February

Hello!

I am writing from the banks of the latest atmospheric river, watching the unmoored of the east bay float by. Cars, pedestrians, a google bus or two or three. Let water wash away what will be washed away.

In February, I became an official Reader at the Huntington Library in Pasadena (easy enough to do; it requires only signing up for an appointment in one of their beautiful Reading Rooms), current home of the Octavia E. Butler papers—an extensive collection of Butler's manuscripts, letters, and working materials. Never having visited an archive before, and being too embarrassed to call them up and ask what to do, I went ahead and requested a lot of material. 19 boxes worth, or about ten more boxes than I could go through in 9 hours. But I sat in the quiet, plush, polished-wood reading room, and went through as many boxes as I could, one at at a time. Drafts of "Bloodchild," "The Morning, The Evening, and the Night," early manuscripts of Dawn, Clay's Ark, and an unpublished novel Blindsight. Letters to Vonda McIntyre and email correspondence with press. Notebook pages with jotted notes for new stories, novel revisions. Real, physical artifacts. Type paper that Octavia Butler touched. I touched. I was greedy in touching. I was moved, deeply. They—her words—are here, after her. Something of her remains, ink and pencil smudged by her hand, her fingers, indelible. Let what can remain, remain.

Maybe it is because I am also reading the Bible that I find myself so moved these days by what remains, what endures. In the common Western monomythical consciousness, the Bible remains. In a lecture I attended this month (March) by black horror writer Steven Barnes, he observed that humans are still obsessed by three major categories of social rules: rules to promote individual survival, rules to ensure tribal survival, and rules to control reproduction. Abortion bans, trans hate campaigns, beating down any and every good idea that might stand a chance of easing the ignorance that is white supremacy... any of these could come straight out of Leviticus or Numbers:

"When Phinehas son of Eleazar, son of Aaron the priest, saw [an Israelite man bring a Midianite woman into his family], he got up and left the congregation. Taking a spear in his hand, he went after the Israelite man into the tent, and pierced the two of them, the Israelite and the woman, through the belly." Numbers 25:6-9

Breaking these rules makes for great horror.

Octavia Butler drew constantly on the Bible for inspiration. Tales of vengeance, incest, tribal wars for dominance. She was in many ways in thrall to a deeply conservative brand of power: physical might and technological superiority will always win, and it's no use questioning what might as well be universal law. What is of use is bearing what you can bear in order to preserve the humanity of future generations. What would Butler write of the unborn child in that Midianite woman's belly? Enslaved to the Israelites, powerless, and yet heir to power as well. Enlightened by suffering and misery. What will remain, will remain...but not unchanged by what has passed. That's the constant threat...or promise.

Book(s)

I finally finished Howard Thurman's Jesus and the Disinherited, Thurman's compact and beautifully written treatise on Christianity for "those who stand with their backs against the wall." While Christianity has been weaponized largely in the West to oppress the poor and the suffering, and here Thurman most directly addresses Black Americans, this is a gross misreading of the teachings of Jesus. As a Jew under Roman persecution, Jesus's suffering was directly akin to the suffering of Black Americans at the hands of white America.

"It was this kind of atmosphere [Koreans wanting only freedom from Japan] that characterized the life of the Jewish community when Jesus was a youth in Palestine. The urgent question was what must be the attitude toward Rome?

...In essence, Rome was the enemy; Rome symbolized total frustration; Rome was the biggest barrier to peace of mind. And Rome was everywhere.

...This is the position of the disinherited at every age. What must be the attitude toward the rulers, the controllers of political, social, and economic life?"

It is a spiritual balm and, I believe, still politically relevant though at times Thurman can feel outdated.

The Bible is a good accompaniment to Jesus and the Disinherited. Classic read, very dramatic, quite enduring. I recommend The New Oxford Annotated Bible, New Revised Standard Version with the Apocrypha.

I read other books, but who can compete with Octavia Butler, God, and Howard Thurman? I'll save them for next month.

Record

What remains is vinyl. Jose Feliciano's Feliciano! Find it in a record store, find a record player, and listen with your eyes closed.

Until next month,

Endria

P.S. Some good news about the earth:

>> A dear friend, Gina Clayton-Johnson, has launched what promises to be an insightful and beautifully-written newsletter, Knowings. I will let Gina's own words do that talking:

Everything has a backstory. The backstory to my knowledge (and this newsletter) is women, mostly. For the last 9 years I’ve been organizing women with incarcerated loved ones. Convening intergenerational conversations, sitting on chairs close together, trying to find my clipboard in the happy hecticness before a member meeting starts with babies on hips and kids running around knee-height, to plan what a small group could do in the face of big harm. Along the way I built an organization, I ran policy fights, I trained budding organizers, I wrote social change theory, I visited prisons, I developed Black feminist HR policy, I gave birth twice in my bathtub, and I bailed Black mothers out of jails. And all around us Black uprising, feminist wins and losses, the Covid pandemic, and a new climate reckoning unfurled too. The things I know are about movements and social change, feminism, and leadership. In this newsletter, I bring you some of what I’ve learned — as an organizer, mother, and woman with an incarcerated loved one myself.

>> I will be writing at the Headlands Art Institute in Marin in May, along with some truly inspring artists and writers. I am happy and grateful for this opportunity, and excited to befriend the local flora and fauna!