EMMETT TILL
I Be A Ghost Unto Thee
[Curtain rises]
For those who believe in a heaven and hell, I wonder what it would be like the day these two ghosts meet: the ghost of Emmett Till and the ghost of . . . you. What would you say to him? And what might he say unto to you?
GHOST 1:
I be dead now a long long time, methinks. Can you tell me, O Ghost #2, if this be true?
GHOST 2:
It be true and twice true. You’ve been dead a long long time, O Ghost #1, and me as well.
GHOST 1: And of what did I die of, if you know, pray tell?
GHOST 2: Prithee, I know right well but am not eager to tell thee.
GHOST 1: It be that bad, that I did some unbecoming act of cowardice or behaved violently toward another, that you be ashamed to tell me that which was the true cause of mine own death?
GHOST 2: Not that at all, as there was nonesuch, leastwise not on the part of thee; but thy death was not pleasant but bloody and unforgiving and will cast thy attackers downward into the deepest pits of fiery Hell forevermore!
GHOST 1: Aye! Then these nightmares are not the illusions of dreams I hoped they might be! My memory is impaired but not broken; I remember certain of these acts of violence of which you speak! I remember men grabbing me . . . but wherefore did they think I did wrong them in the first place?
GHOST 2: Aye, the details there are not so clear but rumor has it, begging thy pardon O Ghost #1, that thou did look or whisper or whistle at a full-grown woman, she of the white race and thee of the Black race, sable son of Africa. She was of the Old South and thee of the New North. These two streams do not mix smoothly but jostle and push against one another for strength of supremacy in all such matters as these.
GHOST 1: And if all that be so, am I in Heaven or Hell? And what brings you here? Surely you did not look or whisper or whistle at a woman of another race as in the manner of my own undoing?
GHOST 2: Nay, that be so. We are in Purgatory awaiting the Lord’s decision whether we are to ascend higher to heaven or descend lower to hell, to the fiery pits below. I am here for Cowardice, for not speaking to save thy life, for not speaking to condemn thy murderers, for not witnessing all men are brothers. I died of Cowardice and Fright, methinks.
GHOST 1: Aye, and here comes one of the angels of the Lord toward us now. I wish you luck, O Ghost #2, stranger no more but friend that ye yet may be to me. May we both see happier times in heaven above!
GHOST 2: Agreed! And good luck likewise to thee, O Ghost #1! Let us leave the pit of Hell to the murdering fiends who deserve to burn and roast there forevermore!
GHOST 1 and GHOST 2 turn toward the angel to hear their fate . . . .
[Curtain closes]
IN MEMORY OF EMMETT TILL
(July 25, 1941 – August 28, 1955)
