  Images imagined and produced by Oakland artists including sculptor Mario Chiodo, painter Mary Lovelace O’Neal and ceramist Ron Nagel are in public spaces and major private collections around the world. Along with outstanding collections at the Oakland Museum, traditions and festivals abound including Art& Soul, the Oakland International Film Festival and the Greek Festival. 

Just South of  Lake Merritt, a wonderful reflection of Oakland’s Mediterranean topography, International Boulevard begins and so too does “Little South East Asia;” an assortment of grocery stores, fabric shops, real estate offices and restaurants serving family style meals that put you at tables in Saigon, Bangkok and Vientiane.  The ritual drumbeats from the Intertribal Friendship House, one of the first urban Indian community centers in the US, juxtaposed right at the beginning of this business district, mixes with the fragrance of the boundless spices drifting out onto the streets from the myriad of Asian restaurants.  This area runs for about ten blocks before a business district and neighborhood comprised primarily of Mexican, Salvadorian and fast food restaurants runs for almost 85 blocks to the boarder of San Leandro. World class chef Anthony Bourdain found himself deeply impressed by the offerings served at Tamales Mi Lupitas, one of the scores of food trucks along the Foothill corridor.  While wine bars and breweries continue to emerge around Jack London Square, West Oakland and Rockridge, the ubiquitous liquor store remains mostly in the impoverished communities of the city. The evidence of the thriving burglar bar industry seemingly prevails on the windows and doors of homes where owners and renters are struggling to sustain life on “incomes” that require unprecedented economic voodoo.

 Rising above this area are neighborhoods (also not immune to foreclosures) where primarily long established African American professionals, third generation Asian-American and European American families (also descendants of immigrants) live. Despite a school district rife with the problems of all too many urban centers, students from Oakland Tech, Oakland High, McClymonds and charter schools still get accepted into Harvard, Yale, Spelman, Stanford and Mills, a more than 150 year old college for women (which accepts men at the graduate level).  Alumnae include Congresswoman Barbara Lee, legendary jazz musician Dave Brubeck and sports announcer Renel Brooks Moon.  The current faculty includes Google Geek Ellen Spertus; Margaret Hunter, a sociologist doing ground breaking work on race gender and popular culture; and world renowned artist Hung Lui.  Mills also serves as the landscape for three structures built by 19^th and 20^th century, Oakland architect Julia Morgan.

Along with three sports franchises—the A’s, Warriors and Raiders,  a stellar blues history and as an incubator for Hip Hop and Rap, Oakland also has a strong tradition of political activism that spans the 19th^th century to the Occupy Movement.  I’m counting on Michael Morgan, Director of the Oakland Symphony, to write the “Occupy Opera or Concerto.”  By the way, the nosebleed seats in the Paramount are acoustically superb and provide a commanding view inside our Art Deco cultural palace.  With a steadily growing vibrant night life, the city’s center includes banks, hotels, federal and state buildings, and slowly re-merging retail scene.  I am grateful that we have no empire tall skyscrapers.  But the city center lacks even one major grocery store, despite numerous development projects that have brought thousands of new residents to Oakland.   

The downtown corridor is populated by medical marijuana dispensaries and students attending Oaksterdam, a degree granting university where weed (21st century gold) is the focus for the curriculum.  But it seriously grinds my guts that “Pookie” is in the joint for a couple of ounces, while medical marijuana CEO’s make a Wall Street-type killing.  Any night of the week, I can engage in the intersections of music by bopping over to Yoshi’s to take in Jazz, Hip Hop or World Music.  On weekends, the 57^th Street Gallery riffs with up close and personal sounds from local and international jazz giants including vocalists Robin Gregory and guitarist Calvin Keyes. 

Oakland is also a city where people sweep their sidewalks, tend their yards and though there are still miscreants who throw fast food containers out their car windows or dump along freeway ramps, our streets for the most part are relatively clean.  There are areas mainly in East and West Oakland still riddled debris.  And behind the gates and doors of some of the more elegant enclaves, at the most prestigious addresses, are things we’d never imagined would exist therein.

