Feature: Ten ‘Pitch Perfect’ Tips to get Published Works by: Loretta Collins Kloblah, Newton Chance, Tricia Allen, Ken Thomas Chantel DaCosta, Kwame McPherson, Gervana Stephens, Kavita Ganess, Marisa Forbes
Issue 3, December 2014
Susumba’s Book Bag is a quarterly digital magazine dedicated to showcasing writing of the highest grade from new, emerging and established Caribbean writers at home and in the Diaspora. The magazine is an offshoot of the Caribbean arts and entertainment online magazine Susumba.com We will publish poetry, fiction, flash fiction, interviews as well as reviews of Caribbean books. Occasionally, we will also publish one-act plays and monologues. Currently, we do not offer remuneration for the writings we publish, but we believe that writers should be paid for their work, and so we working on a way to do that in the near future.
Submission Guidelines We accept a maximum of 5 poems and 2 short stories at a time and we have no problem with simultaneous submissions but ask that you notify us immediately if the work is accepted elsewhere. We have no bias of genre or style. Our only requirement is that it be good, so send us your best stuff. Short stories should range from 2,500 to 3,500 words while flash fiction is from 10 600 words. We prefer our poetry to err on the side of Mervyn Morris, the shorter the better. We do accept longer work but if your poem is at the 33 to 64 line tipping point (longer than a page), please only submit two poems at a time. We try to keep our response time to a month, but alas we are human and so it may go beyond that. If you have not heard from us in 90 days, please feel free to send us a query. Though we publish quarterly, we currently accept submissions throughout the year, except in December. There is no reading fee, and submissions are only accepted via email. Send submissions to info@susumba.com Subject: Lastname-Firstname-Submission. Send your work as an attachment (.doc, .txt or .rtf), not in the body of the email. Works sent in the body of the email will not be accepted. Send submissions to info@susumba.com Subject: Lastname-Firstname-Submission
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG June 2014
Contents 6
Everywhere is Blue
Kavita Ganess
12
Ghosts The Colour of Drought
Tricia Allen
13
These Evenings Wall and Zinc Fence
Marisa Forbes
18
Remittance
Ken Thomas
19
Hymen Hymn Orchids
Loretta Collins Klobah
24
My Jamaica Vignette #3: Baby Mother
Chantel DaCosta
25
The Robbery
Kwame McPherson
27
The Islander Penitent Peak of Liberation
Gervana Stephens
29
Declension Burning Bush
Newton Chance
10 ‘Pitch Perfect’ Tips for Getting Published: The Book Doctors - Notes from Pitch-a-palooza at Brooklyn BookFest 2014
Tanya Batson-Savage
31
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Editor’s Note Susumba’s Book Bag is approaching its first Christmas and we are excited. With these three issues, not only have we seen great new work from some of the region’s emerging and established writers, but we have discovered new voices who have sent us poems and short stories that grab you by the short and curlies. With each issue it becomes increasingly clear that this archipelago we call home is a floating in a sea of talent. To our writers: thank you for trusting us with your work and allowing us to share your talent. And to our readers: thanks for taking the time to dip into the bag and discovering some bad ass writing. May your gladbags overflow in the coming year. Ours certainly has
Tanya
A publication by Blue Moon Publishing
Cover Design: Tanya BatsonSavage
Editor: Tanya Batson-Savage tanya@susumba.com
Tanya Batson-Savage Editor in Chief
Sales info@susumba.com
PO Box 5464, Liguanea PO, Kingston, Jamaica W.I. www.susumba.com www.twitter.com/onsusumba www.facebook.com/Susumba 5
SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Everywhere is Blue by Kavita Ganess Blue Devils fascinated me, yet I never ventured near. I feared they would ask me to dance, and my inhibited body would decline with shame. I went to church every Sunday and generally snubbed Carnival, only venturing to view the annual parade throughout the years only if the sun wasn’t too hot. I was never a participant of that poetry of movement, glitter and colour. A spectator I was always, and I secretly admired the blue grime and the grind of Blue Devil hips. I loved the way they rotated their waists to the rhythmic music, as if they did not know what it was like to be tired. I was in awe every time, I watched the Blue Devils breathe fire from red-painted mouths. Their cobalt skin called to me. Male and female Blue Devils made tantalizing pairs, like lovers drugged on passion, dancing solely for each other’s pleasure. How I wished to be a Blue Devil. How I wished to be free like them, but I kept my urges buried deep; till one day that thread of blue found me, and snaked its way into my heart like a blue serpent of lust.
