Is it really Integration that we mean?

Currently, I am involved in the research phase of a project, that will culminate in a play that deals with black power next year, which will be the 40th anniversary of 1970 Black Power (misnomer)= Revolution in Trinidad and Tobago. I am also doing another course that seeks to introduce us to the world of Caribbean thought, via arts and cultural studies. The course is called, Critical Readings in Caribbean Arts and Culture, or something of the sort. Recently in that class, after taking up the task (in a group project), of giving a critical interpretation of Walcott's Nobel Prize lecture, one of the coordinators sought to clarify WHY we needed to know about all these "thinkers". When speaking of Walcott, though Antilles covers much deeper ideas of home (which the coordinator did speak about), exile, Our Edenic opportunity, and what threatens us now as a people, he thought it necessary to quote Walcott as saying "I am only one eighth of the writer I would've been had I been born in Trinidad." Which is a misquote. The real quote, says " I am only one eighth of the writer I might have been had I contained all the fragmented languages of Trinidad" (pg 69 What the Twilight Says essays) And I mean who wouldn't? In a place as ethnically, religiously and culturally multifarious as Trinidad, who wouldn't have much more to write about, many more images to deal with, many more world views, many more conflicts. Not to mention the fact that there is a University in the midst. This coordinator IS someone that I have a lot of respect for, but I questioned why he saw it necessary to say that. But there was something paradigmatic about it.
When I first came to UWI, there was a sort of Mega Ice-breaker called UWI Life, which sought to get students properly assimilated into the University Life and with it, Trinidadian culture and so forth. Which is understood. We do not exist in a vacuum. We are part of the Trinidadian society while we are here. A question was asked about a nobel prize winner from Trinidad and Tobago, other than Naipaul. I was obviously confused at that point. And heck! I did want the prize, so I began brainstorming. Then I heard the answer, can't recall if it was the host who gave the answer or if someone thought of it. It was Sir Arthur Lewis. Who, well, is a St. Lucian by birth, education, up-bringing you name it. Now this is no nationalistic argument, I assure you. I am not one of those competitive nationalists of the Caribbean.
As I am writing this note, my housemate came to me (after returning from a Spanish class) saying that his lecturer asked him, what is Derek Walcott, to which he responded "a St. Lucian" (as they were dealing with nationality). The lecturer responded, " no no no, what is he at heart." My house mate was confused. "He is a Trinidadian at heart" was the lecturer's response. Now, I am aware of Walcott's great affinity with Trinidad. I am also aware of his inherent problems with Trinidad as well which one may find in the Interviews entitled " Conversations with Derek Walcott." And also, Walcott makes clear in The Prodigal, that home was indeed in St. Lucia. And I am sure that these people follow Walcott's work enough to know that he states emphatically "Mwen se' jean Ste. Lucie, is there that i born." But that's besides my point. I am not, and have no need to claim Walcott for St. Lucia. However, the problem is that this is part of the constant undermining of particular islands in the Caribbean, and it is part of the process of claiming the successes of the Caribbean.
