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
And like Pete “El Conde” Rodriguez, smelling like warm cognac, pure and sweet sweat que toca the sidewalk like Pacheco, I saw her, la gringa negra and her body was singing to me. No, really. Listen. Listen to her stroll Avenue C. “Canta, canta, canta mi cancion, querida. Canta, canta, mi querida, canta mi cancion.” I admit there’s every possibility that Liliane, I always call her “mi luchadora,” she had no image of me before I took her, captured her, however you wanna say it in English. I’m in charge of visiones del sur, south of 6th Street and anything between 1st Avenue and the East River esta mi corazón, esta mi tierra. I’ll fight for it and I’ll love it, mira, I make it black and white, two-dimensional, con claridad once I get una cosa that no one else seems to be able to see; once I get la cosita in a photograph: There’s no gettin’ away. So I mambo with long legs. Challenge telephone poles, carnal. That’s chicano talk. I’m telling you I whipped around la gringa negra like all of El Gran Combo on New Year’s Eve. She startled, stepped back and ba-tum, I took her picture.
I smiled, relaxed, moved out of her way, but she was mine. Tu m’en tiende, yo tengo su cara and when she walks her limbs cry out like a mulatta who never tasted fresh coconut milk, at least not from Puerto Rico.
But that’s a lie, just like the camera lies. When I catch what nobody wants anybody to know just wafting cross their cheeks, trickling out the side of their eyes, a shallowness or a hurt allegedly disguised. I lied about meeting Liliane, myself, the pace of it. I wished I coulda been alla that for her, mi luchadora negra, but like Felipe said years ago, “I’m nothin’ but a Spanish-speaking colored kid.” So what would Liliane want with me? I asked her once, but her English was not only syncopated, it was multisyllabic, but I ain’t really no different than her in the gut. I could see things, even invisible things. Anyway, one time I said to her black ass, negra, what do you want with me? And she said something about a “man” and language. That was a bit much, you know. Just bopping over my head. So I ’plained. Listen, querida, cajones is the problem on the Lower East Side, the Loaisida.