Sailboats, yachts and house boats, some of which have traveled the world, are moored at our estuary. You also can take a ferry from Jack London Square, cruise pass Alcatraz and take in views of San Francisco, the Golden Gate Bridge and the Bel Marin Keys.  While you well may have left your heart in San Francisco, you could find your soul in Oakland.  From janitors to jurists and teachers to high tech pioneers, thousands of residents contribute to growing Oakland beyond the Sisyphean lockdown in which it’s been mired for far too many decades.  All too often our efforts and contributions are blocked by “greedlock” politicians whose visions are stuck in reverse gear and who remain unsophisticated in the ways of Urban Détente. While some are hell bent on destroying it, others are occupying Oakland to leave the most vital legacy possible for our children, grandchildren and generations to come.  I love me some DC, Paramaribo and Capetown, but Oakland is home.  In collaboration with residents, small business owners, developers and politicians, the Oakland Renaissance has been decades in the making.  Long before the New York Times declared Oakland number five, just after London and before Tokyo as places to visit in 2012, we knew it was a jewel in the crown polished by the hands of thousands who love her.

Things I love about Oakland

Sweeping vistas that pan out into the Pacific Ocean, even from the flats

Bibliomania Rare Bookstore

Yoshi’s Jazz Club

The Golden Gate Ferry ride around the Bay

Culinary venues that range from nouveau sassy soul food to soul warming Southeast Asian spreads and full on fusion

Elegant evergreen, deciduous and fruit bearing trees all over the city, including Redwood Park

The all too rare sound of children playing outdoors

Quirky, Cutting edge, world class artists, musicians, writers and designers creating Cultural Crawls

Lake Merritt, our homage to the Mediterranean

Superb vintage and second hand stores

Barbara Lee, who still stands with me

Mills College

Some things our city needs

Leadership that translates the potential of the city into sustainable economic, cultural and political results

A Peace Force instead of a Police Force deeply involved in working with citizens and citizens likewise involved in keeping the peace and promoting viable community relations

A Jobs Plan that takes into account the size, scale and economic as well as class and ethnic diversity of the city and what it really takes for the City and supportive services to run

Affordable and transitional housing for young people, the disabled and elderly

Reduction of the Dropout Rate in the school district by 33% in three years through mentoring and partnerships

Mounting a Home Foreclosure Restitution Program, where the City partners with community banks and credit unions to help people recover their foreclosed homes

Creating multipurpose plans for the use of schools, libraries and recreation centers

A collaboration, with the City and community partners, to sponsor an annual contest to celebrate and honor people from a range of neighborhoods and sectors who help make Oakland work

Become one of the top twenty ADA Compliant Cities in the Country

Supporting the work of a City engineer to invent a pothole free road pavement

Digitization and voice activation of our “Welcome to Oakland” signs to provide reflections of the beauty of our city

©Daphne Muse January 2012

Word Count=1986

www.daphnemuse.blogspot.com, msmusewriter@gmail.com

NSA Memo

Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Memo

To:  National Security Agency (NSA)

From: Daphne Muse

Re: Verification, Fact Checking and NSA Feeling Neglected & Standing for Democracy in a Digital Age

With your operatives tracking billions of calls, emails and other electronic communications platforms deep into the corridors of global power, up in Pookie’s Place and across the Universe on a nano-second by nano-second basis, the complexities of gathering and verifying data is bound to produce errors. While your scale of efficiency on harvesting data is far reaching, accuracy may well be another matter.   The unredacted part of my FBI file is filled with misinformation documented by agent Jim South.  Stuff just got made up by folk who fabricated and fictionalized my life including having me in two different places simultaneously.  In accordance with the Freedom of Information Act, I’m requesting a random sampling of documentation gathered on the date noted above, to begin making some determination about the level of erroneous details that may well be under construction about me, my life and communications with others. 