Shisha had more to say, and I was delighted. She continued, “Blue Devils have tails, so they can walk with their tails tucked between their legs; so that their crotches bulge like well-endowed men.” Shisha pronounced every word with excitement. “Blue Devils were baptized in barrels of blue paint and Soca music, when they fell from the sky; so their hips grind blue and smooth to the groove of Carnival and Jouvert.” I giggled and fanned myself. I fell on her pillows, swooning with delight and I whispered to her, with playful yearning, “I have to find a Blue Devil, help me find one, come on, Shisha, help me!” Shisha smiled, happy that her words had touched me once again. I loved to listen to her weave her magical stories. She had no television at her place, so she was my only entertainment, and every night I spent with her, we had such fun sharing tales of exquisite experiences. Her new subject was Blue Devils, and she spoke of them with confident knowledge and relish. One of them had whispered Blue Devil secrets in her ear - after he bit her on the softness of her right calf, one night in St. James at the We Beat Festival. He infected her with an illogical and insane lust; and her stories of him infected me with voracious curiosity.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Everywhere is Blue Kavita Ganess
Shisha spoke of the closeness of that beautiful Blue Devil, as he stood next to her, with the odour of pitch oil in his warm breath. She spoke about how the blue paint flaked like scales off his skin in the amber street light, till he looked like a mesmerizing blue iguana. She spoke of his nipples that jutted hard like sugar apple seeds, and how his body was muscled and delightful. She loved how he moved to the music for her, oblivious to all the tourists with cameras who called for his attention. Loud and aggressive music was not Shisha’s preference, so her body was always unyielding to its rhythm. The night she met him, I knew she stood out from all the other women, like an unmoving, beautiful statue in a crowd of bouncing breasts. She said he sent her imagination whirring. She said he spoke words with his eyes that only her heart could hear. I giggled to hear her rave about him like that, but a pin-prick of longing stabbed deep in my heart. I wanted to meet him. She said her love-story began when she smiled at him, and noticed that out of his mouth oozed a scarlet liquid like Red-Mango juice. She said he saw her watching his mouth, and said to her that his mouth was red from hiding flocks of ibis in his belly. That night I whispered with sheer rapture, “Did he really say that? Gosh, that is so beautiful!” Then Shisha laughed, and said, “No silly. I made that up!” I loved her mischievous side and I knew I was too gullible at times. She said his eyes travelled all over her that night, taking in her long-sleeved brown shirt, stopping at her black skirt that stopped midcalf, and her shiny indigo shoes. He had a way of looking at her, a way that made her feel beautiful. Her parents always complained that for a twenty-five year old, she dressed like an old lady. But both of us dressed the same, and often borrowed each other’s clothes. She said she knew her long black hair was a mess that day, for his eyebrows raised as he looked at her head. Finally when he spoke, he stretched out his hand and said to her, “I sense a Kama Sutra spirit in you.” Shisha had laughed and was unsure how to respond to his statement, so she replied, “My name is Shisha, and I have always dreamed of being a Blue Devil.” She said her voice trembled in her throat that night like how her legs trembled beneath her skirt, as she shook his hand. That night he told her, “Only if your soul is blue, you can be a Blue Devil, and your soul is not blue – it is red.” Yet she was smitten. She gave him her phone-number and they had spoken and met a few times. She confided she did not want to tell me anything until she got to know him better. His name was Burt, but everyone called him Bird. She said he worked in his father’s bar part-time and he was a bird enthusiast. Shisha said he always spoke of his birds. He had twelve cages each with a happy bird in it, and each of them delighted him with song. I learnt about his Merle Corbeau, his Big-Eye Grieve, his Blackbird, his yellow Oriole, his Blue-grey Tanager and many others– what was remarkable was that these were wild birds that he had managed to lure into his finely crafted cages made of dried bamboo. I never met him, but I felt I knew him. He had to be a charmer
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Everywhere is Blue Kavita Ganess
Shisha whispered many thrilling stories about him. As we lay in bed, I listened to her like a woman with hungry ears. She said when he took a shortcut though Woodford Square, to go to Mass in Holy Trinity Cathedral, pigeons followed him like he was the Pied Piper of Pigeons. The vagrants call him Obeah Man, she said with a mysterious smile. He thrilled her with his stories, and she thrilled me with the stories of him. I dutifully said, “Both of you are a great couple, you would tell each other stories every day!” Then I met him, and I fell in love with him too. Without the blue paint, he was quite extraordinary as well. He had golden hairs on his huge calves and arms, golden hairs that caught the light like the hair of lions. His eyes were light brown and his bottom lip had a scar, which looked as if a woman had sunk her teeth into it, during the throes of a powerful