One thing is important to note. Trinidad, Jamaica and Barbados, where Universities lie, are the putative intellectual hubs of the Caribbean. Obviously. That would explain Lamming's, Walcott's and other writers' fascination with Trinidad. Me being one of those (aspiring) writers. I am fascinated with the existence of such a Cosmopolitan, multifarious, multicultural (and so on) society existing in the Caribbean, especially being from an island like St. Lucia when the demographics are a lot simpler to understand and deal with. We have a black majority, an indian minority, and a mulatto/ white elite minority. So I would find the complexity of Trinidad alluring. However, what has been created is a sort of fealty relationship between these "intellectual/cultural hubs" and the other smaller islands; a sort of Bourgeousie/ Proletariat relationship where the Means of production is intellect. And it is a specific kind of intellect, that which is attained through structured, institutionalized education, and of course the new ideas that this sort of education may engender. This exists on a cultural level as well. A lot of the time when people speak of Caribbean integration, I think they speak of the smaller islands becoming subsumed in one of the supercultures of Barbados, Trinidad or Jamaica (more so the last two). Thus, Walcott and Arthur Lewis, paragons of Caribbean thought, must at heart be from somewhere other than one of those smaller islands.
Even in the study of the Black power which I mentioned at the beginning, and among all other things, there is a gravitation towards the orotund, the Mega-statements of a movement, rather than the insidious, modest revolts that existed. For instance, the Blue Blouse Theatre in Stalinist Russia. One does not need to focus on the loud speakers all the time, but on the little pensive whisperer, who, because of the skew of the wind, may not get heard. How that whisperer will get heard is by the hearers going closer to him. That is one of the failed parts of Caribbean Media, intellectualism and (endeavours at integration) a failure to look at the smaller islands and what they have contributed to the Caribbean, not the "Re-massa-fication" (if memory serves me right, I am borrowing this term from Dr. Humphrey Regis, if not, then its my term :D) of the Region. That is the last thing we need, this re-Massa-fication. In all honesty, in many aspects (especially culturally) Trinidad is the Chimera of the Caribbean. Trinidad culture, and the idea of Trinidad itself was built upon a fusion, or boullion of cultures and traditions from other caribbean islands along with whatever was indigenous to it at the time. Many trinidadians may not even know that a lot of their culture came out of countries like Barbados. For instance, the Moko-jumbie. (correct me if I am wrong). The further we move from this insular view of ourselves (and I am speaking of the smaller islands in this respect as well) we are staring at, the wider our vision. Thus, we should be able to see the Caribbean in its fullness, whether dealing with black power, political revolution, rebellion, or anything that is part of our history. We must look at Desmond Trotter, The Brigands, the Grenada Revolution (which many know LITTLE about). Listening to talks of integration and of "where is home" which Earl Lovelace sought to examine with us in the first lecture of the Critical Readings course, we must let go of our insularities, and our pride in being from a particular piece of earth, and begin to create an egalitarian and all-encompassing idea of who we are, of integration, of home, instead of expecting the smaller, less-noticed countries to come under the "cultural and intellectual" umbrella of Jamaica, Trinidad and Barbados, merely because their economic situation is more fortuitous that that of the smaller islands.

