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ELEV8 EXCLUSIVE

A few weeks back Elev8 posted a story that generated a great deal of buzz.  The story was called In New Book “Call Tyrone”, Pastor Advises Black Women To Stay Single.

Here exclusively on Elev8 you will read the first chapter that you cannot read anyplace else.

Pastor Jomo K. Johnson penned his new tome “Call Tyrone: Why Black Women Should Remain Single Or… “ in response to what he witnessed within his North Philadelphia flock. Make sure that you read Part 1 here.

Here is Part 2.

THE ETERNAL MOTHER

The survival of the African-American woman would come, in part, through motherhood. Despite being beaten and bullied, raped and ravished, subjected and enslaved, it would be through motherhood that the black woman could possess, in and for herself, something that belonged entirely to herself (even for a moment in time). Motherhood would become, in essence, the salvation of her soul, redeeming past recollections of position and prominence which once again could be portrayed through the progeny of her offspring. Motherhood was something that gave the black woman a sense of pride and responsibility. And although this institution was too embedded with the pain of children being sold on the auction blocks, the internal wrestling’s of infanticide, which many mothers opted for out of love for their child, and the willful acceptance of motherly servitude in contrast to attempts to escape their bondage with their husbands, the black woman’s love for her children was undeniable, uncontainable, and even eternal.

In her famous poem, The Slave Mother, Frances Harper, recalls a mother’s personal hell of being separated from her children as they were sold in the slave trade. She writes,

 Heard you that shriek? It rose

So wildly on the air,

It seemed as if a burden’d heart

Was breaking in despair.

Saw you those hands so sadly clasped–

The bowed and feeble head–

The shuddering of that fragile form–

That look of grief and dread?

Saw you the sad, imploring eye?

Its every glance was pain,

As if a storm of agony

Were sweeping through the brain.

She is a mother pale with fear,

Her boy clings to her side,

And in her kirtle vainly tries

His trembling form to hide.

He is not hers, although she bore

For him a mother’s pains;

He is not hers, although her blood

Is coursing through his veins!

He is not hers, for cruel hands

May rudely tear apart

The only wreath of household love

That binds her breaking heart…

 

She is a mother, and her heart

Is breaking in despair. 

           The last line of this wrenching poem is unmistakable. Yes, the woman is having her heart torn out – but still, she is a mother. Her son has been ripped away by cruel hands – but still, she is a mother. She desperately fears the moment her child will be taken away – but still, she is a mother. She can hear the shriek of fear coming from her baby – but still, she is a mother. The black woman will always be a mother. There is no whip, no slur, no theft, no rape, no bondage, and no pain that could ever deny this truth: still, she is a mother

Make sure that  you read Part I:  Call Tyrone: Why Black Women Should Remain Single Or..” [EXCERPT PART I]

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Check out the gallery below of some amazing women! Who did we miss?

“Call Tyrone: Why Black Women Should Remain Single Or…” [EXCERPT PART 2]  was originally published on elev8.hellobeautiful.com

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