Melissa Valentine - The Names of All the Flowers: A Memoir

the names of all the flowers

a memoir by melissa valentine

Published in 2020 by the Feminist Press
at the City University of New York

The Graduate Center

365 Fifth Avenue, Suite 5406

New York, NY 10016

feministpress.org

First Feminist Press edition 2020

Copyright 2020 by Melissa Valentine

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, used, or stored in any information retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the Feminist Press at the City University of New York, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

First printing July 2020

Cover photograph: Untitled (For Jr.) by Sadie Barnette, 2019
Cover and text design by Drew Stevens

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available for this title.
ISBN: 9781936932856

PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

CONTENTS

For Junior

AUTHORS NOTE

With the understanding that the nature of memory is ephemeral, the following is true and factual based on my knowledge and memory. In the name of narrative flow, I have in some instances re-created dialogue, collapsed time, and reimagined certain details and conversations, but the story and all events herein are true. Some names have been changed to protect the identities of individuals.

all these years of death later

I search through the index

of each new book on magic

hoping to find a new spelling

of your name

AUDRE LORDE, Alvin

I know what the world has done to my brother and how narrowly he has survived it. And I know, which is much worse, and this is the crime which I accuse my country and countrymen, and for which I nor time nor history will ever forgive them, that they have destroyed and are destroying hundreds of thousands of lives and do not know it and do not want to know it.

JAMES BALDWIN, The Fire Next Time

INTRODUCTION

Oakland, CA & Selma, AL
20162017

When I move back to Oakland around 2012, after being away for six years, I reach out to a childhood friend and we decide to reconnect over dinner. Her brother Corey has passed the threshold into adulthood. He has lived to become a man in his early twenties, and when we decide to have a drink at a bar after dinner, we are both surprised when he walks in with their cousin. We havent seen each other in a long time. I remember him as a boy perpetually in the back seat of my friends car because he was undersupervised and grief-stricken. Theyd both lost their father back then, and we all gravitated to one another because of our common loss; they were fatherless, I was brotherless. The boys, now, dont smell clean, their clothes are a bit dingy, their faces greasy. Coreys hair is wild, long, and frizzy around the edges as if hes slept on it for days, and in both of them, him and his cousin, I see my brother Junior as if he were alive before me. I see him everywhere. We drink and we clink our glasses of Hennessy together again and again in celebration of our reunion. How good it is to see the boys all grown up and living.

When we were teenagers, my brother used to come home late. His hair looked like Coreyslong, frizzy, and unkempt, face slick with oil. He would look dirty and he would smell like the old smoke and alcohol that oozed from his greasy pores. But Id be so happy to see him. Like the wild man he was, he would turn on the light no matter if it was midnight or three oclock in the morning. Hey, hed announce himself in the dark. He was probably high or drunk or both, or a zombie from not sleeping for days, or he just wanted someone to talk to. What time is it? Id ask, but I would not protest, would not ask him to leave, would not ask him to turn the light off. I just wanted a time stamp: hes home now. I would sleep while he ate his burrito on my bedroom floor. Maybe Id wake up occasionally if he said something, asked me a question. He would finish eating and leave me, go downstairs to his bedroom, or sometimes hed stay there, sleep on the floor of my bedroom and drift out in the morning. He was safe. He was home. Thats what mattered.

After a few drinks, we decide to continue the reunion at my apartment not too far away. You live in Funktown! The boys lament about the east Lake Merritt neighborhood theyd grown up in, now hip and expensive, quickly whitening. Its crazy over here, they say. They perceive the new neighborhood with wide eyes, completely shut out. Unemployable, without much education or experience, they cannot afford to live anywhere, let alone in the neighborhood they grew up in. It is an us-and-them kind of conversation. We the Oakland natives, they the white gentrifiers. I tell them that every year my building gets whiter and I see more and more license plates from places like Idaho, Oregon, Ohio. And then I change the subject and tell them how excited I am that theyre here. What I dont say is how happy I am that theyre still alive. We walk up to the door of my apartment and I am jubilant. I am with my brother. We are in one of those dreams where hes alive and I tell him, I knew you werent dead. I knew it.

I switch on the lights, put on some music, and open a bottle of wine. My friend grabs the wine glasses. I see that the boys have found the only kind of entertainment I have: a set of pink tarot cards. Slightly embarrassed, I feel the need to apologize. Sorry, I say. I dont have a TV. Because most people have them, but all I have are books and tarot cards. They surprise me by wanting readings. I chuckle to myself and agree. My friend pours the wine and I burn a stick of palo santo. I begin smudging the room and the cards, having them believe Im some kind of diviner.

A total amateur, and drunk, I pull some cards for them. They are cards I am never excited to receive: the Moon, Death. I dont know if its true, but I try and say something meaningful. I tell them they will be all right. I tell them they may go through a dark time. I tell them they will undergo a transformation and it will be difficult but they can survive. I give them the bad but inevitable advice Id received when I myself had gone through a dark time. I tell them to survive. I explain that there is an other side to whatever is going on, but theyll have to work very hard to see it. I dont really know what Im saying but I say it with confidence. They nod. Okay, they say. They hear it. They listen to each others readings and offer commentary. At one point I cry. Maybe Ive had too much wine. It is Junior I am talking to. Do you have any questions? I ask the cousin after his reading. He is very tall but his giant T-shirt that looks like a nightgown makes him look boyish. In his manner of speaking that muffles any sign of vulnerability, he says he does have a question.