orgasm. His smile held an endearing space between his two front teeth. The space was like an air vent from which the steam from his hot body emerged and warmed my face. He kept his hair short and neat on his head like a conservative man, but the sparks of blue-fire in eyes gave him away. He always had us laughing over cups of steaming tea and coffee. “Vee, I can teach you to communicate with birds. Birds follow me everywhere. I tame them with one wink of my eye and a click of my tongue. When I blow a kiss to them, they fall into the palm of my hand,” he said. He was a strange young man and I knew I was in love from the moment he held my hand in his, and whispered when Shisha left, “I can paint your soul, blue like mine.” But what did a twenty-seven year old flirt know of souls and love? Yet I was intrigued. I preferred older men, but this young man fascinated me. He made me forget about my love for Shisha, which spanned over twenty years. We played together both as girls, and as women. She was the first woman I ever loved, yet Bird managed to wipe our closeness clean from my conscience. Bird was going to make me a Blue Devil, and we were going to keep it a secret from Shisha. There were Borough Day Celebrations in Chaguanas, and he wanted me to go with him. Chaguanas was a place in central Trinidad that was always busy with flea markets full of Indian merchants selling every type of product from India and the streets were lined with stores that boasted great deals. The Borough Council had invited Bird’s team of Blue Devils to be a part of their festivities. He said that we had to walk from Montrose Junction to Saith Park in Chaguanas. I was thrilled. I was thrilled that he chose me over Shisha. I was thrilled that the feeling was mutual. He took me to his home on New Street, to be trained. His home was an old house that had sheets of furry goat skin hanging on the walls. I heard talking but I could see no one. When I asked him about his family, his said he had four brothers and they were around. The house seemed full, and I heard the sound of Picoplats and Finches chirping behind the walls. The coos and caws made the house seem like the spirit of a forest hovered within its wooden structure. The noise of his father’s bar was muffled and I could hear music and laughter. Bird’s place was huge, but devoid of much furniture. He joked that his family was rarely at home, so they didn’t need much furniture. The air was pungent with
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Everywhere is Blue Kavita Ganess
incense and oily substances had been sprinkled on the bare, concrete floor. There were pictures of Jesus and Hindu goddesses hanging on the wall. Bird took me to his room. A broken shard of mirror hung on the unpainted wall, and a mattress with a white sheet lay on the floor. He closed the old, termite-ridden door. “Strip of your clothes, I want to look at you,” he said softly. I laughed nervously. “Is this part of the Blue Devil training?” I asked. He didn’t answer. He picked up a large, half-empty bottle from the floor. It contained a strange collection of grasses and seeds submerged in a yellow liquid. He poured me a full, large glass of the thick substance. “Drink this,” he commanded. I asked him what it was, but he told me to sit. I sat, and he began to talk. His voice was soothing, as I obediently swallowed every drop. He spoke about how a Chinese woman had given him a fan, at a restaurant in town, and he gave it to his aunt who suffered from hot flushes, but now he wished he hadn’t given it to her because his mother wanted it. As he spoke I started to feel a burst of air rising inside of me. It felt like a cloud was building inside; like I would have a heavy shower of rain, and I would flood and gush from the opening between my legs onto his mattress. I closed my eyes. When I opened them, I realized that in the corner of Bird’s room, was a clothes line on which three pairs of jeans hung. They swung now in the stillness of the room. I blinked again. They kicked up their legs, as if fighting with each other in some strange, slow Capoeira dance. I looked around for Bird. He had disappeared. “Bird, Bird,” I called, my voice sounded weak in my ears; a strange warmth coursed through my legs and I couldn’t stand up. Bird appeared. He had a bucket of blue paint in his hand. There was a stick in it. He sat on the mattress next to me and began to turn the paint carefully. His muscled arm looked like a piece of flesh I wanted to bite, chew and swallow. I watched as he stood up. He took off his shirt. He was wearing short, blue-paint stained pants. He smiled at me. I had never kissed Bird. What would our first kiss be like? I wanted to pull him to me and kiss the thick, lushness of his neck. He pulled me up, and I stood on trembling legs. His eyes glowed like the incense that was now burning at his bedside, in a brass incense holder. I heard the sound of pounding rain. Was it raining outside? Or was it raining inside of me? He pulled off my dress. I stood before him in my white underwear. The setting sun was coming through the thin curtains, and I could feel it on me. I covered my breasts. He laughed. “You can’t do this if you are shy”, his voice sounded like that of an old professor, gentle and patient with his wisdom. His words were an earnest plea. I moved my hands from my breasts. They hung at my hips. I was angry for my sad state of stiffness. I was angry that I was reserved and inhibited. How could I ever be a Blue Devil?
