NYU Black Renaissance Noire Spring/Summer 2014 | Page 18

16 By KWAME DAWES MAN Clean-headed men, men who sit in that easy sprawl of ownership; loose pants, bundled fabric around the balls, jockeys so you see the print of their dicks that have walked through so many thick-grassed fields chopping as if that is all a dick is made to do; men who have ritualized the sipping of brown liquor; men who’ve turned fool from chasing after fresh pussy; men full of stories about being drunk, about how they pissed themselves on the spot; men who know the value of a woman who lays out his starched drill pants and softly laundered cotton shirts; men who slap Old Spice on their faces after a smooth shave; men who shake their heads and say “You don’t know nothing about what I’ve seen, what I’ve done, what I’ve been through…”; men who know that they are always doing better than their sons-of-bitches fathers who were bums, who drowned drunk in Mississippi, who gave them nothing but a fat thigh and a big nose, and that hint of evil and shine in the hair; men not scared of death but scared of dying; men with arms still stone hard, fists black-knuckled with scars, men who will take you out if you try; men who know where their pistol lies at all times; these men, in their fedoras, their polished shoes, the Florsheims, burnished with patience—the layers of Kiwi, the soft wet cloth, the waterproofing blackening, the whip of a dry rag, the smiling gleaming of the toe, the smooth manliness of the sides, the quick dab of black over the scuffs; their Oxford socks, their gold chain, their Lucky Stripes, their clicking lighter, their allowance, their twenty-in-the-walletand-a-five-in-the-shoe; their permission to be hard, cold, tough, to be just men alone, sitting on the stoop talking trash and feeling good. These are the men we are talking about. These are the men we learn to loathe, these are the men whose sins are legion, these are the men who kneel at the altar, these are the men who count the collection, these are the men who guard the Lord, these are the Deacon men, lately saved, these fathers of many, these silent keepers of secrets: these are the men we praise.