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Commemorating lives and times of Elizabeth Keckley, Frederick Douglas, Horace King, John Sella Martin, Henry Garnet and comparing that with ours.

From, "Behind the Scene or Thirty Years of  

Slave, and Four Years in the White House" by Elizabeth Keckley 

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Woke

“Hey!”, Lizzie's ghost yelled at Okoro.

Before the ghostly shriek could touch Okoro’s eardrum, his hands threw a Molotov cocktail to the dress shop across the street.

Lizzie's ghost loved the shop. Tamara built it at the intersection of North Second Street and Lucas Avenue. Tamara even named it “First Lady Lincoln’s Choice”. Thus, she paid homage to the legacy of her great grandmother, Prissy.

Lizzie herself taught Prissy, a slave girl then, her cutting and fitting techniques, which were later adored by the First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln. Then Lizzie used to live in Saint Louis Missouri, married to James, suffocated by his abuses, excesses and lies.

Prissy passed her learnings to her daughter and granddaughters. Tamara has learned from her grandmother, Josephine, Prissy’s great granddaughter. Tamara’s exceptional sartorial skill fused with her intelligent business moves reminded Lizzie of herself.

Tamara’s burning store gave Lizzie’s ghost the feeling of bleeding welts she got from flogging by Mr. Bingham. Cost of the burned asset might be recovered from insurance but would miniscule fragments of moments of Tamara’s enthusiasm constituting conspicuous countable years into this business be recovered?

Lizzie’s ghost mustered some dust, took form of an oldie, appeared in front of Okoro before he threw another bomb. Okoro failed to shove her off. He groaned in anger.

Lizzie’s ghost asked, “Why are you after this shop?”

Okoro replied, “They’ve fired my friend Keira …”

Lizzie’s ghost expressed concern, “What did she do?”

Okoro explained, “She took money from the register, picked up a dress and a bonnet; she’s working towards repaying; but they’re so impatient! The owners drive fancy cars, they’re wealthy; they could’ve waived Keira’s a few borrowings in a year. That’s how the rich become richer, depriving the poor; this country and its capitalism - Urgh!”

Lizzie’s ghost asked, “Do you understand that Keira not only borrowed from the store owner but also from her poor colleagues? If the owner loses money for Keira's and other employees’ borrowings then they might have to close the store; then there wouldn’t be any employment for Keira and her ilk.”

Then the ghost added, “This country and its capitalism let slaves like Horace King and me buy our freedom, became respectively representative to the State Assembly and Modiste and Confidante to the First Lady. Even before being manumitted, Horace was so influential because of his building skills that the State of Alabama, later a confederate state in deep south, amended  laws, much before the Proclamation of Emancipation, so that Horace could stay in Alabama and build. Don’t they teach these in schools?”

Okoro stalled her, “Don’ know. (I) haven’t been to school here. But traditionally people in this country are racist. White cops kill black people. White folks crave here to enslave the others.”

Lizzie's ghost cast a mirage depicting Horace King, erstwhile slave, whipping John Sella Martin, his slave then, though both had African ancestors. She narrated how Martin endured and escaped slavery and became an abolitionist preacher.

Okoro shrugged, “They’re born here. They never felt estrangement, like me, from mother, five younger siblings flying thousands of miles away from Nigeria.”

Lizzie's ghost quipped “My friend Henry's grandfather was enslaved in Africa itself, by losing a war to another African tribe and, was, later, sold to the Europeans by that tribe.”

She paused for few moments and added, “There's famous Sengbe Pieh, also known as Joseph Cinque, member of Mende People of today's Sierra Leone. Both Henry's grandfather and Cinque were enslaved before being transported as cargo, in brig of ship to the United States, unlike your travel by airplane. They're estranged, too.”

She continued, “My friend Frederick Douglas was separated from his mother by their owner …"

Okoro grew impatient and reflected his grudge further, “They weren’t betrayed by their own father. My father left my mother and us. Until my maternal uncle prodded and goaded me to come here on a diversity visa, I didn’t know that my father could've sponsored our visas! But he never intended.”

Lizzie’s ghost tried to appease Okoro, "So what? I's born slave in this country; my own father, a free White man, made me his slave by some 1662 Virginia law. I didn't give in to feelings of betrayal, bitterness. Instead, I built my life, helped numerous others build their respective lives ...”

Okoro protested, “How can I build life here? Everywhere they ask for racial identity, generously called Affirmative action, basically identifying people by their skin tone or DNA make-up … grossly racist.”

Lizzie’s ghost argued, “Everywhere people are different. Igbo dominated Biafra tried to be separate from Hausa-Fulani dominated Nigeria. Minority tribe, Ibibio doubted their stake in proposed Biafra.”

Okoro whimpered, “It’s not about demography. I hate White people. A white woman got my father after his arrival here …”

Lizzie’s ghost reasoned, “It’s personal then. You’re neither doing Keira a favor nor taking part in a social movement. Just because Associated Press sold you a narrative about victimhood of racism through a South African immigrant of mixed race, you’ve taken part in fashionable violence under peer pressure, driven by your urges of vengeance.”

The ghost continued, “My time saw that violence is White man’s way. John Brown bled Kansas, raided Harper Ferry Arsenal for slave revolution. But he was of English, Welsh and Dutch origin. White man’s newspaper publicized his actions.”

Then she added, “You might call me racist for my views on John Brown and media. Won't you?”

Wee hour’s greyness covered Okoro. He was quiet. Lizzie’s ghost begged him, “A new morning is here. Embrace it. Free yourself from anger. Stay woke.”

Then she dissolved into thin air.

Okoro ran to his uncle’s place, finished filling up and submitting his application form to Saint Louis Community College for a course on telecommunication engineering; tidied himself up, went to work in the neighborhood grocery store.

He realized, “History’s the witness of both conflicts and construction. It’s my choice to take a side and define myself.”

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Word count: 998 (nine hundred ninety-eight, with hyphenated words, without hyphenated words, 1000 [thousand]) Words.

FCA : Full Critique Acceptable

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