Trigger Warnings: discussion of racial harassment, non-consensual touching, public humiliation, emotional abuse, disorientation, existential distress and multiple mentions of death. Please stop reading if you think it may affect you. Take care of yourself.
A Memory
I was probably 3.
I was the teacher’s pet already, I could read stuff before I could babble.
I remember sitting in a circle, and the teacher looked at me, smiling, saying: she will be the one.
I remember feeling special.
I was the chosen one.
I was selected to enact the role of Mother Mary.
It was a rare moment.
Just a little detail I revisit now.
You are the only person of color in a room.
For most of your lifetime, you are the only colored one1
I am not Mother Mary.
I become THE.
THE Black Mary.
It was the highlight of the year in town. Age 3.
A theatre turns reality.
You never come out of it.
I don’t remember much of the recital, just that I was standing close to Jesus.
Jesus was an Argentinian kid named Diego.
The purple dress was stressing me so much.
me, an incredibly shy kid that does not speak to people,
(long long before the term neurodivergent and autistic was known and acceptable and popularized and self-diagnosed through and among Gen Z)
standing in front of a full crowd.
The only button at the back of the long purple dress fell, before or during, I don’t know how and why it happened, and I was just stressing about the fucking button. The whole time. White, round, a material unknown to me. Where did it go? Maybe it’s stuck inside the dress. Hanging somewhere, just about to fall. I should tell my teacher. Is it on the floor? I can’t see it. The whole time. The fucking button was my only thought.
I was naked. I felt naked. Uncomfortable.
There are no pictures of this.
Black Mary was not witnessed fully.
I had denied my parents to come see me; I was embarrassed.
I mean, I couldn’t imagine a big crowd back then.
My mother showed up anyway, and I was annoyed.
Like really.
A mother’s pain is understood by another mother.
But now always.
I am not a mother.
Not every mother is a mother.
The spectacle starts.
For the audience, the spectacle has a defined start and ending.
The spectacle starts long before I could learn to talk properly.
The spectacle goes back in time.
it still goes on.
for many of us.
there are no pictures of this.
I mean, I don’t. My parents didn’t have a camera.
the queue of mothers waiting
for a picture with Black Mary -
endless.
You come close and before I can move away, you have already touched me.
my hair stays intact
even when I die
Your fingers entrenched deeply in my nest of hair. That’s what you say.
You ask if if it’s fake.
Is it real?
How come is it so long?
It’s different, straw-like.
consent does not rhyme with joke.
Laughter.
How many of you touched me?
The number of laughter is countless.
A laughter that contradicts Mother Mary’s existential pain.
The flesh, ripped open.
A laughter I can hear when I am silent.
When I am silenced.
When I speak up.
a laughter. stuck in my throat. a laughter. stuck in my throat. a laughter. stuck in my throat. a laughter. stuck in my throat.
Black Mary.
I become a wonder.
An attraction people come to see.
There is yet no suggestion that I am human.
I simply become a living wonder.
Mother Mary is holy.
I am just a kid.
A poor kid.
Among the rich ones.
Eternally outperforming the rest.
Magna cum laude
Summa cum laude
Si laude Si laude Si laude
Maria
Please pray for me too
Black Mary,
the kid.
always the first of your class and
the last to be chosen at gym hour.
I simply become a living wonder.
I have to.
Black Mary.
The kid.
The kid becomes a teenager and now we are on a class trip, outside in nature.
This time, we are not sitting, but standing in a circle.
A return
Repetition
Unlearning would be the real miracle.
We are close to a waterfall.
water
falls.
The tears I hold do not come out.
Not until two decades later.
Mother Mary is still crying.
We play a game.
One closes the eyes and another talks.
Now, find out who this is by their voice.
The newest kid in my classroom is not given time to learn the names.
He stays in the red building, where families drop kids in case of hardship.
It’s a taboo, and when so, nobody speaks out loud.
poverty is only whispered.
poverty is a little cell.
shame is the thick double-membrane enclosing the nucleus.
existential holes in my pocket
Now.
Black Mary is stripped of holiness
I spoke out loud.
An embarrassing silence is what follows.
“I don’t know her name; it’s… just la nera.”
Laughter.
Ahah
Ahahahah
AHAHAHAH
AHAHAHAHAH
The laughter of my schoolmates echoes through the mountains.
It was a sunny day. It was supposed to be pleasant.
The two teachers were laughing too.
My favorite teachers.
They look at me in the eyes and have a good laugh.
Mother Mary standing up right to the Cross.
The kid is crouched in spasms on the floor,
in pain. The soul,
a seizure of agony,
mixed with shame
and the void
of a voice echoing
through the hills.
my voice? a laughter. stuck in my throat.
They witness me standing still.
But I am not.
Not really.
I died that day. A little.
I died many times right after.
And also before.
Black Mary lives on.
I die many deaths.
Every cell in my body carries shame,
imprinted on my DNA
A miracle.
The chosen one.
I am a living wonder.
THE Black Mary.
Now.
Just Black Mary.
Just black
Just
…
Mary, stripped of her dignity.
Her right to exist in peace denied.
The Flesh. ripped.
Tears of blood are not enough.
Giggles become swords
plunging into the heart.
Sacred Mount echoes the laughter of death.
Standing up right to the Cross
Mother Mary
the grief, abiding
Black Mary,
the kid
can cry now
PS: all characters in this story are not fictional.
This is my story.
Do not take offense at my mention of Mother Mary.
I hold her with reverence in my heart.
I do not seek to embody or replace her.
This is creative nonfiction, rooted in lived experience. A form of literary art.
Thank you for reading.
“I feel most colored when I am thrown against a sharp white background” Zora Neale Hurston
la nera: THE black one
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I have walked away from conventional pathways to pursue a full-time writing life. It comes with uncertainty, but also a deep sense of alignment. As a migrant, queer person of color, this asks for a different kind of resilience. If you have the means and feel something through my words, consider supporting me by leaving a tip. Even a small gesture means a lot.
You’re an amazing writer Nimila, this poem is vulnerable and beautiful in the fact it’s a story of you and experiences that had a part in shaping you, I’m so sorry you’ve dealt with so much hurt.
black Maria,
oh, black sheep -
they can’t tame you
they can’t even tell
you’re hurting
shunken
sunken
salty
tears
they can’t even tell it -
but you’re almost not here
dark Maria.