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Everywhere is Blue Kavita Ganess
I pushed him roughly. I held his scruffy chin in my hand, and watched him deep in his beautiful eyes. The walls of the room was closing and expanding like an umbrella in the hand of someone who was hesitant to use it. I knew I was intoxicated now. What had he given me to drink? My voice was a throaty growl, “Hear this – why don’t you paint my soul blue, like you said you would?” I was unprepared for him when he pushed away my hand, and placed both of them behind my back. With one hand he gripped me with an exciting forcefulness. Then he changed before my eyes. It was like he had ten heads, all of them moving at the same time. He bit me on my chin, and sucked on my flesh slowly. His tongue snaked out of his mouth to my own, like a pitchfork on a mission of pleasure. His mouth was everywhere at once, under my left breast, on my belly, on my thigh. He devoured me. His hands grabbed my hair; he pulled it away from my face so I could look at him, as he licked me. Then I heard a loud crash. The bucket of paint had tipped over. The floor was painted a rich, dark blue. He moved to stop the bucket from rolling away and we both slid into the slippery mess. It was cool on my skin and I wanted more of it. I rolled around, dragging him with me. Our bodies slid over each other, fitting together like an erotic Blue Devil puzzle. He was deep inside of me, when he whispered, “Grind your hips for me, grind for me like you mean it, I want to feel the vibrations between your legs”, and I ground my hips for him. My hips twisted with the fire-water and strange magic-herbs he made me drink. I moaned “Bird, Bird” in his ear, and I heard his name echo in the room like a sweet chant everywhere. Strange voices were calling him. Our sex had awakened spirits, it seemed. It wasn’t my voice in my ear, it was another voice. Then I heard other voices. He had changed me into a Blue Demon in his arms, and now I was hearing voices from the Underworld. I was hearing the walls pounding with the force of his thunderous thrusts. We were locked in each other’s firm grip, as the door slowly opened. Bird’s four brothers stood there watching us. Was it time for the parade already? They were all blue, horned and tailed and ready to go. Bird’s teeth fastened on my breast, as they all came in and sat on the mattress. I heard one brother ask, “Did she drink all of it?” Bird mumbled, “Yes”, against my breast. I didn’t feel any shame as they all looked me, lying naked on the mattress like a Blue Queen in a Blue Devil Wonderland. She has nice, long hair; I heard one of them say as he smelled its fragrance. One braver brother reached over, and put his hand on my breast; while Bird pounded away at me like a woodpecker, pecking for that last little ant caught in the deepest layer of bark. I closed my eyes. I felt teeth on my neck, teeth on my shoulders, and teeth on my back. I felt the hardness and softness of man in my mouth, between my legs and all around me. It was a magical and mystical moment.
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Everywhere is Blue Kavita Ganess
I knew the taste of many tongues, and I worked tirelessly from brother to brother. Bird gave me wings to fly and flutter for all his brothers. I was a cake to be sliced equally among these sexy siblings. I was a blue kite in this room, and all of these fine young men had me on the edge of their string. Soon it was night, and the only light that burned was that of a yellow citronella candle in a corner. Hands had to cover my mouth, for surely it would rip with the sound of extreme pleasure that came again and again. The Blue Devils had changed to black now. These were Black Devils dancing between my legs now. These were Black Devils suckling at my breasts, as if my two nipples could never satisfy the ache in their belly for breast. As I lay in the darkness, sated, I fell asleep. Then I felt myself being carried. Through half-opened eyes, I saw when they took me to a bathroom. I felt the splash of warm water. I sat on a white plastic chair, as they gently washed the blue from my skin. It was evening when I was fully awake. There was no blue paint on the floor or on me. The mattress was neatly covered with a white sheet under me. There wasn’t any bruise to be found on my naked body. But between my legs were wet. I looked down. Was I bleeding? I passed my fingers over my tingling labia. When I looked, my fingers were moist with blue paint. In my mouth, there was a strange taste like that of fried piranha flesh that I had tasted in Suriname some years ago. My