According to my records, I:

Arose at 5:35 AM and turned on my 24/7 jazz station KCSM

Drank two glasses of water

Processed the meal from the evening before

Brushed my teeth/splashed face

Drove to the Aquatic Cathedral

Dashed into a 75 degree pool/with an air temperature of 46 degrees for a brisk mile long swim and realignment of my molecules

Showered after swim and mixed it up with my aqua-homies in the locker room

Returned home and called my momma; we discussed her progress with a series of dental treatments and her latest art project

Spent an hour talking with my brother Vincent and yes we discussed this electronic harvest of shame

Wrote for four hours

Ate carrots, coconut and lox for lunch

Watched DW-Journal (They have penchant for intelligent coverage of news around the world and interesting programming with a global focus.)

Finished editing a piece for my blog

Read an article on Common Dreams about the country’s Electronic Harvest of Shame: “Nation's Libraries Warn of NSA's 'Ravenous Hunger' for Data”

 

Had lamb bacon sandwich (Yes, my butcher does lamb bacon) and collard greens for dinner; no wine

Stepped outside on the deck to talk a few minutes of smack to my rescued orchids and watch the bright beacons from the satellites now obliterating the stars in the sky and thanked the Universe for forming me

Read some Lucille Clifton poems.  She should be canonized as the Goddess of Poetry

Invoked my gratitude mantra before going off to sleep at 10:11 PM

Had reams of dreams about liberation, freedom and the daily formation of socially just living, and a fellow kinda sorta on my mind

Oh, and don’t feel neglected, ‘cause there are folk around the world paying as much attention to you, as you are to us.  As you now know, a call for International Bill of Digital Rights was put out by five-hundred writers worldwide (http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2013/12/10/249935326/book-news-500-authors-demand-international-bill-of-digital-rights).  You probably received and coded this memo before I finished writing it. 

Daphne Muse is a writer, social commentator and poet.  Her articles and commentaries have appeared in The Atlantic, San Jose Mercury and aired on NPR.

Under the Branches of a Mighty Tree: A Baobab among the Redwoods

Under the Branches of a Mighty Tree: A Baobab among the Redwoods

     Nelson Mandela, Revered Ancestor (1918-2013)

By Daphne Muse

His path from Mvezo, a village near Mthatha in the Transkei on the Eastern Cape, to speaking to an absolutely thunderous and amazed assembly of more than 58,000 people in Oakland, California in 1990 was a Long Walk to Freedom*.  It is a remarkable story made even more so in that Rolihlahla Nelson Dalibunga Mandela was inaugurated as President of a democratic South Africa on May 10, 1994 and served until 1999.  Mandela was given the name Rolihlahla on his first day of school; it is a Xhosa term that means "pulling the branch of the tree.”

The day he was released from the Victor Verster Correctional Center in Paarl where he was transferred to in 1989, my brother Vincent Muse was in Capetown engineering the feed for journalist Renee Montagne who was covering this historical moment for NPR.  He called me from Capetown breathless, excited beyond belief and fighting back waves of tears that mixed with the sweat pouring from his body.  He so wanted to dance with the hundreds of thousands gathered on the plaza.  Vince told me it felt like the energy in that moment could have fueled the nation for decades to come.  But faced with an endless series of technical challenges (rescued by duct tape), he had to do everything possible to ensure the feed made it across the pond and on the air.  His stories of engineering the feed while listening to Mandela speak in Capetown’s public square on February 11, 1990 and being invited to Bishop Tutu’s home charged my own excitement about Mandela speaking and being honored in Oakland.

Aware of the roles that many Bay Area activists played in unshackling the chains of apartheid, mandating divestment and securing his freedom, Deputy President of the African National Congress (ANC) Nelson Mandela accepted the invitation to speak in Oakland, California.  On June 30, 1990 he spoke at the Oakland  Coliseum to an audience 58,000 people.  Among them were longshoremen, union organizers, elected officials, diplomats, cultural icons and school children to witness one of the most amazing moments in the city’s history:  Nelson Mandela, free and standing with his then wife Winnie Mandela.  Not since August 6, 1977 with the visit of Tanzanian President Julius Nyerere to San Francisco had an African leader been honored in the Bay Area.

