Authors: Jamaica Kincaid
Mr. Potter (11 page)
And here are the many interstices of Mr. Potter's heart: valleys of regret and hope and disappointment; mountains of regret and hope and disappointment; seas of longing; plains barren of vegetation and plains full of dust; shallow gutters of joy; deep crevices of sorrow; a sharp ledge of awe. So went the interstices of Mr. Potter's heart and all of this was a secret to him and so sometimes he sang with joy a song about a man running after a woman as she skipped through brambles and sugarcane fields unscathed and this woman would taunt her pursuer with sounds she created in the largest part of her throat, and Mr. Potter only sang a song about this, such a thing had never happened to him. And sometimes again he sang a hymn about the ending of the day, the ending of life itself, and the many secrets of God hidden in everything large and small, but he only sang the hymn with a determination
he did not allow himself to know, he kept the meaning of the hymn hidden from himself. And the interstices of Mr. Potter's heart resembled the surface of some familiar but not yet found planet, something so ordinary, something so rare.
he did not allow himself to know, he kept the meaning of the hymn hidden from himself. And the interstices of Mr. Potter's heart resembled the surface of some familiar but not yet found planet, something so ordinary, something so rare.
And I am now the central figure in Mr. Potter's life as he has been in mine without either of us knowing it. I have known from even a time before I knew my own self that the central figure in my life was my mother Annie Victoria Richardson, but she is not a central figure in Mr. Potter's life, in Mr. Potter's life she is only one of the many women who lived in a house that was really a room with four windows and two doors and was the mother of one of his many girl children, and she was my mother and my name was Elaine Cynthia Potter, a name she gave to me. From dry land, see the lights of a ship as it makes its way through the black waters that are the sea; from the ever fretful surface of the earth, look up and see the benign brightness that makes up the stars; from across Redcliff Street, I, then a child with my name Elaine Cynthia Potter, saw Mr. Potter, Roderick was his name, Drickie was the name people who loved him and knew him very well called him, and this man, Mr. Potter, Roderick, and Drickie, was my father. And that name, Potter, haunted me when I was a child, for I did not know any Potters, I knew of a village called Potters but I had never met anyone who came from
that place, and that name, Potter, was a part of my own name and yet I had never met the man whose name I bore. I saw him from across the street and from across the street I asked him for money to buy books that I needed for school, but I do not remember any of this, it is only that my mother has told me so and my mother's tongue and the words that flow from it cannot be relied upon, she is now dead. And who was I then, Potter or Richardson, for though my mother wove herself around me, wound me up in a cocoon of love and bitterness and anger and pain, and from this cocoon I shall never emerge, having metamorphosed into something new, something not yet heard of, something that might inspire desire and envy, entrapment and then death, through those unbreakable fibers I could feel Mr. Potter, the shadow of him, the real body of him, for he was my father and so he was in me, he was one of the elements in the emotional fibers that my mother had woven around me, but his presence was a shadow and that shadow had more substance than any real person I actually knew, and a real person was made up of blood and tissue and veins and arteries and organs and soft matter, but in my life Mr. Potter was a shadow, a shadow more important than any person I might know, a shadow more important than any apparition I would ever come to know. And then I became myself and Mr. Potter remained himself and the women who were the mothers of his many girl
children remained the same, hating him and speaking ill of him, and my own mother spoke ill of him, this man whom she called Potter sometimes and Drickie less often, and when I was in her presence, the ill way in which she spoke of him was not addressed to me, it was addressed to an invisible audience, and I grew used to hearing my mother speak ill of a man named Potter and Drickie, a man I did not know and had never met, and yet I had met him and did know him, for an entire half of me was made wholly of him.
that place, and that name, Potter, was a part of my own name and yet I had never met the man whose name I bore. I saw him from across the street and from across the street I asked him for money to buy books that I needed for school, but I do not remember any of this, it is only that my mother has told me so and my mother's tongue and the words that flow from it cannot be relied upon, she is now dead. And who was I then, Potter or Richardson, for though my mother wove herself around me, wound me up in a cocoon of love and bitterness and anger and pain, and from this cocoon I shall never emerge, having metamorphosed into something new, something not yet heard of, something that might inspire desire and envy, entrapment and then death, through those unbreakable fibers I could feel Mr. Potter, the shadow of him, the real body of him, for he was my father and so he was in me, he was one of the elements in the emotional fibers that my mother had woven around me, but his presence was a shadow and that shadow had more substance than any real person I actually knew, and a real person was made up of blood and tissue and veins and arteries and organs and soft matter, but in my life Mr. Potter was a shadow, a shadow more important than any person I might know, a shadow more important than any apparition I would ever come to know. And then I became myself and Mr. Potter remained himself and the women who were the mothers of his many girl
children remained the same, hating him and speaking ill of him, and my own mother spoke ill of him, this man whom she called Potter sometimes and Drickie less often, and when I was in her presence, the ill way in which she spoke of him was not addressed to me, it was addressed to an invisible audience, and I grew used to hearing my mother speak ill of a man named Potter and Drickie, a man I did not know and had never met, and yet I had met him and did know him, for an entire half of me was made wholly of him.
