Scenes In Brooklyn
Jard Lerebours
1 INT. NICHOLAS REGGAE DAY
As a child, my mom always drove us to Nicholas Reggae, a quaint bookstore in Brooklyn.
She could never be in one place at once. Her mind was always ticking, fueled by grief and anxiety. I clamoured after the Black Lightning comic books. Her greatest gift to me was a Black imagination, populated with people who looked like me and loved me.
By the time I was a teenager, Nicholas had changed drastically. Once it housed Black knowledge and esoteric treatises, now there were skin and hair care products as far as the eye could see. Jewellery that bespoke old African royalty. Clothing that pounded on your chest with a closed black fist yelling “I’m Black and I’m proud”.
Neither had the staying power of books. Still, I found things to read. I killed the British and French crowns with Brother Fanon. I unlearned imperialism from comrade Walter Rodney. I questioned masculinity aside from bell hooks. I practised loving with James Baldwin. I filled my stomach with sweet words from Nikki Giovanni. I sailed away with Marcus Garvey. I cursed Capitalism with Angela Davis.
I would people-watch.
I met Beautiful Black folks from across the diaspora. Afro-Latinx, West Indian, West African, East African, African American. Niggas with tams and dreadlocks hung like crowns on their heads. Sistahs with crystal rings on their fingers ready to share their good energy.
Children raised on ital food and good ol’ Black love. Children raised on Black thought and Black imagination. Children raised on Malcolm X and Nina Simone.
I would people-watch.
I met Madrid at Nicholas.
She had thick dreadlocks, dark skin and a decolonized mind.
Tattoos adorned her temple. I was captivated by them like poems to a mystic. Crochets and knits. Earthy colours. Gender Fluidity. Freedom.
She was Garifuna. Her kin spoke a Spanish Patois not unlike my Father’s Haitian Creole and Mother’s Jamaican Patois.
I would sneak up to the counter and exchange words with her, mystified by her wisdom.
She promised to knit me a tam for my baby locs. I never saw her again.
2 INT. APARTMENT DAY
Nkechi was not her given name. She was named Michelle by colonised parents who were named Victor and Julianne by colonised parents who were named Patrick and Clarissa by colonised parents. She washed ashore from an Island in the Caribbean sea. I could tell by the way she spoke.
My mother went to Nkechi for massages. Loosening the knots in her back. Relieving the tension of Amerikkka. Releasing the toxins of a White supremacist diet.
Nkechi was a bushwoman.
Tall bones and black flesh. The body of a mighty warrior.
A painting sprung to life. Curls that were loved right. Baked in coconut oil and battered in silky shea butter. Seasoned and wise.
A complex combination of spirit, experiences and intentional living boiled down to create a delectable curry.
I would wait in the kitchen. A kitchen filled with spices and roots like a talisman waiting to conjure revolution. Waiting for the right moment to strike.
My nose is prickling. The smell of the ancestors. The smell of melanin making love to the sun. The smell of clay pot upon scorching Earth.
I sat at the table across from old revolutionaries, reanimated by their works.
Darkwater by W.E.B. Du Bois, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa by Walter Rodney, Pan Africanism and Zionism: Two Movements in Polarity by Toks Adewale.
I feasted in Nkechi’s kitchen. Loosening the knots in my mind. Relieving the tension of a double consciousness. Fasting from the toxins of a White supremacist diet.
3 EXT. COMMODORE BARRY PARK DAY
While the rest of the United States celebrated Independence Day on July 4th, my mom and I drove to the International African Arts Festival at Commodore Barry Park. Through the years, the passengers changed but I always rode shotgun. It was our thing.
One year I bought an Anubis statue, he was immobile but still managed to be my favourite action figure.
One year, my mom commissioned a portrait of my father and me in pastel.
One year, my mom took me and some distant cousins horseback riding.
One year, we went with my best friend Noah. Some elders taught us how to play Mancala. The pebbles felt good in my hands like they were shaped for my palms. I took joy in knowing the ancestors had played this.
I took in the scents.
Scotch bonnet peppers. Fried shrimp. French Fries. Fried Chicken. Mac and Cheese. Collared Greens. Black rice. Red Snapper. Jerk Chicken. Griyo. Peanut Stew. Curry goat. Beef Patties. Jollof Rice. Stew Chicken. Fufu.
Is this what the motherland would smell like when I returned home?
I’d look at the sights.
Moroccan Chess Boards. Ancient Egyptian statues. Central African Masks. Coconut Oil. Jojoba Oil. Black Castor Oil. Mancala. Nigerian Waist Beads. Senegalese Dashikis.
I admired our beauty.
Bungu locs. Braids. Two-strand twists. Canerows. One strand twists. Sistah Locs. Afros. Waves. Bantu Knots. Perms. Bobs. Box Braids. Bald heads. High Top Fades.
Is this what the motherland would look like when I returned home?
I prayed with our clergy. Rastafarians and medicine men. Womanists and Black Nationalists. Manbos and Abolitionists. Black Muslims and Afropessimists. Orisha high priestesses and community organisers.
I’d vibrate to the decoration of time, allowing space to materialise and let the rhythm move me.
Fela Kuti. Mike. Lauryn Hill. Burna Boy. Beyonce. Vybz Kartel. Playboi Carti. Buju Banton. Amaarae. Flo Milli. Pink Siifu. Blood Orange. James Brown. Alice Coltrane. Gil Scott Heron. Ice Spice. Kendrick Lamar. Bob Marley.
Is this what the motherland would sound like when I returned home?
I pause for a moment.
I allow the euphoria to rush over me. I allow myself to be changed, to find my footing in the moment. I am saved, resurrected and die again.
I went from Malcolm to Detroit Red to Malcolm again. I went from Zev Love X to Mf Doom to Zev Love X again. I went from Cassius Clay to Muhammad Ali back to Cassius Clay again. I went from Erica Wright to Erykah Badu to Erica Wright again. I went from Leroi Jones to Amiri Baraka to Leroi Jones again. I went from Thebe to Earl Sweatshirt to Thebe again.
I am saved, resurrected and die again.
Jard Lerebours is a first generation Jamaican-Haitian antidisciplinary storyteller from Long Island, New York. He approaches artmaking as a conversation between friends and family in communion. He deeply cares about this owing to a West Indian upbringing in a loving village of cousins, aunts, uncles, great-uncles, grandparents and great-grandparents. The goal of his work is to capture the nuance, joy and responsibility that comes with being a living, breathing Black being. Jard’s films have been showcased internationally by Atlanta Film Festival, Berlin Short Film Festival, Indie Memphis Film Festival, NFFTY, Uppsala International Short Film Festival, Southern Fried Queer Pride, Out on Film, VAEFF and others. Jard’s nonfiction and poetry has been published by several outlets including Office Magazine, Issay Magazine and Forgotten Lands.
*Image by Mike Von on Unsplash
