last day of the feast

Today is the last day of the scheduled Black History Month. I didn't celebrate with others like other descendants of immigrants in this country celebrate their points of origin. We have big celebrations for being American and then slightly smaller celebrations for various ethnic groups. When Black people's time comes around there are isolated public displays, perhaps a rally and a picnic, but it's not like a national public display. We have a history of being shamed, even lynched in public, we are leery of open displays of pride. Safety in numbers huh, whats to stop the squashing of even a million man march, if it suits an end game.

I was in college in the 70's, we tried to have a celebrate Black heritage week. We sported our dashikis and fros (real hair not wigs), we had drum troops, stepp'n troops, dance and singing. We did rap before it became cursing and dissing. We talked Malcom and MLK and Douglas. The first year it was glorious, the second a ho-hum, the third a what the hell was that. To "celebrate" Black History never catches on really, there is too much effort to rekindle it every year, sparks but no fire. There is something wrong, something missing, hidden, unexplained, covered up.

Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 in the Bible says a certain people will forget and be forgotten, forget their God, heritage, and ways. Psalms 83 speaks of a collusion of crafty council to make you forget and wipe you out of remembrance (the Willy Lynch letter). We are a people who as a whole can't say who we are or where we are from. We can't point to our origin, don't speak our original language and can't figure if the things we do are whispers of our forgotten culture or not. Black scholars and truth seeking individuals have posted so many identifying clues but as a group we don't identify enough with this information to link, bond and have a cultural remembering as a group. Oh it can't be that!!

Remembering, remembering, remembering. When I get out of my car at the grocers, walking to the door, I look at every face. I look for remembrance in every Black face. Almost all have forgotten, perhaps one or two might give a sign of knowing. Some are still waiting, some have given up, some given over. It doesn't matter, so what, who cares. The ones who have it can't pass it on because younger ones can't receive it. We can't even say if what we have discovered is real. Can't trust the establishment who lied. It's hidden in plain sight, we still don't believe what we are seeing. It's so hard to remember when you've been cut off...............reparations won't restore knowledge of self.