lips felt sore and my body felt hollow. I got up and dressed. Bird and his brothers were nowhere to be found. As I walked out of his home; I heard his caged creatures cackling, as if they were laughing at me. I felt foolish. I had to see Shisha. I was dizzy and my body ached all over, but I found my way to her apartment. She opened the door and took one look at me and knew right away what had happened. I fell crying into her arms. We both began crying like babes, like women without shame; we held each other and emptied the hurt from our hearts. Shisha whispered, “I could not tell you, I could not bear to tell you what happened when I went to see his birds.” She continued with sadness slurring her voice into a slow pace, “I never thought you would go with him, that’s why I never said anything.” My voice rattled in my throat, “His brothers came…” Shisha’s eyes were pools of luminous tears. Her fingers stroked my hair. She kissed my cheeks. “I love Bird, and I forgave him for what he did.” I pulled away from her. Her words were like a punch, hard and painful in my belly. I looked at her. Her eyes sparkled with a strange interest, as she surveyed my swollen lips. I shrunk away from her, and walked to the door. I heard her voice, stern and sharp in my ears, “Don’t go, you know you enjoyed every moment of it – that’s what makes it worse, doesn’t it?” I turned around and looked at her. Shisha could see right through me. I shut her door and sat on her couch. What was I crying for really? Was it that I betrayed my darling friend? Was it because I enjoyed the experience? “I’ll go make you a cup of tea,” she said softly. I watched her walk to the kitchen. Tonight would be my night to tell her a story.
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Tricia Allen Ghosts Ghosts float across these lines sour-faced shadows float across this house white as the night heavy with dust and the scent of rain Ghosts swallow smiles gnaw at my lines mouths full of teeth.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Tricia Allen
The Colour of Drought When she arrive, she wear disguise: her face covered with bandana yellow dress swinging in evening breeze yellow dress clinging to skin You would think she is festival queen The way she moving in the breeze Everybody come look because they never see a woman tall so and proud so wearing the sun in her skin You ask her to wine her hips and you play music, beating the drums deep into the night So she dance for you, twisting her hips loosening the yellow revealing nakedness the colour of terracotta and yet she getting hotter still wearing the sun in her smile You feel like is fire inside you a fire twisting you insides into ash a fire that sucking the earth beneath you dry But you watch her dancing still mesmerized by her nakedness or was it the sunlight in her yellow dress?
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Marisa Forbes These Evenings These still evenings Where trees sit, unmoved And no dust gathers At my feet like little children, Remind me of days spent at home, Evenings walking along the seawall As I watch my day end Closing in a spectacle The orange ball Disappearing behind the Blue, purple, orange, green seawall Raging at the dying of the day Never quite surrendering to the sea. These still evenings When the poinsettia blooms Red like sorrel And Christmas carols circle me Like gingy flies Remind me of home And sitting on the verandah Drinking chocolate tea Talking on the phone And fingering My ankle Length skirt
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Marisa Forbes
As my childish Giggles lift up to the sky Like praises and doves You comment on My country peeni wallies’ Twinkling noise As they quint their goodbyes. These still evenings When darkness is neither Blessing nor curse Remind me of nights When we could hide Behind light posts And steel a kiss Or when I, Having turned Into your old woman Swat you away Like a bee or fly Because hiding and kissing Was no longer endearing. And as time Sits still Like a concrete well The aches in the bones Make me hate Still evenings like this Because sometimes ‘Still’ Means cold and stiff I want the breeze to roam And the sun to be at high noon Or else Give me the harvest moon That marks the end Of a beloved summer’s day.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Marisa Forbes
These still evenings Have me scared That our unroving eyes Mean that soon we’ll separate Perhaps in our sleep. But still, I prefer The movement of the breeze And your blue, brown eyes As we watch the sun arise. I have come to prefer Mornings Mornings that are not Still.
