ya know what i'd love to see? i loved to see me some lavender. you got any lavender? or even pink - pink'll do.
ah, winter in ohio is especially rough if you've got an appetite for color.
oh, that's fine. fine.
they'll be all right. i'm surprised they lasted here this long.
what'd be the point? not a house in the country ain't packed to the rafters with some dead negro's grief. we lucky our ghost is a baby. my husband spirit come back? or yours? don't talk to me! ha. you lucky. you got one child left, still pullin at your skirts. be thankful. i had eight. eight with six fathers. every one of them gone from me. four taken, four chased and all, i expect, worrying somebody's house into evil. my first born - alls i can remember of her now is how she loved the burned bottom of bread. her little hands. i wouldn't know'em if they slapped me. can you beat that? eight children and that's all i remember.
oh, i remember bits and pieces of all of'em i guess. halle, of course. i had halle a lifetime. almost twenty years.  my two girls, sold and gone before i could even a heard about it, and them without their grown up teeth yet. my third child, my son after halle. i let that straw boss have me for four months so's i could keep that boy. next year, he had him traded for lumber anyway and me pregnant with his child. i couldn't love that child. i wouldn't. not any of the rest either. god take what he would. and he did.
those boys didn't even know him. you had six whole years of marriage to my halle fathered every one of your children. a blessing. i learned hard that a man's just a man, but a son like that. like halle. now that's somebody.
i'm not here to tell you all to clean up your lives and sin no more. i'm not here to tell you we're the blessed meek and are glorybound!. i'm here to tell you that the only grace we can have, is the grace we can imagine. and if you cannot see it, then you shall not have it.
god lead you home.  so now, lay'em down, child. sword and shield. don't study war no more. lay all that mess down. sword and shield.
oh my lord. my sweet lord thank you.
where's halle?
well, he be along presently, i'm sure.
not now. you too ugly looking to wake 'em up in the night. first we get you well.
you feel this?
nothing.
girl.
already crawling - ain't that somethin? . come on, baby girl. right this way. mama's waiting.
all right boys - mama's home now, you be seeing her all the time. go downstairs and get your supper. go on.
nothing worth saving here.
be nice if there was a groom to go with it. what do you think happened to him?
well put these on - maybe they'll light his way.
whatever happens now. god lead you home. so now lay'em down sethe. sword and shield. don't study war no more. lay all that mess down. sword and shield.
let the children come!
let your mother's hear you laugh!!
let the grown men come!!
now. you women. i want you to cry. for the living. for the dead. just cry.
what a sight you are, stamp.
it'll sickify her stomach. now go wash up round back. crazy fool.
he's a good one, no doubt of that. i can get three, maybe four pies out of this. seems a shame just for us though. i'm gonna invite ella and john over.
i beg you pardon. i beg your pardon.
excuse me. but the child needs nursin. needs the mother's milk.
one at a time!. and you gotta clean yourself up!
i beg your pardon. lord, i beg your pardon. i sure do.
all i remember is how she loved the bottom of burned bread. her little hands. i wouldn't know 'em if they slapped me".
folks come. folks go.
i got a delivery around here. name of tucker.
well what?
if i call them, and they come what on earth am i going to say to them.
that's the last thing they took from me.
what i have to do is get in my bed and lay down. i want to fix on something harmless in this world.
blue. that doesn't hurt nobody. yellow neither.
i likes yellow.
can't say. it's something can't be planned.
no, stamp. i ain't.
those white things have taken all i had or dreamed. i'm saying ain't no bad luck in this world 'cept for white folks. they just don't know when to stop.
i'm saying they came into my yard.
i'm saying they came into my yard.
not like he punished me.
was a time i knew what was.
what i know is what i see: a nigger woman hauling shoes.
no. i'm looking for what i was put here to look for: the back door.
you mean i never told you about your daddy? about the bodwins who let me rent this here house while i do my shoe repairing? about your mother's feet, not to mention her back? i never told you all that?
is that why you can't walk down the steps and out yonder by yourself?
why you never go back to lady jone's and learn your letters? you liked going there i remember. seeing the other children. then all a sudden, you stop.
my jesus my. what people won't say. why didn't you come and ask me? 'fraid i'll tell ya, huh? come here, child.
you got to go sometime. you got to go out there by yourself sometime.
there ain't.
know it, and go on out the yard. go on.
the only grace we can have, is the grace we can imagine. if you cannot see it, you will not have it. here, in this place, we are flesh. flesh that weeps, laughs, dances on bare feet in the grass. love it. love it hard. yonder they do not love your flesh. they despise it. they flay it. o, my people, they do not love your hands. those they only use, tie, bind, chop off and leave empty, love your hands. love them. raise them up and kiss them. touch others with them, put them together, stroke them on your face 'cause they don't love that either. you got to love it. you. yonder out there, they ain't in love with your moth. they will see it broken and break it again. what you say out of it, they will not heed. what you scream from it they do not hear. no, they don't love your mother. you got to love it. and the feet that need to rest and to dance. the backs that needs support. the shoulders that need arms, strong arms i'm telling you! o my people, out yonder they don't love your neck unnoosed and straight. so love your neck; put a hand on it, grace it, stroke it and hold it up. love all your inside parts, love 'em. and the beating heart, love that too. more than eyes or feet. more than lungs that have yet to draw free air, love your heart. for this is the prize.