Breath, Eyes, Memory

by Edwidge Danticat

“You must never forget this,” said my grandmother. “Your mother is your first friend.”

She told me about a group of people in Ginen who carry the sky on their heads. They are the people of Creation. Strong, tall, and mighty people who can bear anything. Their Maker, she said, gives them the sky to carry because they are strong. These people do not know who they are, but if you see a lot of trouble in your life, it is because you were chosen to carry part of the sky on your head.

“Remember that we are going to be like mountains and mountains don’t cry.”

with a mother and no father. She told me the story of a little girl who was born out of the petals of roses, water from the stream, and a chunk of the sky. That little girl, she said was me. As I lay in the dark, I heard my mother talking on the phone.

My mother now had two lives: Marc belonged to her present life, I was a living memory from the past.

“You look like you’re all grown up,” he said. “A lot of time has gone by,” I said. “What’s time to you and me?” “Out of sight, out of mind.” “Not your sight and not my mind.”

“Do you see my granddaughter?” she asked, tracing her thumb across Brigitte’s chin. “The tree has not split one mite. Isn’t it a miracle that we can visit with all our kin, simply by looking into this face?”

There is always a place where nightmares are passed on through generations like heirlooms. Where women like cardinal birds return to look at their own faces in stagnant bodies of water. I come from a place where breath, eyes, and memory are one, a place from which you carry your past like the hair on your head.