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
——— Well, we just dance. We dance all the time.
———
——— Yes. We go out sometimes. I get all dressed up and we go dancin’.
———
——— Something frilly with big loopin’ earrings I wear, but you don’t know. Sometimes I put on really sexy clothes, chiffon skirts and things so tight nobody believes I could take them off, not even in the shower. He dances with me.
———
——— Then, after he dances with me, he makes such a great omelet with cheddar cheese and some small enticing avocados. He wants to bomba.
——— But you say this guy likes to dance.
——— It’s 10:30 A.M. in the mornin’. We’ve no clothes on. Why would we? It’s the mornin’.
———
——— Actually, I’m not tellin’ you everythin’.
———
——— It’s not that I’m lyin’, I just forgot to tell you about these…contests we usedta win.
——— Contests?
——— Yeah. We were so poor. Well, not white people’s poor. We usedta win these salsa dance contests at this place on Valencia in the Mission that had just discovered that everybody wasn’t from Jalisco. No. I shouldn’t say that. It’s not fair.
———
——— But there was no way they were gonna take that twenty-five dollars from the two of us.
——— Isn’t this a new person?
——— Yes.
———
——— Why?
——— You’re saying “us” and “we” so easily, that’s all.
——— Well, if you did get a chance to dance with him, you wouldn’t want to be one of them either. Definitely one of us, that’s how my daddy would say it. “One of us.”
——— He’s a good dancer?
——— Who? Daddy? Oh my God, yes! Oh, you are being so smart. My daddy dances with my mother. The contests they won were on these boats that the city of Akron could fit in where they never forgot they were colored, but it didn’t hurt so much.
——— Where was that?
——— At sea, Jesus, sometimes you are very slow.
———
——— Suave. Suave. Slow. That means slow and smooth, soft. His hands are very soft, almost like damp silk, you know, and we’ve no clothes on. So we just ate breakfast in bed. I could have stayed asleep. I sleep so well there, with him. Like I’m so relaxed, so much at home I could have stayed home, I sleep through too much of my visits with him. I don’t want to, but I lose track of my bones, the skeleton, ha, and melt into this mound of flesh, warm. I feel so warm there. Do you think when I’m sleeping like that I feel like damp silk, too?
——— Undoubtedly.
——— Don’t make fun of me.
——— Why do you think I would make fun of you? This all sounds rather delightful to me.
——— Really?
——— Yes.
———
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——— I really could just stay asleep there…til he comes sayin’, “Darling, it’s time to eat now.” What could I do?
——— Sounds like you could do anything you want with this fellow.