Come Me Pickney - Written and Performed by Valerie Bloom

  “You coming to play football, Joe?”
I turned round to say,
  “Of course”, but before I could open my mouth …
  “He can’t.”
I turned to Keisha.
  “Who made you my mother?”
  “I just saying.”
  “Well don’t. I can go play football if I want to.”
  “Fine. I’ll just tell Mum you couldn’t be bothered to come home to see Gran after she come all the way from Jamaica to see us.”
  “Oh crumbs. I forgot.”
So of course I had to tell Lee and Abdul that I couldn’t play football after all.
And I tried to ignore the smug look on Keisha’s face as we walked home from school.
I’d never met Gran, though I talked with her on the phone every now and then.
Keisha and Dad had gone to Jamaica to see her,but I went to camp with Lee and Abdul instead.
  “So, what’s Jamaica like?” I asked Keisha when they came back.
She started ‘waxing lyrical’ as Mum would say, ‘bout climbing mango trees, swimming in the river behind Granny’s house,
playing with the cousins, riding Gran’s donkey to the market…
I realized she had more fun in Jamaica than I had at camp, so to shut her up I ask her,
  “So what’s Granny like?”
  “Granny?” A little smile curl up her mouth and her eyes look past me to a place I’d never been.
  “Granny.” She say it again. Dreamy like. Then;

        Granny is
        fried dumplin' an' run-dung,
        coconut drops an' grater cake,
        fresh ground coffee smell in the mornin'
        when we wake.

        Granny is
        loadin' up the donkey,
        basket full on market day
        with fresh snapper the fishermen bring back
        from the bay.

        Granny is
        clothes washin' in the river
        scrubbin' dirt out on the stone
        haulin' crayfish an' eel from water
        on her own.

        Granny is
        stories in the moonlight
        underneath the guangu tree
        and a spider web of magic
        all round we.

        Granny say,
        'Only de best fe de gran'children,
        it don' matter what de price,
        don't want no one pointin' finger.'
        Granny nice.

  “Right.” And I exit the house quick time before she get any weirder on me.