Jesmyn Ward - Sing, Unburied, Sing. A Novel

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For my mother, Norine Elizabeth Dedeaux, who loved me before I took my first breath. Every second of my life, she shows me so.

Who are we looking for, who are we looking for?

Its Equiano were looking for.

Has he gone to the stream? Let him come back.

Has he gone to the farm? Let him return.

Its Equiano were looking for.

Kwa chant about the disappearance of Equiano, an African boy

The memory is a living thingit too is in transit. But during its moment, all that is remembered joins, and livesthe old and the young, the past and the present, the living and the dead.

from One Writers Beginnings , by Eudora Welty

The Gulf shines, dull as lead. The coast of Texas

glints like a metal rim. I have no home

as long as summer bubbling to its head

boils for that day when in the Lord Gods name

the coals of fire are heaped upon the head

of all whose gospel is the whip and flame,

age after age, the uninstructing dead.

from The Gulf, by Derek Walcott

I like to think I know what death is. I like to think that its something I could look at straight. When Pop tell me he need my help and I see that black knife slid into the belt of his pants, I follow Pop out the house, try to keep my back straight, my shoulders even as a hanger; thats how Pop walks. I try to look like this is normal and boring so Pop will think Ive earned these thirteen years, so Pop will know Im ready to pull what needs to be pulled, separate innards from muscle, organs from cavities. I want Pop to know I can get bloody. Todays my birthday.

I grab the door so it dont slam, ease it into the jamb. I dont want Mam or Kayla to wake up with none of us in the house. Better for them to sleep. Better for my little sister, Kayla, to sleep, because on nights when Leonies out working, she wake up every hour, sit straight up in the bed, and scream. Better for Grandma Mam to sleep, because the chemo done dried her up and hollowed her out the way the sun and the air do water oaks. Pop weaves in and out of the trees, straight and slim and brown as a young pine tree. He spits in the dry red dirt, and the wind makes the trees wave. Its cold. This spring is stubborn; most days, it wont make way for warmth. The chill stays like water in a bad-draining tub. I left my hoodie on the floor in Leonies room, where I sleep, and my T-shirt is thin, but I dont rub my arms. If I let the cold goad me, I know when I see the goat, Ill flinch or frown when Pop cuts the throat. And Pop, being Pop, will see.

Better to leave the baby asleep, Pop says.

Pop built our house himself, narrow in the front and long, close to the road so he could leave the rest of the property wooded. He put his pigpen and his goat yard and the chicken coop in small clearings in the trees. We have to walk past the pigpen to get to the goats. The dirt is black and muddy with shit, and ever since Pop whipped me when I was six for running around the pen with no shoes on, Ive never been barefoot out here again. You could get worms , Pop had said. Later that night, he told me stories about him and his sisters and brothers when they were young, playing barefoot because all they had was one pair of shoes each and them for church. They all got worms, and when they used the outhouse, they pulled worms out of their butts. I dont tell Pop, but that was more effective than the whipping.

Pop picks the unlucky goat, ties a rope around its head like a noose, leads it out the pen. The others bleat and rush him, butting his legs, licking his pants.

Get! Get! Pop says, and kicks them away. I think the goats understand each other; I can see it in the aggressive butts of their heads, in the way they bite Pops pants and yank. I think they know what that loose rope tied around the goats neck means. The white goat with black splashes on his fur dances from side to side, resisting, like he catches a whiff of what he is walking toward. Pop pulls him past the pigs, who rush the fence and grunt at Pop, wanting food, and down the trail toward the shed, which is closer to the house. Leaves slap my shoulders, and they scratch me dry, leaving thin white lines scrawled on my arms.

Why you aint got more of this cleared out, Pop?

Aint enough space, Pop says. And dont nobody need to see what I got back here.

You can hear the animals up front. From the road.

And if anybody come back here trying to mess with my animals, I can hear them coming through these trees.

You think any of the animals would let themselves get took?

No. Goats is mean and pigs is smarter than you think. And they vicious, too. One of them pigsll take a bite out of anybody they aint used to eating from.

Pop and I enter the shed. Pop ties the goat to a post hes driven into the floor, and it barks at him.

Who you know got all they animals out in the open? Pop says. And Pop is right. Nobody in Bois has their animals out in the open in fields, or in the front of their property.

The goat shakes its head from side to side, pulls back. Tries to shrug the rope. Pop straddles it, puts his arm under the jaw.

The big Joseph, I say. I want to look out the shed when I say it, over my shoulder at the cold, bright green day, but I make myself stare at Pop, at the goat with its neck being raised to die. Pop snorts. I hadnt wanted to say his name. Big Joseph is my White grandpa, Pop my Black one. Ive lived with Pop since I was born; Ive seen my White grandpa twice. Big Joseph is round and tall and looks nothing like Pop. He dont even look like Michael, my father, who is lean and smudged with tattoos. He picked them up like souvenirs from wannabe artists in Bois and out on the water when he worked offshore and in prison.

Well, there you go, Pop says.

Pop wrestles the goat like its a man, and the goats knees buckle. It falls face forward in the dirt, turns its head to the side so its looking up at me with its cheek rubbing the dusty earth and bloody floor of the shed. It shows me its soft eye, but I dont look away, dont blink. Pop slits. The goat makes a sound of surprise, a bleat swallowed by a gurgle, and then theres blood and mud everywhere. The goats legs go rubbery and loose, and Pop isnt struggling anymore. All at once, he stands up and ties a rope around the goats ankles, lifting the body to a hook hanging from the rafters. That eye: still wet. Looking at me like I was the one who cut its neck, like I was the one bleeding it out, turning its whole face red with blood.

You ready? Pop asks. He glances at me then, quickly. I nod. Im frowning, my face drawn tight. I try to relax as Pop cuts the goat along the legs, giving the goat pant seams, shirt seams, lines all over.

Grab this here, Pop says. He points at a line on the goats stomach, so I dig my fingers in and grab. Its still warm, and its wet. Dont slip , I say to myself. Dont slip.

Pull, Pop says.

I pull. The goat is inside out. Slime and smell everywhere, something musty and sharp, like a man who aint took a bath in some days. The skin peels off like a banana. It surprises me every time, how easy it comes away once you pull. Pop yanking hard on the other side, and then hes cutting and snapping the hide off at the feet. I pull the skin down the animals leg to the foot, but I cant get it off like Pop, so he cuts and snaps.