February 27, 2009 @ 5:17 pm
Black History Month Blowout #20 (A Black History Month Happy Friday Mix-tape and Confessions w/ Robert Hayden)
Those Winter Sundays
Sundays too my father got up early
and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.
When the rooms were warm, he’d call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,
Speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love’s austere and lonely offices?
***
It wasn’t until my father died that I began to understand him. I was adopted– my foster mom couldn’t have any children of her own and I fell into her lap thru circumstances. My father was able to father a son with another woman– but kept his distance from his son and his mother and stayed with us. Only now can I understand my father’s silence, and distance he kept from me. I was his and not his. His responsibility and heartache at the same time. In my late teens and twenties I hated my father– not for anything he DID but what he Didn’t Do. I hate that he left me alone. I hate that I didn’t learn anything about sports or cars or women. I hate that he would sometimes look at me like someone would throw matches at baby seals. A week before he died of asbestos related cancer, I sat with him in his hospital room a solid hour and fifteen minutes in total silence. I was twenty three and in spite of all those years he raised me and we’d spent together, he lay there a stranger to me and we had nothing to say to one another.
Only after he was gone did I begin to understand. My father was born in Texarkana, Texas as Oscar Cagney during the depression. He never knew or mentioned his father. His mother, Leola, remarried a man who had two sons– my father fought those other boys on the regular. They would make fun of his by his name, Oscar, by gargling saliva in the back of their throats and spitting into the Texas dirt. He decided to change his name to something less odd sounding, something more masculine and common. He chose James, though I never clearly understood when and if he was inspired by the movie star . Its possible: Cagney made The Public Enemy in 1931, a huge success. But it wouldnt be until 1941 that Cagney would begin making a series of movies that would catapult him into the upper echelon of fame. In my personal mythology, my dad chose it at random.
My father changed his name and ran away from home. By my father’s account, his mother was a cold woman– the only photo I ever saw revealed a woman with impossibly strong Native American and Black features and a woman for whom smiling would be an issue. A story he told a lot, after he married my foster mom, Juanita, when they were 15, 16 years old– they apparently ran out of money and went to see his mom, who told them ‘Get off my porch with your hungry belly,’ and shut the door.
My dad left home when he was 14– not finishing school– and lied about his age to enlist in the military. He met my mom when he was stationed in Bakersfield and they married in 1945. After the service, my dad worked for years alongside longshoremen in San Francisco as a forklift mechanic. It was in that job, helping to unload ships, that he contracted asbestos poisioning.
My parents never talked about my father’s other son, Sean– who is two years older than I am. Sean would visit from time to time, but it was so infrequent he obviously had another life, another family, another father. Perhaps. My father’s longtime best friend, James Lacey (Yes. Cagney & Lacey. I couldn’t make that up.) asked my dad on his deathbed if he wanted him to contact Sean, and my father said no. I have not seen or heard from Sean in more than 20 years. I know Sean went to the military, and even that I’m not totally certain.
My dad was quiet. Never taught me to drive. Never taught me to ride a bike. Never played. He kept to himself and the cars he’d kept lined in the driveway. He’d repair motors in his retirement for fun and money. My memories of him are sitting in the garage for long hours, or repairing a carbuerator on a mat of newspaper on the dining room table. He was a huge fan of the blues; John Lee Hooker and Lightnin Hopkins– Hopkins especially since they came from similar parts of Texas.
When my father died in about 1991– it was as if he took the contempt in my heart with him. After being inspired by an episode of Oprah, oddly enough– I lay on the floor of my bedroom and wrote him a letter of apology. I suddenly couldnt remember why I disliked him, why I wanted him to be responsible for all the choices I didn’t make. I wrote to him all I didn’t think to say when I sat with him in the hospital. It was mostly that I loved him. It felt as if his spirit stood over me and read and accepted it AS I WAS WRITING. I almost didn’t need to ‘deliver it’, clumsily, which I did when I finally went to the cemetery (I chose not to go to his funeral). I felt sorry for everything I didn’t do. I didn’t realize or think… I should have just asked. I should have wanted to share his life, instead of standing shyly at a distance as if he were an animal that may suddenly pounce. I remain sorry, even though I know the apology is old news. I dedicate today to my foster father and namesake James Cagney Sr.
I have no scanned photos of him. In the movie, I would either cast Gary Dourdan or Terrence Howard
According to family lore, my father’s cousin was musician Louis Jordan.
***
Thank you, Robert Hayden. This was the first poem I ever had to write an essay about in college. It perfectly illustrates my relationship to my dad.
Thank you, Carter G. Woodson- author, educator, journalist who, along with original gangsta Mary Church Terrell helped create and institute Black History Month.
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