And Mr. Potter continued to wend his way into the world, how he continued to wend his way into the world, his world, his immediate and real world, not his world as a metaphor, and this world into which he continued to wend his way was shaped by men and other people and events, some deliberate and some accidental; for Mr. Shoul's displacement was deliberate but his presence in Mr. Potter's life was an accident, and the attempt to murder Dr. Weizenger was planned but Mr. Potter becoming his chauffeur was an accident. And while living within the maze of the accidental and the deliberate, Mr. Potter met and married a woman named Yvonne. And Yvonne had a child, a girl, and they, Yvonne and her girl child, lived with Mr. Potter in a house with many rooms and each room had more than one window and each window was made up of four pieces of glass pane and each window was framed with curtains and the curtains
were made of cotton on which had been printed the images of hibiscus in bloom and birds, just birds, in flight, all in colors and sizes that were not known in the natural world. And then Yvonne had another child, a boy this time, but Mr. Potter was not his father, Mr. Potter was not the father of this little boy, the father of this little boy was a fashionable undertaker in the city of St. John's, Antigua, and Mr. Potter loved his son, and the father of his son was someone who administered to the dead and Mr. Potter loved his son best of all his children and all his real children were girls and he was the father of all these many girls but he did not love them, he only loved his son whose real father was a fashionable and well-regarded undertaker. And Yvonne would place her children in a perambulator and parade them around the shady parts of town, taking a stroll with them along East Street when the flamboyant trees were full of flowers so full, as if flowers were all they would bear, and she would wheel her children around the botanical garden, stopping to rest (but she did not need a rest at all) at the rubber tree, a specimen of vegetable matter so far away from the place in which it had originated, as were the perambulator and the curtains and the panes of glass that made up her windows, and Mr. Shoul and Dr. Weizenger.
were made of cotton on which had been printed the images of hibiscus in bloom and birds, just birds, in flight, all in colors and sizes that were not known in the natural world. And then Yvonne had another child, a boy this time, but Mr. Potter was not his father, Mr. Potter was not the father of this little boy, the father of this little boy was a fashionable undertaker in the city of St. John's, Antigua, and Mr. Potter loved his son, and the father of his son was someone who administered to the dead and Mr. Potter loved his son best of all his children and all his real children were girls and he was the father of all these many girls but he did not love them, he only loved his son whose real father was a fashionable and well-regarded undertaker. And Yvonne would place her children in a perambulator and parade them around the shady parts of town, taking a stroll with them along East Street when the flamboyant trees were full of flowers so full, as if flowers were all they would bear, and she would wheel her children around the botanical garden, stopping to rest (but she did not need a rest at all) at the rubber tree, a specimen of vegetable matter so far away from the place in which it had originated, as were the perambulator and the curtains and the panes of glass that made up her windows, and Mr. Shoul and Dr. Weizenger.
Oh, to see a life, so small, so vulnerable at its beginning, so soft and sweet to touch and taste at its
beginning, so wingless yet in flight, so much a part of this world yet so unbeholden to it at its beginning. Oh, to see a human being new, freshly made, with all of life ahead, a stout bolt of carefully woven linen, with weft crossing warp in perfection, and this bolt of carefully woven linen is unsmudged and undirtied in any way, and as it unrolls, as it unfolds, yard after yard, it is filled with images that make up love and joy and contentment and all this to such a degree that even sorrow and disappointment and pain are only a form of this love and joy and contentment and how manageable and to be agreed on as the world in all its entirety would be if it was made up in just this way, a large bolt of clean cloth, unrolling and unrolling and each unrolling becoming filled up with images of love and so on and so on, until the bolt was finished, not cut into after many yards but just finished, and there was nothing left on the staff that had made up the foundation of a life, the life to be seen at its beginning. And there was Mr. Potter, my father, a certainty even then, lying deep within his own father Nathaniel and lying deep within his own mother, Elfrida Robinson, and I lying even deeper inside them. And from Nathaniel and Elfrida came Mr. Potter and then me, and the bolt of cloth continues to unfold and no one has made a cut in it and it has not yet come to an end, for even though Mr. Potter slammed the door in my face when I was sent by my mother to ask him for
a tablet of writing paper, I still managed to acquire the ability to read and the ability to write and in this way I make Mr. Potter and in this way I unmake Mr. Potter, and apart from the fact that he is now dead, he is unable to affect the portrait of him I am rendering here, the scenes on the bolt of cloth as he appears in them: the central figure.
