Chapters (31)
- Cover
- Title Page
- Dedication
- Contents
- Room in the Dark I
- Fawns of the Diaspora Court Liliane in Paris, While Tabou Combo Whispers “Coq Qualité” in Her Ears
- Room in the Dark II
- “I Usedta Drink, Smoke and Do the Hoochie-Koo,” or What’s a Girl to Do When Her Mother Looks Like Ruth Brown
- Room in the Dark III
- “El Bochinche” es que only Fe Cortijo Knows or All the LeBron Brothers Know If Victor-Jésus María Sang Lili to Her Freedom
- Room in the Dark IV
- And Where Is Garnett Mimms?
- Room in the Dark V
- I Know Where Kansas City Is, But Did Wilbert Harrison Ever Get There?
- Room in the Dark VI
- Zoom Went the Strings of Liliane’s Heart, But Arsenio Rodriguez Could Have Told Her the Music Sounds Just as Sweet When We’re Blind and Still We See
- Room in the Dark VII
- I Know Where the E Train Stops But I’m “Sendin’ Out an S.O.S.” and I’m Not Edwin Starr Either
- Room in the Dark VIII
- “Happy, Happy Birthday, Baby” or Wouldn’t It Be Great If the Lead Singer of The Crests Wasn’t a White Boy and I Could Be My Mother?
- Room in the Dark IX
- Every Time My Lil World Seems Blue, I Just Haveta Look at You and Learn Eye-Hand Coordination
- Room in the Dark X
- “That’s Why I Love Her So and Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, I Want to Know” or Why Jackie Wilson Died in Silence
- Room in the Dark XI
- There’s No Use Cryin’ “Forever” or Hyacinthe Returns from a Very Blue Holiday for Real B(l)ack at Ya
- Room in the Dark XII
- Lollie Struts Her Stuff Thru “The Sea of Love” or the Brides of Frankenstein Catch the Bouquet
- By Ntozake Shange
- Acknowledgments
- Copyright
Liliane was in Escambray with all those hard-nosed counterrevolutionaries, who claimed they were patriots. But Jose Martí or Bolívar didn’t seek no solace with no white Cubans from Escrambray, be like asking Bull Connor do he want a black daughter. Anyway, Lili let poor Roxie, who didn’t know much of nothin’ bout nothin’, Lili let Roxie linger in this Latin’s arms. Now, I’m not saying that Tony was not a hot prospect, but I can admit that Tony was a white Latin when he met Roxie and we all know he was still a white Latin when he left Roxie: bludgeoned, stabbed, bleeding, dyin’, strangled, beat, shot, deformed, stomped, broke, twisted, left, left, left for dead. He left her for dead and I have here in front of me my friend’s drawings of how beautiful Roxie might have looked, how full of hope for her and those children she let us be. So, Lili is not protecting me. I am no different than any other black colored Negro person. I want my friend back. I want my brother back. I want crackers to stop killin’ us. I wanta gun; a .25, a 9-millimeter, a AK-47, a Tech-9. I want to see somebody else die. One after another like my friends died. One for one. I want to go outta here and see more than spilt blood and white folks.
“Oh Aurelia, I didn’t know you were here!” I am slipping my drawings from Liliane under my thigh, but Aurelia sees me.
“Why, Hyacinthe, I know these young folks. They’re friends of Lollie, as I recollect.”
“Yes, m’am, they probably are,” I said under my breath.