Comprised of liberation movements, foundations, faith-based organizations, cultural groups, those living in exile and members of anti-apartheid initiatives throughout the Bay Area, the Northern California Mandela Reception Coalition produced and coordinated the celebration.  Among those present and instrumental in getting him to speak were long-time activist and architect Ken Simmons.  Simmons also was instrumental in leading the faculty divestment movement at UC Berkeley.   Mandela and his wife were greeted by a host of Bay Area leaders including Maudelle Shirek, the godmother of East Bay progressive politics and California Democrat and Representative Ronald V. Dellums.  For years, Dellums pushed legislation for sanctions against the South African Government.   Like Berkeley and San Francisco, Oakland had an ordinance calling for the divestment of stocks in American companies doing business in South Africa and longshoremen throughout the region refused to unload South African goods.  Mandela noted that he personally wanted to thank the hundreds of thousands representing liberation movements, unions and South Africans in exile in the Bay Area who were instrumental in helping to secure his freedom.  

The thousands gathered stood in the power of the victory of this tree of a man who never bent, standing just as tall and majestically as many of the historic Redwoods surrounding backyards, parks and forests in Oakland.  Under a sea of green, black, red, yellow and blue banners representing the colors of the ANC, we gathered together in his name and growing South Africa into a “one person, one vote, and democratic, non-racial, nonsexist society.”  Like millions of people in South Africa, Cuba, France, Tanzania, Canada and Sweden, we joined in raising our voices and funds to impose sanctions and develop other strategic organizing tools to end the fetid stench and brutal rule of apartheid.  Although the movement was global, it also took place at kitchen tables in East Oakland, board rooms at the Port of Oakland, classrooms across the city and in the streets of East, West and North Oakland.

So many of us were struck by how his vision always went far beyond his own people and at the Coliseum he apologized to the First Nation people’s for a logistical mix up that made it impossible for them to publically present him with ceremonial robes.  It really was a moment that the audience and world should have witnessed.  He also was so unequivocally disciplined, a bold visionary and a man with some of the same kind of human frailties we all carry.  He made it crystal clear that apartheid had no future. The steady flow of my tears and non-stop quaking of my body let me know how much it meant to be sharing this surreal moment with thousands of others from my community.  That night, the stars cast a an even brighter glow across the skies of Oakland and the evening air reverberated from the powerful performances by Nigerian master percussionist Babatunde Olatunji, who opened the tribute, Harry Belafonte,  Bonnie Raitt and John Lee Hooker, John Santos and the Machete Ensemble, Vukani Mawethu Choir and Oakland activist Lakiba Pittman.

Mandela’s trajectory from his village of Mvezo to one of the most revered visionaries and leaders of the 20^th century is such a lesson in the power of liberation and building a nation.  In order to avoid arranged marriages, Mandela and his cousin Justice ran away to Johannesburg, where he initially worked as a mine policeman before being introduced to Walter Sisulu in 1941.  Sisulu, son of a black domestic worker and white public servant who never acknowledged him, was one of the primary architects and master strategists of the Anti-Apartheid Movement.   In 1944, together with Sisulu and Oliver Tambo, he founded the African National Congress (ANC) Youth League setting the trajectory of his life on an irreversible course.

 In 1919, the year after his birth, a delegation of the South African Native National Conference attended the Versailles Peace Conference to put the voices and grievances of the African people of South Africa on the table.  He went on to become a lawyer and strategic visionary for the ANC.  Arrested repeatedly and charged with sedition, in 1962 he was arrested for the third time and convicted of sabotage, and conspiracy to overthrow the government.  Sentenced of life imprisonment, for twenty-seven years, Mandela navigated his life beyond the brutality of being imprisoned on Robben Island.  His sanity was grounded in gardening on the prison grounds, writing and corresponding with the family and comrades for whom he was their very heartbeat.   His hard won release from prison in 1990 precipitated political changes that would bring blacks and coloreds to the ballot box, uproot a ruthless government and uplift a people who had been under the spiked boot of white rule for more than three centuries. In 2008, Congresswoman Barbara Lee co-sponsored H.R. 5690 legislation to remove Nelson Mandela and other current and former ANC members from US travel and terrorism watch lists.

