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UMI Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Reproduced with with permission permission of the of copyright the copyright owner. owner.Further reproductionFurther reproduction prohibited without prohibited permission. without permission. RIVER WOMEN by Donna Hemans submitted to the Faculty of the College of Arts and Science of American University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Masters of Fine Arts in Creative Writing Chair: Richard McCann Mvfa Sklarew Kermit Mover Dean of the College Date 1999 American University Washington, D.C. 20016 %\% Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. UMI Number: 1395939 Copyright 1999 by Hemans, Donna Anne All rights reserved. UMI Microform 1395939 Copyright 1999, by UMI Company. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. UMI 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, MI 48103 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. © COPYRIGHT by DONNA HEMANS 1999 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. RIVER WOMEN BY DONNA HEMANS ABSTRACT Weeks before Kelithe is set to depart for New York to reunite with her mother, her son, Timothy, drowns. The drowning ignites the forgotten town, Standfast, whose residents accuse Kelithe of watching her son drown so she could fulfil her desire to leave for America. After 15 years of absence, Kelithe’s mother returns and struggles to determine whether or not the daughter she doesn’t really know could be guilty of such a crime. While Kelithe tries to come to terms with her mother’s long absence, love, the town that is ganging up against her, the limitations o f life in Standfast, and her future, her mother strives to come to terms with her own desire to remain unencumbered by a needy daughter, as well as her need to belong to her hometown. Standfast, long cut off" from the remainder of Jamaica, uses the drowning to launch a political fight. ii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I could not have written this book without the assistance of the entire creative writing department and my family. I am grateful to all writing instructors and my peers for their time and insights. I am especially grateful to Richard McCann, Myra Sklarew, and Kermit Moyer, who sat on my committee and guided me through the final stages of this process. iii Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT................................................................................................. ii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS........................................................................ iii CHAPTER 1. The Drowning ......................................................................... 1 2. Fairy-Tales ............................................................................... 5 3. Country Women’s Ways ........................................................ 17 4. Stirrings ................................................................................... 28 5. The Promise ............................................................................ 34 6. Standfast .................................................................................. 36 7. Escape ...................................................................................... 48 8. Carrying News ........................................................................ 56 9. Sonya’s Return ....................................................................... 72 10. Three Generations of Romance ............................................. 78 11. Mother Daughter Dance .......................................................... 89 12. My Mother’s Love .................................................................. 100 13. An Official Response .............................................................. 104 14. Wait and It Shall Come .......................................................... 122 15. The Wake ............................................................................... 126 16. Sonya’s People ....................................................................... 147 17. Standfast’s Awakening .......................................................... 151 18. The Bridge’s Fate .................................................................. 156 19. A Promise Suspended............................................................ 165 20. News Reports .......................................................................... 167 21. A Hungry River ....................................................................... 172 22. Standfast’s Son ....................................................................... 174 23. Timothy’s Funeral .................................................................. 185 24. Dead Sea .................................................................................. 195 25. The Burial ............................................................................... 197 26. Sonya’s Final Departure ......................................................... 209 iv Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. CHAPTER 1 THE DROWNING Women around me were screaming, running, and somebody was shouting, trying to get my attention. They’d left their clothes upon the rocks where they were sunning them or beating out the yellow stains that their husbands’ sweat and deodorant had left in the arm pits of the shirts. Soapsuds were still on their arms. I could hear the pitter patter of their hard feet on the smooth gravel that had been washed over thousands of times by the river, or covered completely when heavy rains swelled the river and made it impossible for us women to gather there in the hot sun to wash our clothes. I saw when Pam hiked her skirt above her thick, scarred knees and kicked off her broken-down sneakers, so she could run faster. The other woman, whose baby always had one hand in her mouth and the other wrapped in her mama’s skirt, shook her baby’s hands off her with a violence that must have been strengthened by the numerous times she may have wanted to push her daughter away but didn’t dare. I saw Carol’s breasts swinging from side to side underneath the red T-shirt she wore, her black nipples protruding because the water from washing had flattened her T-shirt against her body. I wondered if her breasts didn’t hurt from flapping like that against her stomach. 1 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. 2 The women were running fast but I didn’t move in the direction they were headed because I didn’t know what was drawing them so quickly toward the water’s edge. It wasn’t ‘til I saw Pam grab the small body in the blue shirt, which had a hole in the front, that I noticed my baby was missing from under the tree where I had left him sleeping. I ran with the other women closer to the edge o f the water. “Mi baby, mi baby! Oh, mi God, mi baby!” I cried. I pushed my way between the women who were pulling my boy’s body out of the water. “Timothy, Timothy.” The women, all mothers themselves and much older than I was, wouldn’t let me near my baby’s soft body, which they had placed on the sand. Pam, although I’m sure

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