Wall and Zinc Fence So you point out to me The difference between The we and the them The cool cooling out And the hot getting hotter No, colder For this is the cold weather But the man still needs to eat And him need socks For him feet An him ‘oman feet An di baby foot dem Is col’ wedda An di more Mi rite Di more yuh realize Seh, it a more Yuh An wi Than We And them Words separate us
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Marisa Forbes
Like zinc fence Or brick wall And some still grow Like bamboo shoots But then they shoot Up and up And fence nor wall Can be tall Enough To contain the spill over Of our fears And their cares. But still, We dangle bait, Party late Right under their noses And expect To abate the violence That ensues When money is misused And they go hungry As we pay thousands of dollars For half drunk liquor. But something must Numb the pain; Liquor for us Bullets rein again For them. It’s a small price we pay To release the pressure Locked up behind zinc fence Locked down by brick walls. At least, That’s what We tell ourselves.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Remittance by Ken Thomas Her words poured out of the edge of reality and into my young ears. I'd asked her to explain... again. The other five, six times she'd explained it had made no sense, and it still didn't. So I tried to pretend it wasn’t going to happen. Her eyes were cool and calming; they always were. Gentle and smooth like her hands had been before years of me coarsened them. Yet, I would never deny the perfect beauty of my mother. Eventually (as I watched plaits of all-human hair flow swiftly downward) I resigned myself to deny sense and accept her words. As a child, do you ever know that you're poor? All I knew was that I wanted her with me, not there, in that place in Canada I could barely pronounce. She promised to send me pictures, but what could images of falling water matter to me when I knew that no matter how much I stared and glared across the only waters I ever knew, I still would have no chance of seeing her? A hug and one quick kiss on my forehead served as the farewell. I watched her walk out of my life, my tears conspicuously feeble compared to the overwhelming cascade that is money.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Loretta Collins Klobah Hymen Hymn If you want to go to heaven in the name of the Lord, you must wash your hair on Saturday all rooted knots finger-pulled, the roller brush, mother’s hand starting at crown, wrist twisting tangling my hair around the barrel until she must tear hair to wrench brush free. Toni curls, tight winding, curling papers between mother’s fingers pull down hair strands until each hair is an over-wound violin string that she strums and plucks as I jump. If you want to go to Heaven, in the name of the Lord, wake early Sunday to take out rollers that won’t unroll, each curler sharpening its little teeth, on my hair half in spirals and half in rat-frizz clumps.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Loretta Collins Klobah
If you want to go to Heaven, in the name of the Lord, let mother chase you with the roller brush, apply maximum torque. Oh, Lord, the brush gets stuck and could just stay in my hair like one hangman dangling from my head. If you want to go to Heaven, in the name of the Lord, wrap ankles around each other when you sit in the church, yellow dress smoothed, black patent-leathers. Do not twirl your hair on a finger, or suck a hair strand, or build a church and steeple with your hands and unruly fingers. If you want to go to Heaven, in the name of the Lord, young lady, do not think about the word turning around and around in your mind. Do not yearn for enlightenment, pondering why schoolmates drawl out the word when they pronounce it, like “spooool” or “Yooooooouuu
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Loretta Collins Klobah
gonna get in trouble.� Do not think of the torsion of a light bulb twisting into a socket, the sole definition you can think of. What does that word mean? If you want to go to Heaven, girl, be quiet all the service long, and when the congregation drops to their knees in silent prayer never rise up and shout out in a voice that carries up to the angels Daddy, what does SCRE-E-E-W mean? because at that moment, that very moment, you have to know what that word means. Your daddy buckles in the pew and is unbound. Girl, with your springy curls, you may not be headed for the promised land.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Loretta Collins Klobah
Orchids For A.M.L.
For morning glories vining the road’s edge, orchids hidden down stony paths, yellow butterflies skirting bush, jackfruits hanging heavy behind the clapboard house, dogs raising ruckus at the tyres to defend wide open mountains, the Wag River, its boulders, foam-sluiced rocks, lychee fruits, bags ram-packed with red hog plums, nutmeg in its red lacy aril of mace, provisions, brown-skinned, yellow-bellied yams, squat pumpkins stacked in a pyramid, a girl in short braids, dancing in her pink frock calling out to us to stop, and her grandfather, sitting in a doorway in his white cap, his eyes looking with welcome into ours, give thanks. We stopped, and you skipped down the stone stairs at the other side of the road, you, charmed by everything green growing there, carting back yellow flowers for your yard. Your babyfather drove down mountain roads like Batman on Skyjuice, give thanks
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Loretta Collins Klobah