In 2009, I got to see the results of this revered statesman’s leadership and the relentless fight against Apartheid.   At museums, shopping malls, clubs, community centers and in townships, the new South Africa was reflected politically, socially and culturally.  Its citizens were some of the fiercest people I’ve ever met.  From Graça Machel (his current wife) and groups of grandmothers with whom I met to early members of the ANC to folks I spoke with on airplanes and busses, and children who sang to us in Soweto, it is crystal clear that this is a nation forged by fires that burn deeply in the bellies, hearts and souls of its people.  Machel was trained as freedom fighter who went on to become an advocate for children and the only woman to have served as first lady of two African nations:  She is the widow of Mozambican President Samora Machel.   In 2012, she was appointed President of the SOAS Institute at the University of London.  

On my visit to Robben Island where he spent eighteen years of his incarceration, I also got to retrace the steps from his cell, with a man who was imprisoned with him, out onto the grounds where he gardened, dreamed up and strategized about freedom(s) beyond his own.  In the “time of Mandela,” leaves of vision, justice and wisdom tumbled from the branches of this tree of a man and were woven into crowns of liberation.  The winds of change also blew some of the leaves across the landscape of Oakland into the hearts and minds of generations coming up the ranks.  We must continue to share the stories of resistance with our children and grandchildren.  Holding men like Mandela in our hearts, minds and daily practice means the difference between returning to living under Tsunami’s of oppression or swimming upstream in seas of freedom.

 History has proven that more and more people refuse to allow the boots of oppression to rest on our necks.  His own words “… to be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others” embedded a kind of strength in me that encourages me to make decisions that turn the world on the “Axis of Affirmation.”   Mandela never met racism with racism, hate with hate or wavered in his devotion to democracy, equality and unbridled possibilities for the future.  The legacy of Mandela can never be destroyed, because truth blooms through concrete and is deeply encoded in the cultural and historical DNA of millions of the citizens of SA and people all over the world.  His life was also strengthened by bold, fierce and visionary women who stood with him including Winnie Mandela his second wife, Graça Machel his current wife and millions of South African blacks, coloreds and whites who stood with him in historical solidarity. 

I remain eternally grateful to have been born at a time that allowed me to witness and engage in this transformational nexus in history.  As a beacon of civility, compassion and honor, Mandela was the “Godfather” for many an activist.  This Nobel Peace Prize award-winner also got to experience the awe and magic of life, attending concerts in his honor, holding his grandchildren on his lap and witnessing a new generation of young black and colored South Africans become scholars, tech pioneers, cutting-edge researchers and future leaders. 

  I thank his family for sharing him with the world, for I know that came at a great cost to them personally.  But so many of us got to create inheritances from his vision, legacy and practices to our children, grandchildren, students and young people we mentor.  While some of these “twigs” will grow into sturdy branches and even trees themselves, they can cling to this tree of a man who turned dreams of liberation into historical realities and taught millions how to climb, along the way.  May the verdant landscape of his smile, and depth of his soul, continue to shine an eternal light on the mounting injustices attempting to eviscerate our humanity.

Amandla

*Mandela’s Autobiography published by Little Brown and Company (1994).

Daphne Muse is a writer, poet and social commentator.  Her work has appeared in the Atlantic, Washington Post and aired on NPR. 

©Daphne Muse Oakland, CA 2013

Links to Mandela speaking in Oakland

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlcfwwS7iPY

http://www.daytrotter.com/#!/video/nelson-mandela/10643-5033/1008527