Sun, Sky, Sea and Sometimes Mud! An Interview with Joan Lavern Marshall Wilkinson

Sun, Sky, Sea and Sometimes Mud! An Interview with Joan Lavern Marshall Wilkinson

A poem should evoke emotion in the reader whether it is tears or laughter; or cause them to reflect.

-Joan Lavern Marshall Wilkinson 

Donna Bailey Nurse: When and where were you born?

Sun, Sky, Sea and Sometimes Mud! by Joan Lavern Marshall Wilkinson
FriesenPress
135 pages

Joan Lavern Marshall Wilkinson: I was born in Spa Hill in the parish of St Joseph’s, Barbados

DBN: Many Caribbean people write about the experience of being left behind as children while their parents settle abroad and work to bring them over. As adults, those children often describe their experience as lonely or even traumatic. Your parents went to England and left you and your siblings with your grandparents. Tell me about your experience.

JLMW: I don’t have any animosity about my parents leaving me because I feel like I benefitted from my parents going to England. As the oldest girl, you would be expected to stay home and help with the other kids and miss out on higher education. But because I was not the oldest girl of all the cousins, I finished high school in Barbados. My father was a stickler for education. Even for us girls. He was consumed with education. Even though they were absent, we knew our parents were always thinking of us. They never missed a birthday. There was always a present and a card.

DBN: What was it like living with your grandparents?

JLMW: When my parents were growing up they got much lashes when they misbehaved. But by the time we lived with our grandparents they were well-versed in parenting. They were more relaxed, and we did not get much lashes. When my grandfather got in a temper with us, he would say “Becrinks!” and we knew the belt could come out. And when my grandmother would smack her lips, you knew to smarten up! My grandmother would always be watchful and careful because we were in her care, and she didn’t want to have to tell our parents that anything bad had happened to us. I felt we had the best of both worlds.

Map of Barbados (Illustration from Sun, Sky, Sea and Sometimes Mud! Illustrator: Kano Mac)

DBN: Why did your parents decide to go to England in the first place? And why didn’t you children join them there?

JLMW: In Barbados we were led to believe that England was the answer to everything. Those who emigrated there had great expectations. But my Dad was a man of vision. He saw Black kids get mistreated in England so he decided early that he would never bring us there. My Dad had gone up first and then my mother had gone to join him as he found it too lonely and difficult on his own. My dad operated a train for the London Transport. I had a Jamaican friend from England who used to say that the Bajans in England thought they owned the London Transport; there were so many Bajans operating those trains! My parents came home ten years after they left. I was 16 or 17 years old.

DBN: What are some of the reasons you wrote this book?

JLMW: Once I was talking to a bunch of white security guards (here in Canada). They were explaining their job to me. “So, you are a kind of sentry,” I said. They told me they were shocked that I knew the word “sentry.” Another time, a guy asked me if I would like a cigarette. “No thanks,” I said, “I don’t smoke.” Then he said, “I guess (in Barbados) you were too poor to afford cigarettes.” I wanted my book to dispel inaccuracies white people have about our lives in the Caribbean.

I wanted to show that I had a joyful, loving, happy childhood. I remember tourists would come and see us in our school uniforms freshly pressed, our shirts crisp and white. But all they would notice is that some of us didn’t wear shoes. They always emphasized what we didn’t have.

Donna: Tell me about this title, Sun, Sky, Sea and Sometimes Mud!

JLMW: We were perceived to be poor. And we thought that the tourists who came were rich. But I have realized, now that I am grown and travel back and forth to the Caribbean myself, that they weren’t always so rich. They were coming to see the sun, the sky, the sea, and the sand; all the great gifts that we possessed every day and took for granted. We didn’t have to travel; we didn’t have to pay for them.  I wanted to include mud because we had such fun making mudpies. Dear Aunt, who lived next door, had a hibiscus plant in front of her house, and we would take a twig and pull the flowers off and we would stir our mud and put it into a container and leave it out in the sun and we would feel as though we were really baking something. It was an intrinsic part of our childhood.

I had a little cousin who had very dark skin. She came to me crying because somebody at school told her she was made of mud. But we are all made of mud. They were trying to insult her but like the Bible says, man is made from mud. And our bodies will return to mud and in the end our bodies will be buried in mud. It will be our body’s home.

DBN: The Crocus Bag is one of my favourite poems in the book. What exactly are Crocus Bags?

Crocus bag illustration from Sun, Sky, Sea and Sometimes Mud! (Illustrator: Kano Mac)

JLMW: Crocus bags were made of brown netting and held provisions like potatoes or yams. We would fold the crocus bag into a mat that you could wipe your wet feet on. Or you could wet it and use it to wipe the floor. Once the shopkeeper had emptied the provisions, my grandparents would ask for the empty bag. They would take it home and cut it up. The bags would be closed with an embedded piece of twine. We children would spend hours twisting out the twine and using it to make fancy pretend rings or to play at cat’s cradle. All of this was seen as inconsequential at the time, but it was such a big part of our experience.

DBN: Your poems display a profound family bond that touches my heart.

JLMW: Oh yes. My family is still very closeknit. When I go to Barbados, I still travel with my sisters. This family feeling was pounded into us from early on. We were taught to be “All for one, and one for all.” If anything happened at school and our grandparents learned that we had not supported each other, we would be in trouble.

DBN: Did you like to read and write as a child?

JLMW: I wrote letters for my grandparents and my uncle. They wanted me to do it for them because they thought I wrote so well. Sometimes my mother would say the world needs to read your writing: You always find so many things to say and it flows so well. So, they would ask me to respond to their letters for them.

At school I used to do track and play netball. We could do needlework too, but I never got around to that. So, one day our teacher took us to visit factories that made white shirts for the schools. We toured four or five of them. And then we had to go back and write an essay on what we saw and heard. It was a contest and I won! I remember that the needlework teacher was so mad, because I always avoided everything to do with needlework and sewing.

When I was young, I read anything I could put my hands on. I had read all the things they considered the classics at the local library. Also, we had an exchange library with books like Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys.

DBN: The language in the book is so musical. Of course, Bajan voices are extremely musical, even in comparison to the musicality of Caribbean voices in general. What do you attribute this to?

Image from Sun, Sky, Sea and Sometimes Mud! (Illustration by Kano Mac)

JLMW: The Rediffusion Barbados, a radio service, was on all the time. It played local music and all kinds of music from around the world. You could hear it no matter where you were in the house. It was a big part of our education. A part of daily life.

DBN: Can you talk to me about poetic inspiration.

JLMW: I’m nocturnal. So many things come through my head at night. One time, I said to Kano, (her son), “I feel like a conkie wrapped in banana leaves.” And Kano looked at me and said, “Mom, you should write a poem a day! I’ll put them altogether for you.” But it ended up that I put them together myself, four or five or six at a time.

DBN: What do you think a poem is, or what do you think a poem should do?

JLMW: I think of poetry as a simple way of putting words together. A poem should evoke emotion in the reader whether it is tears or laughter; or cause them to reflect.

DBN: Thank you for this wonderful conversation, Joan.

JLMW: Thank you, Donna.

 

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