Toni Morrison | 1982 | Short Story
"Recitatif" is Toni Morrison's first published short story. It was initially published in 1983 in Confirmation: An Anthology of African American Women, an anthology edited by Amiri Baraka and Amina Baraka, and is the only short story written by the acclaimed novelist.
Recitatif, recitative | ˌrɛsɪtəˈtiːv | noun [mass noun]
1. Musical declamation of the kind usual in the narrative and dialogue parts of opera and oratorio, sung in the rhythm of ordinary speech with many words on the same note: singing in recitative.
2. The tone or rhythm peculiar to any language. Obs.
"...she smiled and waved like she was the little girl looking for her mother-not me". (11)
There were many instances with my own mother that I remember questioning, who is the child? Who is caring for who? Stumbling home from a Monday night dinner, attempting to get her straight home without much constraint. Conversations where she details her desires for our relationship, her eyes conveying a fantasy with her own mother .. not the daughter before her. My calm, questioning, blank face stare back as I question, are we both little girls?
"All I could think of was that she really needed to be killed." (13)
The comfort I felt when I admitted this for the first time. When I gave voice to long cultivated thoughts of a life without her. The expected ease and freedom, space to breathe and live without her dominance. A young girl thinking that there was a simple barrier to move, for her to make fantasy a reality. Driving in the car with her mother, answering to patterned questioning of Where would you want to live if mommy died? Fear turned into wonder.. what would like be if I lived with this family in Poughkeepsie, or this one in Bay Shore?? As I grew older, what if I could stay in my childhood and my brother take care ... I could clean the house out and make it a home for me. Even now .. I wonder, what will be when she is no longer?
"Nobody was inside. Nobody who would hear you if you cried in the night. Nobody who could tell you anything important that you could use." (28)
Crying alone in my doorless room. Wondering if she could hear me. Wondering how she couldn't. Wondering if she'd walk down the hall. If she'd hug me. If she'd make me feel better. Crying not for hours. Short periods to release. I knew she wasn't coming. I feared her coming. Her door opening and closing, as she maneuvered down the cluttered hallway. Feared her walking into my doorless space. Feared her touching me. Feared her forced dominance in my personal space. Feared making noise as my emotions raged. Feared showing I wasn't okay, in fear she'd see a wound to stab.
"I knew she wouldn't scream, couldn't-just like me-and I was glad about this." (29)
Screams. Cries. Ignored. Until my voice went mute.
''Eight.''
''Eight.''
''And lonely.''
''Scare too.'' (31)
The age I was when I understood reality. When I couldn't explain the why to my actions. When attendance to a friend's party I'd long waited for, was threatened if the truth was not given. A truth was communicated. A shame was enveloped. For over a decade I was ashamed around the family. Ashamed over pencils. Until my mother read my journal, and my shame was of victimhood. Shame of knowing I was harmed. Lonely knowing my mother didn't care to express and defend her daughter's safety. Scared that it'd be another reason for me to be disliked and not included, as my brother remain favored and in community.
Words I Loved...
"And it shames me even now to think there was somebody in there after all who heard us call her those names and couldn't tell on us." (10)
"... that's all I could catch when I tried to bring her to mind." (14)
"I walked over to the booth, smiling and wondering if she would remember me." (15)
"James is as comfortable as a house slipper." (16)
❤"When our son was born my mother-in-law gave me the crib blanket that had been hers." (17)
"Had to believe what had to be believed." (20)
"I tried to reassure myself about the ... for a long time until it dawned on me that the truth was already there, and [she] knew it. I didn't kick her... but I sure did want to." (28)
"What the hell happened to Maggie?" (31)
>"In the social system of St. Bonaventure, Maggie stands outside all hierarchies. She’s one to whom anything can be said. One to whom anything might be done. Like a slave. Which is what it means to be nobody. Twyla and Roberta, noticing this, take a childish interest in what it means to be nobody:" (Zadie Smith, 2023 The New Yorker)
• December 19, 2022 | Barbados •