(For Justin Hero Cassell) I heard a foolish man say the other day that everything of interest on the island of Montserrat can be seen in two days.  I kept my own counsel and did not talk of either his mother or his lineage.  But the truth is this, friend: It takes a week at […]

And so I left Montserrat, a place of brief and merciful funerals.  She does a good burial, Montserrat — the only place in the world where the barefoot gravedigger rules.  He gets to choose the hymns sung, judge the quality of the choir’s voices, and keeps up a running conversation as he joyfully sets about […]

Goat a dance Goat a cry Drum a sing Always slain but always new. Drum A Dance Edgar Nkosi White is a poet and playwright. | Print

In Montserrat where not even the Cusha free I saw a man and I watched him cry He had to sell his donkey just to buy an eye. You tell me why Tell me why? Edgar Nkosi A.M.D.G 1/18/11 Edgar Nkosi White is a writer and playwright.  He lives between New York, London, and his […]

Daughters are God’s irony on men.  Not His vengeance or His revenge on us, but surely His irony. Daughters, when they come, are never expected and seldom asked for, especially if she is a first child.  Always a surprise, usually more for the father than the mother, who, if she suspects at all, keeps it […]

(For MAAS BOB, father of the Trade Union.  And for Sam White who singlehandedly impregnated half of the women of Montserrat and so made beautiful cousins for me.  Bless you and may you find peace.) My time is sunrise, dawns and mornings clean before the wickedness comes in.  When I see the Montserrat sunrise I […]

Edgar White was born in Montserrat West Indies.  He has lived in the United States and England.  His plays have been successfully presented in New York, London, and Africa.  In the following autobiographical extract, he describes how his radical activities in the seventies led him to being sent down from Yale. for Cornel West It […]

(for Hafiz) The stillest fall of all is the fall from grace.  No louder than a feather falling in a forest, and yet we fall.  There are many ways to kill a man.  Gun and knife will work well but to make a man irrelevant will also do, and what better way to ignore an […]

If ever there was a time for gardens that time is now.  In this time of global meltdown and anxiety there can be no finer remedy than that of returning to the earth.  Gardening provides a hands-on therapy because it is one of the few remaining outlets for those of us who feel increasingly powerless […]