For your aunties in their house dresses cheering Jamaican footballers on television, asking is what sport Puerto Ricans excel in, your snug home in Red Hills, hot porridge you cooked at dawn, your girl Kayla, counting in Spanish, playing dominoes with me. Sloped roads of Red Hills, where, at night, the stars dip down to the bright grid of Kingston’s lights. For singing night frogs. For glimpsing a house on Roseneath Mews, where I once lived, For your idea to carry me to Rae Town for the oldies party, for not treating me like an oldie. For our visit with dear poet elder, Mervyn, my thanks. For coffee and thin coconut wafers, for Ras Dizzy’s painting on his study wall, for Dennis Scott’s books. For a lickle woman, strong like Lignum Vitae branch, striving wordsmith taking us deep into the red hills of Jamaica, word-souns-wounds of its countryside, its city people, I give true thanks. I received your poems at 4:00 a.m. For you, mi dear, a skipping stone across the water from Puerto Rico, I send bendiciones. Bless.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
My Jamaica Vignette #3: Baby Mother by Chantel DaCosta She was tired. From all the cook-clean-wash-tidy-up-opening-up that she did each day. She decided to sit and rest her feet for three minutes and fell asleep. She didn’t want to sleep for long, if at all, she planned to make up for earlier that morning when he was displeased by her offerings of egg and bread. He wanted a real breakfast of food and meat and man’s breakfast and he left angry for work. She could not bear it when he was upset. She planned to prepare his favourite for lunch —- ackee and corned pork with roasted breadfruit. But she fell asleep. The thing growing in her was stealing from her. Sucking all her energy. Just two weeks in and the not quite yet human, the thing that could become baby number four, the potentiality of the son that he desperately wanted, that thing was taking too much out of her. She felt sick, her stomach queasy. She had a hard time staying awake. It was past midday when she awoke, too late to set up the coal stove to roast the breadfruit. He would arrive soon. Frantically, she looked around the kitchen, opening up cupboards and the refrigerator for something to appease the gastrolater. She had missed her mid-morning tea and quickly put on the papaya leaves to brew. She grabbed some chicken breasts from the freezer, when her phone beeped inside the pocket of her apron, the text message from him reads: Can’t come for lunch. Have off site meeting. Relief flowed through her. She could cook dinner. Breathing easier, she grabbed the bag of coal and rushed down the back steps, two at a time, when left foot over right became no feet touching the ground, she tumbled and rolled. Crumpled at the bottom of the steps, the bag of coal still in her hand,. She smiled when she felt the cramping.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
The Robbery by Kwame McPherson It’s difficult but I’ve no choice. Half-eaten fast food. Yesterday’s newspapers. Something dead. The smell’s nauseating, stinging my nose with the vengeance of a smelly smog and after all these years my senses are still unfamiliar with the stench. I pause watching the scenery. The day is warm with sparse cloud cover. People are everywhere, going about their business or not. I notice a woman as she pushes an expensive push chair, two babies in it, a cell phone glued to her cocked head. Behind her, two teenaged boys, back-to-front baseball caps have phones plugged to their ears; traffic creeps along Main and even the drivers are on their contraptions too. I shake my head. I once had a cellphone. Fidgeting with the rubbish I glimpse a smartly dressed man in a hurry - dark suit and tie, sharp shoes. He looks flustered as he looks directly at me. There’s something in his hand as another man follows, a huge camera on his shoulder. I move from my bin watching them both, pushing my dirty hands into my dirty designer-labelled coat. I forget the huge holes where my pockets used to be, my fingers fingering the rough skin underneath. He’s closer and I can see the sweat on his forehead. ‘You!’ He stabs a finger at me. The other hand holds a mike. I look around. ‘I’m talking to you!’ ‘Me?’ I point to myself, straightening my frazzled coat. ‘Yes you!’ He’s closer, the smell of rose bush emanating from him. I grimace, I can smell myself. It’s not as pleasant. ‘I need to talk to you.’ A smile cracks his handsome face. Flared nose. Dark eyes. Pearly white teeth. I nod. ‘Why?’ ‘You always around here?’ He waves a hand. Traffic snarls along the road and I can hear someone swearing. The shops are busy, their Christmas lights already up. ‘Why?’ ‘Good. So you would’ve seen it?’
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
The Robbery Kwame McPherson
I stare. ‘See what?’ ‘The robbery?’ ‘Oh…’ ‘The bank over there.’ He points further up. ‘Yesterday, about the same time? What did you see?’ ‘I….’ ‘You sure?’ He’s already moving away, camera man following. He’s out of ear shot as he shouts back at me. ‘It’s ok Mister don’t worry about it, thought you wouldn’t anyway!’ Shrugging, I return to my bin and move a sheet of old paper. A thick brown envelope appears. ‘I saw the robbery alright…’
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Gervana Stephens The Islander Penitent I sit, watching from the blue, my island green dissolve into the smoke of the morning. A cascade of light breaks the obsidian abyss of sky as birds’ cock-a-doodle-doo us awake. Salt whets the air water breaks on rocks and teases the shoreline. I am but a lowly islander. Silent, I watch the ships come and go their ebb results in green flow for the common man no, the politician gets the green light go away to the hills, I ponder the farms and fields the crop yields the stench of the animals the sound of nature’s meat shop. The ground moist with dew the sop-sop sopping of a shoe cries of children lazy to wake screams of parents “don’t make— mi cum in there” where
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Gervana Stephens
is the money going to come from? Faith shelters the believing hand And so I believe that God’s aim is not to deceive to unveil His plan to us is not a requirement. Praises wane, joy fades and thanksgivings are all the same. Worship, monotonous—forced, and the one you want is not of a colored view. Those that are do not interest you. And you pray for sin, ask with a pure heart for the wrong as you sit and watch your island run down, into the ground, gone—dropped.