Caribbean Integration: A terrifying concept

In a course I am currently pursuing, entitled Critical Readings in Caribbean Arts and Culture, (which i spoke about in my previous note entitled 'Is it really integration that we want') we were to present our first assignment today. It was a group project, where one was required to present on themes relevant to our Caribbean situation, i.e. diaspora/ the Caribbean as Home/ the threats to the Caribbean/ Our approach to our history and ancestry etc. Five groups presented. However, every group, apart from mine, managed to narrow each topic back down to Trinidad, though the works being critically interpreted were from a disparate group of writers: Aime Cesaire, Guillen, Martin Carter, Brathwaite, Walcott, Lovelace. Yet everything managed to be parochially brought to Trinidad, with several strokes of nationalism, like the singing of songs like Sweet sweet T & T and the like. I had to keep reminding myself that this is not the University of Trinidad and Tobago but the University of the West Indies. I do not expect to come to Trinidad to go to UWI and not meet Trinidad culture in several aspects of my life here. I expect that. But in the actual academic atmosphere, in a course that dared to call itself Critical Readings in CARIBBEAN Arts and Culture, I found it horribly unfair what was happening. But it was nothing strange to me. But i did raise the issue during the question session; that i felt that there was a skew. an unfair one, as there were Vincentians, Jamaican and a St. Lucian (myself) in the classroom as well. The justification was predictable: That Trinidad is the cosmopolitan centre of the Caribbean as it has a fair representation of a number of ethnic groups as regards demographics and what not. I think that is a poor excuse. Trinidad is a place that was peopled very much by the people of the islands of the archiapelago, those that are rendered obscure now. It is a hybrid culture not indigenously, but very much because of the migration of people from all along the islands. What i think has come about with these UWI campuses, especially with Jamaica and Trinidad, is , a sort of Elitism has come about by a false notion, purported even by writers and intellectuals from the smaller islands, that somehow these countries are the intellectual hubs of the Caribbean. Well News Flash....there's a University there! Whether or not Trinidad has the most multifarious population in the Caribbean, why then did the group who did Guillen not talk about the fact that Cuba , though socialist, has several citizens who do not feel at HOME (since the concept of home is one of the themes) bcuz of racism and bigotry and so forth. Or why not look at how Cuba has been in many ways excluded from the idea of the Caribbean. Why not look at Martin Carter's situation in Guyana. You see, what happens when these pernicious paradigms are allowed to exist unchallenged, is that you find that Trinidadians are educated on Trinidad, and the other nationalities are educated on Trinidad. That is the underlying attitude here, I am convinced. There is a guy who is around me often enough, who each time he sees me asks me "When u going back to St. Vincent" or When you going back to St. Kitts. I kept correcting him as to where I was from, until I realized he was doing it on purpose. And I can't lie, I've faced this sort of indifference to, not just my island, but the smaller islands of the Caribbean on several fronts, both by lecturers and students. And the efforts at even integrating the international students into the school have been nothing short of a sort of pitiful patronizing. And of course, I've been faced, in places least expected, with that pejorative phrase: "Small island ting." "Small island people behaviour" and so on. What I am left to wonder is, what about the size of a people's country alters their being to being as parochial as OTHERS view their geographical space. But this is a recurring thing. It is like when persons come to a smaller island and look at our malls and say...'thats a mall....thats not a mall?!' .....well I will respond as Walcott does in his Nobel Prize speech (although ironically he was referring to who we call MASSA but it is sadly appropriate here) when told such things one must respond 'I AM NOT YOUR CITY ...." This here meaning that persons have their perceptions based on their circumstances, their terms and ideas of development. A place like St. Lucia does not NEED a huge mall. Build a huge mall and we can probably provide housing for a large percentage of our citizenry. A torpor had grown over me as regards this idea of integration. As my brother said to me a few seconds ago....what we integrating? And i will add, on whose terms are we integrating. Based on the patterns I am seeing in our so-called premier institution of Caribbean intellectualism, I do have reason to be fearful of integration; that we may merely be subsumed, no longer by America but by Trinidad and Jamaica. It is like saying, I doh want no white man robbin me, I rather a black man like me rob me. A phrase that seems to be popular. Integration, for people like us, from the 'unimportantly beautiful' islands is a terrifying thing, and a sort of reverse-entelechy

Fallen Fruit by Femi Renee

This is a poem which has been one of my favourites. It is by a poet, who (i won't lie) , happens to be my brother. He may not like me saying this, but I believe this is the Caribbeans 'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening', yet it is no replica of Frost. It is too grounded in its own private Caribbeanesque mind to be a replica of Frost. As a poem i think it seeks to encapsulate something larger but with the recognizable mundaneness that one is able to relate to with affection, in looking at their human struggle, their human condition, in the euphemism of a poem. The poetry gives them the sort of retrospective calm in looking at that struggle. Set in the Caribbean, its blatantly caribbean image, and the aptness of its subject to the Caribbean dilemma is indeed magical in the modest cathartic explosion it has caused in my heart. Here it goes.

Fallen Fruit

Fallen fruit

Beneath the laden mango trees

Whose leaves do sway astride the breeze

Upon which ants and beetles crawl

And lizards leap among the leaves

From whose dark branches lianas fall

Like columns in the leafy halls

Where cooing doves and sparrows play

On knotted trunks immured in gall

The mangoes in the month of May

Aloft like golden orbs do sway

I cannot climb to claim such fruit

At least that’s what my parents say

I cannot reach such lofty fruit

And so like any common brute

I search about for fallen fruit

I search about, for fallen fruit

By Femi Renee

Upon the Mural by St. Omer at Jacmel

                                              Dunstan St. Omer's Mural in a Jacmel Catholic Church.