beginning, so wingless yet in flight, so much a part of this world yet so unbeholden to it at its beginning. Oh, to see a human being new, freshly made, with all of life ahead, a stout bolt of carefully woven linen, with weft crossing warp in perfection, and this bolt of carefully woven linen is unsmudged and undirtied in any way, and as it unrolls, as it unfolds, yard after yard, it is filled with images that make up love and joy and contentment and all this to such a degree that even sorrow and disappointment and pain are only a form of this love and joy and contentment and how manageable and to be agreed on as the world in all its entirety would be if it was made up in just this way, a large bolt of clean cloth, unrolling and unrolling and each unrolling becoming filled up with images of love and so on and so on, until the bolt was finished, not cut into after many yards but just finished, and there was nothing left on the staff that had made up the foundation of a life, the life to be seen at its beginning. And there was Mr. Potter, my father, a certainty even then, lying deep within his own father Nathaniel and lying deep within his own mother, Elfrida Robinson, and I lying even deeper inside them. And from Nathaniel and Elfrida came Mr. Potter and then me, and the bolt of cloth continues to unfold and no one has made a cut in it and it has not yet come to an end, for even though Mr. Potter slammed the door in my face when I was sent by my mother to ask him for
a tablet of writing paper, I still managed to acquire the ability to read and the ability to write and in this way I make Mr. Potter and in this way I unmake Mr. Potter, and apart from the fact that he is now dead, he is unable to affect the portrait of him I am rendering here, the scenes on the bolt of cloth as he appears in them: the central figure.
And so in the middle of his life, for he was born in nineteen hundred and twenty-two and he died in nineteen hundred and ninety-two, Mr. Potter was the father of many girl children and the father of only one boy and that boy was not his, in truth, in actual fact, that boy's father was the second most important undertaker on the island of Antigua, and that little boy, whose name was Louis, and he was named after someone who had been a king, was fat and indolent and unpleasant; his real father was just the opposite of Mr. Potter, for Mr. Potter was not acquainted with the meal of worms or other parasites who lived beneath the earth. And Mr. Potter loved that little boy who was not his own and was not like him in any way, for this little boy was a boy so empty he was even empty of emptiness itself, and at the school he attended he kicked a ball and the ball missed its goal, and at the school he attended he was always last or near last in scholarly ranking and in a footrace he always lagged far behind everyone and he had an abundance of schoolbooks and tablets of writing paper packed securely
in a traditional schoolbag, and he had more than enough food to eat at home and his clothes always smelled freshly washed and his hair was cleaned and combed daily, and all that made up this boy's young life was wonderful and seemingly complete, so wonderful and seemingly complete that anyone observing it, and I am thinking of a particular anyone, me as a child, me as myself now looking at myself as a child, would only, could only, feel longing; longing for such a wonderful life, longing for such completeness, longing to completely belong and in such a wonderful way. Mr. Potter so loved his son and his son was named Louis and his son was not really of him, he was only a boy whose mother was Mr. Potter's wife, Yvonne was her real name, and Louis was born early in the night and the moon was full and that moon was so full of light and the light spilled out onto the sky and colored the clouds in such a way that they seemed like habitable islands, and that moon so overly filled with light made mysterious and magical all the landscapes over which it traveled, and that moon was full and full of light and then that moon grew smaller and smaller and its light grew weaker and weaker and so did Louis, as if the moon, which by happenstance was the moon in the sky on the night he was born, was his destiny. And Louis lived to be forty-five years old and did nothing that mattered, really, and then he died of a lung ailment or of a disease
of the intestinal tract, I do not know which exactly, and the moon under which he was born retreated and for Louis it remained so, never rising again and never waning again, and then, at forty-five years old, Louis died in Canada. And by the time Louis died, Mr. Potter had died also, and at the time Mr. Potter died he had no idea that Louis's death would so soon follow his own, and at the time of Mr. Potter's death Louis did not know that so soon after he too would be dead. And as I write of their living and dying and as I read what I have written about their living and dying, I do not know the end of my living and the beginning of my dying, for theyâliving and dyingâare both mixed up.
