White like the North
and the cold places on the earth
my great grandfather was fond of
overproof rum and
caribbean sailor blue waves

His Nigerian goddess bore him
nine children
pretty little barefoot toffee skinned children
scampering through sugarcane fields
and tall tropical grasses
the lilting sound of their voices
playing on balmy breezes

My Aunt Glo remembers him well
strolling about with his switch and
stiff upper English lip
he governed the immense rural
Jamaican plantation in St. Elizabeth
around the end of the nineteeth century

Everyone called him Pupa and his
wife Muma

I don't know much about Muma
except that her mother was an
enslaved person and that she
had to tolerate the insult of ritually
hiding her mixed children when
Pupa's mother, Lady Bush
flounced into town with her entourage

There is an old photograph of
the two of them:

Muma in white frock seated,
her eyes drooping brown sparrows
Pupa with his switch, pocket watch
and far away eyes