by David Ambrose Jackson

They were all in various stages of transition, or merely emulating the illusion of womanhood to make a living, glittering eyes sizing up all the men that slowed to whisper in their ear. What happened to them? I write to call their names. The same way we say Breonna, Sandra Bland, George Floyd, Trayvon, Botham Jean, Dante Wright, Nizah Morris.

Writing is a place for healing, for revisiting sites of joy and pain. When asked how my characters come into being, it seems to me that many times, they are already here, walking beside me, living inside my mind, waiting to be given the spotlight. The skeletons are there, only needing me to be silent and listen as they tell me what they look like, how blue-black, mocha-brown, café-au-lait, red-of-bone they are. How deep, mellifluous, braying, lilting they sound. How kinky or smooth, short or long, calm or tumultuous is their hair. How ‘gay’, non-binary, differently abled, trans, hearing-impaired, dependent, or autonomous they are.

I write from a space of memory. The burn of my father’s beard against my twelve-year-old face as he hugged me and my brother so tight, I thought I’d surely break. The scent of alcohol wafting in the air along with his drunken cries. The scent of my first boyfriend’s hair, earthy and elemental, like freshly dug dirt. The perfection of my second boyfriend’s hands, broad, dark, and elegant, with perfectly mooned cuticles. The way the post-coital, early morning damp of his armpit always smelled slightly of garlic, reminding me of Puerto Rico. Walking smelling a particular scent can transport us straight back to a moment in time that we long forgot, flood us with the memory of sitting in the heat of our grandmother’s kitchen surrounded by freshly baked apple dumplings. Then, in a flash, that memory is replaced by another. Memory can be a powerful thing, but it is as gossamer as a ghost.

I write in celebration. Memory is intangible, fleeting. Writing is a fight to illuminate what racism, capitalism, homophobia, ableism tries if not to erase, ignore. Writing reminds us of the collective truths we sometimes forget. Yes, we all know we were once kings, queens but, just like the characters I write, we often forget that we still are. Those of us struggling to find our purpose or identity, fighting mental health and micro-aggressions, are trampled under the crushing weight of this brutal system. My books give honor to the people that helped us make sense of our world. They give honor to the ancestors, reminding us that even though we don’t see them, they are with us, embedded in our blood and our DNA. I transform the marginal into powerful stories of resilience, to remind myself (and you, dear reader) of our strength, our beauty, and how we create mythic identity.

What happened to to our people of old, when me, my cousin, and my best friend were barely nineteen, getting into the long-gone clubs and bars of Philadelphia? Not those white spaces where they carded you, where people that looked like us weren’t valued or seen. No: the places where brown bodies ruled, where the luster and lure of our youth glowed like the sun under brilliant strobing light. The Catacombs, Second Story, The Olympia Ballroom, The Smart Place, Allegro II (was there ever an Allegro I?). Even the bus station on thirteenth where we quickly dashed to the toilets to make sure our hair was of sufficient volume to get us past the man on the door at WILD CHERRY. 

It was like sex, all night long, and was where we saw the nighttime beauties. Bianca, Coco, Mikelle, all of them luminous they shone brighter than the strobe lights. They were all in various stages of transition, or merely emulating the illusion of womanhood to make a living, glittering eyes sizing up all the men that slowed to whisper in their ear. Clutched together in darkened corners like swans riding a current, they bobbed their heads toward the matte black double doors of the infamous ‘snake pit’, where primal groans and the scent of spunk unfurled like a viper. I write to call their names. The same way we say Breonna, Sandra Bland, George Floyd, Trayvon, Botham Jean, Dante Wright, Nizah Morris. There are many whose names we did not know. Many people you did not know, like Ernie Cat, Ronnie Ross, Bobby Hunter, Chocolate, the Diva, Alfie . . .

This summer marks the release of Beyoncé’s seventh solo album, Renaissance. The liner notes claim the work to be a “safe place … without judgement … to be free of perfectionism and overthinking.” Renaissance honors the powerful musical legacy of Black, Latinx, and Queer creatives, harking back to dance, house, and soul music before it was gentrified by the whites. She dedicates the work to the memory of her beloved uncle, whose life—like thousands of other people deemed too insignificant for the government’s research dollars—was tragically cut short by AIDS. 

She calls upon the glorious voices of the female powerhouses that defined an era for people in the shadows of the Nixon years through to the devastation wrought on the Black and the poor by Reaganomics. She brings onboard Grace Jones, Sheila E, Teena Marie, Lidell Townsell, Robin S., Kevin Aviance, Moi Renee, and the many architects of Black and Latinx creativity. It is also a reaching through time to the ancestors, to African rhythms, to the millions whose names are not known and may never be. To ancient tribes, griots, and witch doctors. Like Bey’s, my work is an ode: an acknowledgement of those who came before me and who have, in ways both visible and invisible, shaped the way I see and move through our world. No one, no one, is as resilient, as resourceful, as our people. We hold one another up, and it doesn’t always show in ways that can be seen by the white gaze, because it is for us, by us.

You can see it in my debut novel, State of the Nation, in which the names of the children killed in the Atlanta Child Murders serve as chapter headings. The reader calls the names of the dead, raising them from the dead if only for a moment, as the specter of those deaths haunts three teens trying to survive amidst the peril posed to Black bodies by this country. You can see it in my sophomore novel, A Blind Eye, in which Black citizens gather at card games and braid hair on living room floors as they scoff at media-created mythology of the so-called Welfare Queen. In my latest, Unlawful DISorder, Magdelene protects her mentally ill son, Bowie, the only way there is: she bravely battles through her own generational trauma, not giving a damn how white bureaucrats, probation officers, or treatment teams perceive her.  

I guess, in a way, it all comes down to this: I write to honor the power and the fierceness of the feminine. My Black women and femmes are strong and singular, flawed, yes, and more memorable because of it. The feminine is an elemental aspect in all of us, male or female, pressed into our psyche by the hugs of a mother, the kiss of a grandmother, and the scolding of an auntie, whether by blood or community. My writing a desperate attempt to hold on to the ferocious spirit of my mother. Because while no one can bolster the spirit like the bombastic bass of the Black father, no one is able to transform the traumatic into a thing of beauty like a Black woman. Paying tribute can’t bring back the past, or revive the missing, but it illuminates the beauty of our complete humanity, flaws and all.

by David Jackson Ambrose

DAVID JACKSON AMBROSE has an MFA in Creative Writing from Temple University, an MA in Writing Studies from Saint Joseph’s University, and a BA in Africana Studies from The University of Pennsylvania. His debut novel, State of the Nation, was a 2018 Lambda Literary Award finalist in the Gay Fiction category. His second novel, A Blind Eye (NineStar Press) was named by Lambda Literary as one of April 2021’s most anticipated books. He has over twenty years’ experience working in social services.