Much has been written in the past few days, both electronically and with ink, about the horror and the tears that is Haiti now.
But Haiti has known horror and tears and tragedy for much too long.
That horror and those tears have been amply recorded for at least the past 50 years “in a remarkably vivid and sophisticated Haitian literature [that] has been flowing out of Creole, an ever-evolving language as fecund as the English of Shakespeare’s time.” This, according to Madison Smart Bell in “A Sampler” of such literature published by the New York Times over the weekend.
Several of the literary gems, not surprisingly, speak of “Death,” “Gloom,” and “Misery.”
However, as Bell points out, “The Haitian world is not all suffering; it is full of treasure,” and some of the pieces titled as “Life,” “Song,” “Longevity,” and “Grace” certainly reflect this.
My favorite, “Tenacity,” by Edwidge Danticat, from her essay, “We Are Ugly, But We Are Here” (The Caribbean Writer, Volume 10, 1996):
There is a Haitian saying which might upset the aesthetic images of most women. Nou led, Nou la, it says. We are ugly, but we are here. Like the modesty that is somewhat common in Haitian culture, this saying makes a deeper claim for poor Haitian women than maintaining beauty, be it skin deep or otherwise. For most of us, what is worth celebrating is the fact that we are here, that we against all the odds exist. To the women who might greet each other with this saying when they meet along the countryside, the very essence of life lies in survival. It is always worth reminding our sisters that we have lived yet another day to answer the roll call of an often painful and very difficult life.
I am sure you will find your favorite ones, too, at “Haiti in Ink and Tears.”
The author is a retired U.S. Air Force officer and a writer.