THESE ARE EXCERPTS FROM MY FORTHCOMING BOOK ENTITLED

"CAROLINE'S POT - A GREEN FABLE"

Rumors were flying around the Quarters, that she was nearing the end, and so the lines around her coffin grew longer and longer, as the white people rushed to get a last look. Her skin had stuck so close to her bones from being inside the pine box for so long, her emaciated form resembled a skeleton.

But contrary to all presumed notions of her final demise, on an unsuspecting Saturday afternoon, right in the middle of the exhibition, to everyone’s shocking surprise, she awoke from her spirit’s long hibernation. At that critical moment, an old white lady was standing beside the coffin, enjoying a cool glass of water as she stood transfixed, peering down at the dead slave girl who slept and never woke, when suddenly from out of the blue, her stiff corpse-like body sat straight up and long thin fingers reached over and grabbed the glass of water out of the old white woman’s hand. The sight of those bulging eyes, and her death grip on the glass of water, scared the old woman so bad she suffered a massive heart attack and died right there on the spot, falling over into the coffin on top of the resurrected slave girl.

It was total mayhem and pandemonium, as folks stampeded from the little playhouse, trampling over one another. But even though her senses had awakened, her spirit remained detached from the world around her. Indifferent to the chaos, she gulped down the glass of water with a thirst for life itself. Meanwhile, folks went running and screaming everywhere to escape the dead slave girl who had suddenly come back to life.

Up until the moment of her awakening, the Whiteman spent his Saturday evenings happily counting his profits, but her unexpected resurrection caught him completely unprepared, not to mention the public scorn and humiliation that came from the backlash of the old white woman’s sudden death. It vexed him to no resolve as to what to do with the creature. Out of sheer frustration and anger, he had her thrown into the barnyard to the pigs. Through it all, she kept a death grip on her black pot.

Folks in the Quarters couldn't stop talking about how she had come back to life with the power to kill white folks just by looking at them. Her unexpected rise from the dead ushered in a whole new era of superstitions and fears in the Quarters. Folks debated that her black pot held a curse, however in spite of their fears and confusion, they’d become accustomed to having her in the little shed at the edge of the Quarters. After seeing her lying in the coffin for a whole year it wasn’t easy adjusting to seeing her crawling around the barnyard now, alongside the pigs.

Her year-long sabbatical left her so raw-boned, folks in the Quarters made a point to walk on the far side of the path in an attempt to avoid those big bulging eyes of hers, protruding from their emaciated sockets, looking at nothing in particular. But while curious eyes watched from afar, she remained completely obvious to the world around her. If it hadn’t been for the taunts and jeers of the children, she would have had a perfect peace.

Too frail to be put to work in the fields, the Whiteman kept her chained in the barn while he made up his mind what to do about her. She was all he thought about in the mornings when he awoke, in the afternoon when he came in for dinner, and in the evenings when he sat on his veranda having his evening drink of warm rum, she was still on his mind. And long after the evening campfires in the Quarters died down and the sun set, all he could think about was how he was going to get his money out of her before she died again. Finally, one evening after his fifth jigger of rum, the solution came to him a clear as day. Breed her.

He wasn't that experienced in breeding Negro slaves, and he wasn’t sure if this was the right solution. However, the more he thought about the fifteen hundred dollars he’d paid for her, breeding her seemed to be the perfect solution to his problems. The warm run reminded him of the benefits from breeding slave women; profit plus pleasure, and a smile crossed his lips as he thought about his sons, whose loins were rippling with enough testosterone to supply the whole female population in the Quarters and then some. Normally he waited until the young slave girls had worked in the fields a season or two before allowing them to mate, and even though he knew she was weak, breeding her was his only chance of cutting his loses. Motivated by greed and cheap rum, he devised a plan.

While the Whiteman planned her future, the Girl lay in a pile of hay, her mind aloft in a mass of emptiness. Her memory of the year she spent sleeping in the little whitewashed playhouse was lost. Nor did she recall her spirit’s journey among the trees, or her friend the old Oak tree. It was all gone, along with the endless hell she endured inside the belly of the slave ship. She was a ghost who had appeared from a vast emptiness into a strange and unfamiliar world.

Quarter folks passed the barnyard, starring at the zombie-like figure with the faraway look in her eyes. And although she didn’t understand the language they spoke, her spirit retained the powerful precognitive abilities she had received while her spirit lived among the trees. Consequently, her extra-sensory perceptions only caused her more hurt and pain as their endless thoughts and feelings entered her spirit.