Peak of Liberation ‘Columbus from his after deck…’ Funny how no such part of a ship exists but through poetry we create worlds and build dreams; perfect literary bliss. My soul wades through words— adjectives, prepositions, nouns, verbs I’m submerged in form, meter, rhyme and the poet drowns on imagery emerges a new persona to be. An expression for oppression Babel and be heard, echoed from all sides are history’s stereotypes and liberation comes with discovery and creation. We become Columbus exploring and as Adam naming. Finally, Emancipation through the ‘after deck’ of life.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Newton Chance Declension Here at horizon where sun and moon suck tongue at sunset, the sky appears to dreamers colourful as Joseph's rainbow coat. Here at horizon where sea and sky make congress, becoming as one, terra cotta moko jumbies, stiltwalking, sleepwalking, reach for higher learning that makes of men parrots instead of panthers after truth and right, more intrigued by ceremonial rites and rituals than human rights and justice. I am that child they think does not understand; to be seen but not heard; faceless, nameless, shapeless number in the sheep herd of consumerism where shepherds, pastors, pundits and priests are doctors of letters instead of healing this inheritance of pain that hides behind disease, forgetting a broken bottle holds more poison than a whole. Between blood and enemy lines more things are read than ever said. Papier mâché lions pacing concrete cages, where loyalties are gambled for royalties, have lost their land, their love for land... and man. Here, gamecocks self-destruct while stick-men damblé, dancing in the night.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Newton Chance
Burning Bush Before burning bush of canefield at crop time, the crackling consummation, conflagration of a dying diction in confrontation with pernicious fictions and frictions cultivated from colonial past. Infernal mound or holy ground, what message of deliverance will Moses deliver to a worn and weary people lost and wandering in the aimless wilderness of a nation's political indecision in search of Prometheus, lands promised, promises of land or out-landish promises of a Promised Land.
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
FEATURE 10 ‘Pitch Perfect’ Tips on Getting Published: The Book Doctors Notes from Pich-apalooza, Brooklyn BookFest 2014
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG December 2014
Pitch Perfect Tips: The Book Doctors
The Book Doctors Arielle Eckstut and David Henry Sterry are the authors of The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published. They provide a myriad of services including book proposal development, manuscript review and development, line-editing and self-publishing services. The two hosted Pitch-a-palooza as a part of the Brooklyn Bookfestival 2014 giving tips on getting writers one step closer to publication.
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Just Keep Calm and Pitch: Your pitch is your audition to show what a great writer you are.
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A Minute to Win it: In this attention deficit world if you can't give a kick-ass description of your book in less than one minute you have a problem
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Clarity Rules: For your pitch to work be clear about your hero & antagonist. Give us someone to root for & care about
Familiarity Breeds Consent: People in the publishing world are looking for stories that are familiar yet unique
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SUSUMBA’SBOOKBAG June 2014
Pitch Perfect Tips: The Book Doctors
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Timing is Key: Having the right book at the right moment in history is critical in publishing
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Leave Them Wanting More: A pitch ideally laves people asking, ‘well what happens next,”
Show Don’t Tell: Don’t be too generic. Don’t tell me the book is funny. Make me laugh. It’s like those people who wear t-shirts with ‘sexy’ on it
Comparisons Carry: Comparable titles give agents and/or publishers an idea of what your book is about as well as how to sell it. But don’t use books that are over-used
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Know Where You Sit on the Shelf: The category in which you’re writing is essential and pitching in the wrong category can kill your book. One of the challenges of traditional publishing is that we can’t really publish something if it’s not a category in a bookstore.
Publish or Perish: For anyone writing poetry or short stories the key is getting your work first published in journals and literary magazines that hardly anyone reads
BONUS
Characters, Characters, Characters: When telling your story, the message should be underneath and in between. It’s the character that matters.
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