bills so high that many of its one hundred thousand people only shower once maybe twice a month. “Sure this’ll work?” I say to Winfrey while I drum. Tap-tap-slap-tap-tap-slap-tap-tap-slap. “Just talk the drum, Gerald,” Winfrey says. “You don’t know how to deal with these people like I do—you can’t be a pussy.” The drum circle is too important to let leave; it’d be my fault if it did. “You’ve got this,” I say. “Save the circle.” Winfrey’s top lip draws up at one corner. “I’ll do the talking,” he says. My fingers twitch, I nod to Winfrey. “Whatever—Huey,” I say as in Huey Newton. Mouth dry, I swig park water from the bottle and pressure my bladder. The shakere player rolls her eyes, possibly sensing my irritation with Winfrey. “Let me have some,” she says, and I give her some water to swallow pressure meds. “Don’t let him bully you.” Winfrey turns to the protestors. “Before we start this glorious event,” he says voice gravelly. Silver hair escapes from underneath his red, green, and gold Rastafarian styled knit cap. He scans faces. “Stay together—bureaucrats will try to divide us—they’ll look for excuses to turn us down or form another committee to explore their options—keep shit like it is.” The Jamaican drummer, now in a leopard print loincloth, looks like a fake African from an old Tarzan TV movie. His chest is closed in upon itself with several skin indentations and stitches from past surgeries. He says he was once a pin cushion for prison shanks before he discovered the healing power of drum circles. He helps the Sociology twin in the orange kente head wrap chain her ankle to a Welcome to Trestie Tapia Park sign, positioned under droopy trees several feet from the alabaster executive seat. “Hmph! I feel like a slave in the Jim Crow south,” she says. The breeze blends eucalyptus and disinfectant scents that drift across from the gym restrooms. The line reaches outside beyond the entry door and includes Town Hall attendees and users who’d all eaten roach-coach breakfast. My stomach grumbles, I keep drumming, Tap-tap-slap-tap-tap-slap-tap-tap-slap. “When I was a kid,” Winfrey says to the crowd, now close to a hundred people, “Hubiciti used to be run by White folks—we had Boy Scouts, Little League—park toilets before they took the money and ran after the 65 rebellion.” “Preach!” someone says. ”Tell it like it is!” “Don’t get it twisted. I’m not saying we should catch white supremacy disorder. They’re no respectability standard—too many are fucked up and don’t know it. I say we redefine Blackness, what it means to be Brown—select leaders that value and respect us and hold them accountable.” Winfrey is interrupted by sounds like buzzing hornets, and we duck. A desert-camouflaged clover-shaped drone floats on air; it’s the size of a cornflake box, each leaf a propeller, a big sheriff’s star in the middle. Winfrey cowers, holds up his hand to create a shield. The machine flies in close enough for me to see the “Nikon” logo above the camera lens.
22 | Literature Magazine