Falling to the ground, she covered her ears in an attempt to keep their hurtful thoughts from entering her mind, but with nothing to shield herself from the constant flow of hateful energy floating into the barnyard, she sank into an abyss of self-pity, where unseen demons wrecked havoc on her soul. Overwrought with anxiety, every ounce of energy left in her stress ridden body soon dissipated until she was too weak to even stand. With the heavy chains digging into her bleeding ankles, she crawled around the filthy barnyard, scratching for food. After a year of consuming nothing but oxygen, her craving for solid food was an inextinguishable fire in her stomach that never stopped burning, and no matter how much she ate it was never enough. Each morning the troth was filled with a slop-like mixture of table scraps and clabbered milk. Compelled by the basic instinct to feed, she crawled to the troth an pushed for her place among the grunting pigs, and buried her face in the slushy mixture and ate, oblivious to the glaring stares from folks passing the barnyard, looking at her in disgust. Nor did she hear the children’s mocking laughter or feel the rocks they threw. Eating was her preoccupation, and ultimately her inexhaustible appetite became her saving grace in a life devoid of love and compassion, where eating was all her had.

But from out of the cruel crowd who passed her by in judgment, came the loving heart her Guardian Angels had been searching for. Old Mary was the eldest woman in the Quarters, and the keeper of Kinder. Each time she saw the poor creature in the barnyard, shackled and chained like a helpless animal, it broke her old heart, and out of pity she began bringing the Girl a cool drink of water three or four times a day. It was the very least she could do for the poor thing. Folks stood around watching the old woman as she held the water gourd over fence to the Girl’s mouth so she could drink. And although they resented Old Mary’s show of affection for the ugly creature with the wild hair and bulging eyes, it was this single act of kindness that reminded them that she was human too.

When the Whiteman noticed how her appearance was improving, he released her into the old woman’s care. It was a moment old Mary would always remember. In all her born days she had never seen such a pitiful sight; hair matted so bad she could see louse and ticks hatching their eggs in her head. Her fingernails were so long they turned in a nasty yellowish curl. And the sack she wore looked as though it had been made from mud.

The old woman waited patiently, watching as the chains were removed from the Girl’s ankles, her torn skin covered with dried blood. When the old woman picked up the black pot, it seemed to signal something in Girl’s mind, and she slowly followed the old lady out of the barnyard. Overwhelmed by the worst smell she had ever smelled on a human body in her life, the old woman couldn't wait to reach fresh water creek on the other side of the Quarters.

“Lord a mercy Jesus!”

Between the foul stench and all that matted hair, it wasn’t easy removing the filthy sack from her frail body, and all the old woman could do was call on her God.

“Oh Lawdy Jesus! Help me father.”

But as old woman looked at the miserable soul hidden under all that filth, all she saw a helpless motherless child who had been made into a miserable slave, and it broke her heart all over again. She after she sat fire to the sack, she soon realized the smell hadn’t just been in the nasty sackcloth. The old woman couldn’t get the Girl down in the creek fast enough. She scrubbed and scrubbed until all that foul smelling stench was washed away. But washing away the stench was just half the job. The next challenge was all that matted hair standing on her head like a massive growth of contention.

“Tell me Jesus, whut tuh do wid dis head a’ nasty hair.”

After considering all her options, the old woman simply cut off all the Girl’s hair, along with those long nasty yellow fingernails. And after all the washing and cutting was done, and the stench of wretchedness was gone, the old woman saw a sweet innocent girl child standing before her, and she held out her hand. These were the first acts kindness the Girl had been shown since she’d been taken captive, and suddenly from out of nowhere the misty fog covering her mind lifted, and tears begqn streaming down her brown face. Old Mary wiped away her tears, and holding her hand, she pulled her along.

The Girl remained in a state of sublime psychosis, completely unaware of the piercing eyes from the Quarter folks starring at her nakedness as she walked through the Quarters beside the old woman. Her awareness was totally focused on warm feeling from the old woman’s hand. and old Mary felt it too, as a stream of energy flowed from the Girl’s tight grip on her own hand, and she felt a strange stream of energy in her other hand from the black pot she carried. What neither of them knew, was that from this day nothing would ever be the same again. It was the beginning of a whole new life, not just for the Girl, but for Old Mary, for the folks in the Quarter, and for the Whiteman himself. And what no one suspected was that the Girl's old black pot would be at the center of everything that was about to happen.