Brenda
I was standing in an air-conditioned, wall-papered office,
With a fish swimming in a water-rooted plant's pot,
Talking with Brenda Henson.
(If you don't know who she is, look up Camp Sister Spirit, in Ovett, Mississippi.)
She's a wise woman, full of advice that may help my own dreams come true,
And she was sharing some of her experience with me that day.
She told me of how she wants a video library full of basic health information,
Because pamphlets are useless to the women who come to her-- 40% of Mississippi's women can't read.
Brenda told me, of a woman who had come to her for a shirt to wear,
And how Brenda asked her how she was doing on food.
The woman assured her, "We're okay; we don't need anything; we have enough for tonight."
Enough for tonight.
And Brenda's eyes filled with tears, then and then.
She asked what "enough for tonight" meant, really.
And the woman told her, that she had some cheese left over,
And a little bread,
And she and her children would eat that tonight, and be all right.
Tomorrow was . . . well, tomorrow.
But tomorrow the bread and the cheese would be gone.
This woman, though, was accustomed to that, by now.
She didn't want to ask for too much, after all,
And they did indeed have "enough for tonight."
Tonight, as last night, one in five children in Mississippi will go to bed hungry.
How many of the other four will watch Mama put together the bread and the cheese,
And pray over it with them, and be thankful that they have enough for tonight?
Brenda Henson sent that woman home with a bit more food.
But then, Brenda Henson and her family amaze me.
Each of them deserves a poem, a medal, a paragraph in the history book of saints.
Each of them would trade any of the above, if an illiterate woman could read the poem or the paragraph,
If they could take the D's from their medals and make of them meals.
Let me bring to the north, a bit of the courage, the tenacity, the patience,
That Brenda and Wanda Henson have brought to the south.
Let me have the courage of Wanda, who challenged the sherriff,
Of their daughter Andy, who challenged the state.
Let me have the tenacity of their daughter Teri,
Who kept cooking even after the men came and killed her puppy.
Most of all, give me the patience of Brenda,
Who smiles through her tears as she shares her wisdom,
Whose love swells to envelop the universe,
Within whose arms any woman can feel herself loved beyond measure,
Whose hands clothe the cold, feed the hungry,
And point the way to self-love and sufficiency,
To those whose purple flesh has never been called beautiful before.
Teachers, nurses, more than that . . .
Brenda, the teenage bride who left her own purple places behind a lifetime ago,
The mother who raised daughters full of fire and ability,
The lover who supports her partner when, yet again,
Wanda's said "Yes, of course" before she's answered, "How in the hell?"
The midwife to a place, a spirit, a legacy of something different.
Brenda's words bring excitement, certainty of capability, enthusiasm.
Those who feel the touch of her hands feel the change in the soul.
"I'm glad I met her"--from any spirit that has ever truly interacted with her.
What more could I ever ask,
Than to make as much a difference?
Tuesday, May 2, 2000 11:13:56
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Return to the Front Door.
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