Kizzy Ann Stamps Read Online Free PDF Page A

you find a game and there you go. James used to play on a team, but he’s decided he wants to work on just football and basketball, the two sports he likes better.
    We actually watched a game by your school the other night — what do you think of that? I looked at the school and I got shivers, I tell you. I know some kids been trying to go to your school for years — parents can request for a black kid to go to a white school, but it has to get approved. And somehow or other, it just never gets approved. Like the paperwork didn’t get turned in early enough. The next year, it’ll be that the paperwork got turned in too early. The next year, it’ll be that the signatures are on the wrong line. The next year, it’ll be that the wrong person signed the paperwork or it got turned in to the wrong person. Mostly folks just quit trying. I’ve seen some families try for seven kids, and they never get one kid in that school! But they keep trying — that’s how bad they want for one of their kids to go to your school. That’s how much better they think your school is, compared to the black school.
    And now we get to come. But I’m still shivering. Even if you are nice.

    Thank you for your nice letter to my folks. You were the talk of church this week, everybody showing around their letters to parents (and Mama is pleased as punch that you called me a budding writer in your letter to her). I especially liked that you included a special note for me. Unless I’m wrong, it looks as if I’m the only one who wrote to you as Mrs. Warren commanded. That must be funny to you, as I said we all listen to her — that I’m the troublemaker — and then I’m the only one who does as told. But I think they all meant to. They just felt afraid when they put that pencil anywhere near paper. I hope you won’t think poorly of my classmates. They really do try hard for a teacher.
    (Thanks for the word about the one stall out of three in each bathroom set aside for the black kids — that’s more than fine — we only had a one-seat outhouse for all of us to share, so this is a step up in the world for us! But maybe don’t spread that around, okay?)
    I had no idea it would make Mama happy to think of me writing words down. It seems she has always taken a shine to writers! After your letter came, Mama had me help her shell peas for dinner and told me how she used to go listen to Miss Anne Spencer read some of her poetry sometimes when she had a break at her maid work with Mrs. Patsy Westover. Mama said, “You know, Miss Anne is a published poet, and she has famous men like Langston Hughes and W. E. B. DuBois at her house. You could grow up and write like her.” I asked Mama to tell me more about Miss Anne Spencer and her poetry. I kept my head down, looking at those beans piling up in my bowl, the round of discarded shells growing at my feet. But Mrs. Patsy didn’t like Mama going to hear Miss Anne on her breaks — not that I can see why, because it wasn’t like Mama was reciting poetry when she came back — but when Mrs. Patsy doesn’t like things, that means it has to stop. Mama had no more to say. She just looked at me and nodded, then said, “You could write like Miss Anne Spencer, Moon Child.”
    I don’t know why, but poetry is one kind of writing that I’m not real interested in. . . . Poetry’s like a secret that I don’t understand the meaning of. But I didn’t tell Mama that. I just shrugged. It seems like a good answer, to shrug, when I know I don’t want to say yes to what my mama wants me to do. I gathered up my bowl of peas and slipped past the screen door into the house.
    You might be thinking my mama shouldn’t have to maid for a white lady when we have a farm, and I wish you were right, but our farm doesn’t make enough money every year. My mama is a maid, and my granny does ironing for folks and some sewing for folks, and we all help on the farm. It works out.
    James was sitting at the kitchen table,