in a traditional schoolbag, and he had more than enough food to eat at home and his clothes always smelled freshly washed and his hair was cleaned and combed daily, and all that made up this boy's young life was wonderful and seemingly complete, so wonderful and seemingly complete that anyone observing it, and I am thinking of a particular anyone, me as a child, me as myself now looking at myself as a child, would only, could only, feel longing; longing for such a wonderful life, longing for such completeness, longing to completely belong and in such a wonderful way. Mr. Potter so loved his son and his son was named Louis and his son was not really of him, he was only a boy whose mother was Mr. Potter's wife, Yvonne was her real name, and Louis was born early in the night and the moon was full and that moon was so full of light and the light spilled out onto the sky and colored the clouds in such a way that they seemed like habitable islands, and that moon so overly filled with light made mysterious and magical all the landscapes over which it traveled, and that moon was full and full of light and then that moon grew smaller and smaller and its light grew weaker and weaker and so did Louis, as if the moon, which by happenstance was the moon in the sky on the night he was born, was his destiny. And Louis lived to be forty-five years old and did nothing that mattered, really, and then he died of a lung ailment or of a disease
of the intestinal tract, I do not know which exactly, and the moon under which he was born retreated and for Louis it remained so, never rising again and never waning again, and then, at forty-five years old, Louis died in Canada. And by the time Louis died, Mr. Potter had died also, and at the time Mr. Potter died he had no idea that Louis's death would so soon follow his own, and at the time of Mr. Potter's death Louis did not know that so soon after he too would be dead. And as I write of their living and dying and as I read what I have written about their living and dying, I do not know the end of my living and the beginning of my dying, for theyâliving and dyingâare both mixed up.
And Mr. Potter did not have a uterus that shuddered in agony, for he was a man, and he did not have a menstrual cycle, for he was man, and he did not have ovaries that when discharging an egg which had not been fertilized caused him to feel pain in the area below his waist and above his pelvis, for Mr. Potter was a man and not a woman. Mr. Potter was a man and he was my father and I never knew him at all, had never touched him, or known how he smelled after a night of sleep or after a full day's work, or the smell of his breath after eating a special kind of food, or the look of him after he had an ordinary experience that related to touching or smelling or seeing or hearing. I have only a vague memory of him ignoring me as I
passed him by in the street, of him slamming a door in my face when I was sent to ask him for money I needed to purchase my writing paper, and the full knowledge of the line drawn through me which I inherited from him, and this line drawn through me binds me to him even as it was very much meant to show that I did not belong to him, that I belonged to no one male, that I did not have a father, that no one had fathered me, and that I was female and came from the female line and belonged to my mother and to my mother only.
passed him by in the street, of him slamming a door in my face when I was sent to ask him for money I needed to purchase my writing paper, and the full knowledge of the line drawn through me which I inherited from him, and this line drawn through me binds me to him even as it was very much meant to show that I did not belong to him, that I belonged to no one male, that I did not have a father, that no one had fathered me, and that I was female and came from the female line and belonged to my mother and to my mother only.
And Mr. Potter did not move toward his end swiftly and inexorably, oh no, not at all, not in that way at all. Mr. Potter moved toward his end in an unhurried way, driving one of the three cars he eventually came to own through the streets of the city of St. John's, leaving the streets of the city of St. John's and driving a passenger who had just disembarked from an airplane or a large ship out toward the village of Emanuel and then going through Jennings and Liberta and Falmouth and Swetes and Freetown and Newfield and Bethesda and Old Road and Urlings and John Hughes and Parham and up to Barnes Hill and Cedar Grove and Table Hill Gordon and then home to All Saints Road where he lived in a house with his wife Yvonne and Louis, who was not really his son, and another child who did not count at all for she was a girl child and he had so many of those. For after
my mother had left him, taking with her me, seven months in her stomach, and all of Mr. Potter's savings which he had kept in a crocus bag tucked under the mattress of their bed, he had started all over again at Mr. Shoul's garage, and after that incident, after my mother left him and stole all that was valuable to him, his money, especially his money, which was his future, he went to his work at Mr. Shoul's as if it was his first day, as if he had never done it before, as if it was new to him, and he worked and worked and saved his money and then bought a car of his own and with the profits from that bought another car and hired a driver and with the profits from that bought another car and hired another driver, and not once did he imagine that he was imitating Mr. Shoul, not once did Mr. Shoul's life enter his imagination, for Mr. Potter did in a vague way know that Mr. Shoul did not make the world turn, the world had turned and Mr. Shoul became dislodged from his place in it, the road to Damascus, and the Lebanon and Palestine and date trees and olive groves and so much strangeness, so Mr. Potter thought, so much strangeness.
my mother had left him, taking with her me, seven months in her stomach, and all of Mr. Potter's savings which he had kept in a crocus bag tucked under the mattress of their bed, he had started all over again at Mr. Shoul's garage, and after that incident, after my mother left him and stole all that was valuable to him, his money, especially his money, which was his future, he went to his work at Mr. Shoul's as if it was his first day, as if he had never done it before, as if it was new to him, and he worked and worked and saved his money and then bought a car of his own and with the profits from that bought another car and hired a driver and with the profits from that bought another car and hired another driver, and not once did he imagine that he was imitating Mr. Shoul, not once did Mr. Shoul's life enter his imagination, for Mr. Potter did in a vague way know that Mr. Shoul did not make the world turn, the world had turned and Mr. Shoul became dislodged from his place in it, the road to Damascus, and the Lebanon and Palestine and date trees and olive groves and so much strangeness, so Mr. Potter thought, so much strangeness.
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