You are standing in a gas chamber, naked and hungry. Nothing is in sight, not even your own limbs. The darkness is frightening and slowly becoming familiar. There’s no sound, no movement of light, and the only reason you know you are in a gas chamber is because of the putrid smell of decayed human flesh in the air, encased by a pulsating gassy smell. The toxins beat at your dry lips. The cement floor on your bare feet provides the only bodily sensation available. Do you stay alert and coherent? Is dissociation an ally to be summoned? How are you going to survive. The door to the gas chamber creaks open with a warm gust of wind swallowing you whole. I am at the door, fully clothed staring at you. Staring. You reach for me but miss, and stumble to your knees onto the cold unforgiving cement. I extend my hand. Still sticky from the dinner most recently enjoyed, as the smell of basil twirls in your direction. The sound of footsteps echo in the background. I turn my head towards the sound and look back at you in terror. Your mouth opens to speak but no sound escapes. You do not escape. I close the door, trying to signal with my eyes that I promise to return as the echoing footsteps draw closer. I promise to return.
N.K. Jemison is still on my mind, so writing in second person is still on my mind. The other second person point of view in literature that resoundingly stands out is from Isabel Wilkerson in her New York Time’s Bestseller, “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents”. In her epigraph, and only in her epigraph, she engaged in second person point of view writing, which expressed out the gate who her target audience is: white Americans. It is entirely undeniable who she wrote the book for. Language matters, and I get the approach in utilizing the word “caste” to soften the realities of using the word “racism”, when engaging with a white audience - I get the strategy even though I do not agree with it. Americans, white and white assimilated are going to eat this book up. [white assimilated denotes a person of color who actively assimilates towards whiteness, consciously and purposefully, to an extent of disavowing their own racial self hate]. Some of my radically minded friends and family members (black, white and POC) will never pick the book up, they are not the target audience. It does not matter that Oprah put it on her bookclub list. It was not written for them. Hence my decision to highlight, not the book that is grabbing the attention of individuals right now but Isabel Wilkerson’s ACTUAL WORK OF ART that she spent over 15 years putting research into, “The Warmth of Other Suns”. Purchase it.
I could’ve written in second person about being in the Dominican Republic in a field of parsley, and a whole generation of elderly Haitians might find it intolerable to read concerning the point of history in which Haitians were aggressed upon and murdered at a genocidal rate (google Parsley Massacre). I could reference the Rohingya genocide as well amongst over a handful of genocides in the last 2 decades. But instead I opted for a gas chamber. You cannot breathe in a gas chamber. What is going on in the world that we live in? What has been going on when aspects of difference drive one group to aggress upon another, and justify the behavior. Am I exaggerating by stating that there’s a genocide taking place in America right now, and has been for centuries. My Native American/Indigenous kin might have a lot to say concerning the topic, let a lone black men in America.
I experience most people in the gas chamber and at the doorway of the gas chamber. Needing help, wanting to help. I am less concerned about that dynamic. What is the gas chamber doing there in the first place? Who put the person in there? Why is one on the inside and one on the outside? Those footsteps shifted something. Who or what is the third in that dynamic? Can you see yourself in all 3 roles?
I am both the person in the gas chamber, the person opening the door to the gas chamber and the dark matter in the air bearing witness to the approaching footsteps towards the gas chamber.
Race is the topic right now. If you are part of a diversity group that is not centering race right now then speak out, as John Lewis so proudly exclaimed (may he Rest In Peace), “cause good trouble, necessary trouble”. If you are in a group concerning diversity, race, equity, inclusion and race is NOT being centered in your discussions then seek a consultant immediately. Not 10 months from now, or 10 years from now, but right now. Add variety to your lexicon of authors around race, do not solely settle into the opinion of those who you agree with. There are numerous perspectives concerning race! On that note, the “starter pack” for a person curious about race, but also holding some shame about not knowing “enough”, not doing “enough”, not wanting to say the “wrong” thing, feeling stuck:
-The New Jim Crow
-Colorizing Restorative Justice: Voicing Our Realities
-Stamped: Racism, Anti-racism and You
-Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome
-Medical Apartheid
-anything from Toni Morrison
-The Healing Wisdom of Africa
-Balm in Gilead
-As Brave as You
-The Farming of Bones