Some time ago, I was asked by a friend ( who had forgotten that Walcott had already written about it) to try writing a poem on this mural.It wasn't one of those poetry-on-demand that many in society expect of writers. But I can't remember the reason why my friend asked. It had something to do with some St. Lucian Art incentive/ endeavour. So I was more than happy to attempt in being a part of it. One must give thanks for these little graces and opportunity. I begun the poem but after criticism from the friend, I was unable to complete it. So I thought I'd share it. I may get some assistance here.

Snuggled in this night like a crescent moon,

O dark child, you are the light of so many lives.

Dear Black Madonna, lilium inter spinas,

Darkened by the soot of our burnt-out faiths,

Blessed are you. Roseau has waited for you

With its hands of light-clenching bananas,

The diving dove above your head has made

A falling Fleur-de-lis of itself. It knows of your glory

Immaculate swan of Europe, O dark elephant of those

Who have so long been kept from the light.

How right was Dali about our need for you!

To those, who have whispered Patois desperately into the ears

Of God, like a conch-shell hoarding eternal sounds of the unlistening sea,

To those who have trapped the sounds of stars in chac-chacs,

Who have assembled our broken lives into mosaics, all in praise,

Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your

Womb-deep sweetness.

Here, we are not followers of galaxies, we could care less of Polaris.

We do not interrupt the unending pilgrimage of stars

For nativities. Our jalousies stare upon virginities

With cynicism; our world will not pause for your birth

O Dark child. Some woman shall hang her son’s shirts

To clothe the cold wind; we may strum our joys

Upon the protruding ribs of some dancing, barebacked drunk.

A new-born would place its bottom upon the hands of its mother

Like fallen fruits. The Little Dipper has darkness to scoop,

To allow our dawns, and will not care to lead your gifts to you.

This is just another birth, Black Madonna and Child,

Just another assembling of the unfitting pieces of some faith.

E pur si muove.

Kadhafi at UN

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jKPEIbryFl7wscFHTlXRpRa3yTlw

"I try not to perfume the flower"

 Trying to break out of the initial eurocentricity of my initial reading of poetry, I came across a poet, while reading a little bit on Elizabeth Bishop, called Joao Cabral de Melo Neto from Brazil. I had never heard his name before. At all. So I Wiki-pedia'd him. ( That is when you know your website is successful, when it becomes a verb). And I came across this phrase, "I try not to perfume the flower." This was Cabral de Melo Neto saying this about his own poetry. This excited me after going through a Yeatsian syndrome and reading a lot of the Metaphysical Poets. I had come across something of the sort with Larkin as well. In my own poetry, I wanted that particular sound, not just in tone and subject matter, but in the sound of the consonants, the rhyme (when i did rhyme), the assonances to be at rest with themselves, not too forward and calling attention to themselves. Not too theatrical. And not in a breath that was not mine. I remember having that feeling about Auden, but mostly to do with tone. There was sometimes where along what ever stream of thought Auden was taking you on, you would stumble upon certain words that was like hitting your toe. The kind of hurt that doesnt just hurt but cause annoyance. With phrases like 'Cerebrotonic Cato.' But yes, this is what I wanted. I wanted Larkin's blatant imperfection of tone. His nihilism. His honesty. Too many times, we find that aloofness, that unnecessary space between poet and reader. Reading poetry, becomes sometimes like a lecture, where you just listen, and there is no real interaction between the lines and that mind of yours. The poet seems to have, in the process of becoming poet, become beatified. He is the voice of moral, of reason, of righteousness, and there are few intimations of his humanness. He transcends his role as God of the words, arranging them around an idea, to the God of the reader as well. The voice is romantically peremptory. This is where Larkin gets to wear the vestment of my praise. His poetry, admits a humanness. It may be that, being one obsessed and petrified of death, (' The anaesthetic from which none come around) he was acutely aware of his humanity. Even when he became a bit, (in my mind) melodramatic and whining about death, it was a true feeling. And this imperfect, brazenly human voice was not an intimation, but a lovable veracity.

       Cabral de Melo, in his poem "W.H. Auden" approaches death with a mellow / Melo tone. The first line, "  We die the death death decides" is fraught with that matured acceptance of death. Now to make a comparison between him and Larkin would be unfair, as they genuinely seem to have (honest) diametrically opposite feelings toward death. And of course, Larkin is speaking of the fear of his own death whereas Melo Neto is speaking of Auden's. But there is a prevalence of this unperfumed voice of Cabral de Melo Neto.

      Cabral de Melo Neto avoids poetry's constant temptation for melodrama. The mellow tone, and it possesses that Larkinesque rejection of the Patrican/didactic/ Moralist/ prelate roles that other poets have taken up. There is a sort of plainness in his writing that isnt staidness, but a sort of adventure in being oneself. An adventure in welding one's person thoroughly into the silhouette of the persona. A journey into poetic humanness. Banks and Cathedrals is a wonderful poem that captures the typical Cabral de Melo Neto in terms of his Selected Poems : Education by Stone. Speaking of a woman, whom, being driven around, crossed herself mistakenly every time she passed a bank, he continues:

You were only half in error

To cross yourself before banks,

Weren't they built in the first place

To profit from that mistake?

This is street talk. Mundane if I may. Yet it, for me has an inner fire. Probably by venturing into his work, one may be able to agree with me. I do not want to blab too much about him for more than one reason. He is still awaiting further analysis from me, (meaning his poems, since I don't know him personally) and Larkin as well. Also, I am still amateur in writing about poetry, so I don't want to take the risk of writing more than I have in my banks and try stretching an ability that is not yet fully developed. But upon encountering Joao Cabral de Melo Neto's Selected Poems Education by Stone, one found a hard, dry mystery and strange attraction to his poetry. Unperfumed, and withholding an inner fire for when it was truly struck with a worthy hurt.

    

A Way of Feeling

I am very concerned with this idea of 'A Way of Feeling.' What this is looking at is the idea of certain existing feelings that we feel or make ourselves feel or make ourselves believe we are feeling, are indeed social constructs. Or we can look at it as society teaching us where to apply certain emotions. Whether, we are dealing with real emotions or not, is not of my concern. Yet, I am worried about the idea that there exists this idea of 'A Way of Feeling.' We create simple equations to things as regards the application of our emotions. For instance, death= respect, solemnity, sadness, taboos. Looking at this concept of death, let us begin the examination of this.
       Firstly, I will share this experience. In April of this year, an infamous and indefatigable tyrant in my country passed away. Upon hearing the news, I proceeded to my housemate's room to let him know of the death. His reaction was 'Wow (sarcastically) I don't really care.' Then he began laughing and joking about the fact that the man's scrotum sack had busted open.' This does sound pretty malevolent and unfeeling and so on. I know. But, what is underlying there, is a true expression of what he felt. I felt it improper, his reaction. But the truth is, upon returning to my room and examining my encounter with my housemate, I really was not sad about this death at all. In all honesty, I cannot say that the death meant nothing to me. It meant, in the immediacy of my mind, that I did not have to be in fear of being antagonized by this tyrant when I returned home. Yet within me there was this nagging feeling, some call it conscience, I don't. This feeling that was telling me that I was supposed to be sad. Had I been say, a fatalistic guy involved in gang warfare, or in previous times, a conquistador, upon hearing the death of a tyrant, I would have had an added joy at seeing his body lying there, with deaths nod of approbation upon him; that assuring and (in my hypothetical position) comfort in that finality of unlife cast upon his face. This shows the coinciding of ways of feeling and Zeitgeist/ World view. What this social construct of emotional control and emotional dishonesty does, is to create a sort of mathematical indifference to the exploration of our feeling and thus our being. So as long as the equation is correct we are OK with it. Death= sadness, solemnity, brooches, black clothing yada yada yada. What it has also done, is create a vulnerability and a very pernicious one. Where those who create the mores, norms and values/ world view of the society dictate how we feel about things. And with the inordinate American existence in our media, this, I think we can all agree that for us in the Caribbean, this can be a dangerous, dangerous thing.


I shall end here, so as not to hog the conversation. I decided to start this blog on this lighter note. Let us converse...