Three Leaves, Three Roots - Poems on the Haiti-Congo Story

A Haitian-born, Boston-based poet explores the personal and political stories of the Haitians who were part of Congo’s 1960s decolonization movement

Between 1960 and 1975, thousands of Haitian professionals emigrated to Congo, a fellow Black francophone nation that emerged under the revolutionary new leadership of Patrice Lumumba. As Danielle Legros Georges writes in the introduction to this collection, these émigrés sought to “escape repression in Haiti, start new lives in Africa, and participate in a decolonizing Congo.” Among them were her parents.

Grounded in these personal and social histories, Three Leaves, Three Roots is a collection of Legros Georges’s creative reconstructions of the Haiti-Congo experience. She interweaves her verses with excerpts from primary sources such as the interviews she conducted with the Congo émigrés and letters written by people both famous and obscure, including Lumumba, Fidel Castro, and members of Legros Georges’s family.

The result is a richly layered portrayal of an era of decolonization and rebuilding, a time that sparked with both promise and vulnerability for the Pan-Africanist and Black Power movements. This collection is an important work of Haitian American poetry and of Black history: it reminds us, artfully, that movements of solidarity among people of color have always existed and always will exist.

Introduction

CONGO–1960s

Because
Whites in Congo Flee by Ferry
in this poem, do not use the word revolution
Hands are a matter,
Cobalt
My beloved companion,
A Reply of Pauline Opango Lumumba
Le Congo, c’est moi

CUBA–1950s

Because
Fidel Wears No Hat
Estimada amiga,

HAITI–1960s

Because
Because
Instructions in Times of Emergency
When a book is a sentence
François Duvalier, Country Doctor
François Duvalier, Living God
Simone Duvalier

CROSSINGS–1960s

Because
Diaspora
Diaspora
What Is Water?
Because
I Pray the United Nations Bureau Will Forward This Card to My Brother Rodney Georges Who Is Currently in the Congo, Whose Address I Don’t Know
Letter from Léo
The Reasons of Jacqueline Romain
The Reasons of Rigobert Carty
The Lake Behind You
Thysville, 1966
Headwaters
The Reasons of Ertha Élysée Auguste
Notes on the School in Kinshasa
Max Manigat in Kenge
The Work
Unannounced Evaluation
Critique de Leçons
The Contract of GEORGES, Rodney
an accolade and ache

CONGO–1965–1975

Because
The environment was different from what I had known all my life
what we missed and attempted to replicate
what we found new and glorious
Avenue des Flamboyants
Beer and Babies
In Kinshasa
Because
Trouble in Your Country
Makak
Mobutu Sese Seko, Messiah
The Record of An Attempt to Purge the Country of Colonial Influence by Mobutu (and Unrelatedly a List of Cities in Which Haitians Lived, with Underscores Signaling Antecedents Unknown to Me)
I could have
Postcard | Front and Back
Your Footprints

CROSSINGS–1970s

The Tintin Books
Sunday
Unwritten Letters to Their Parents by Children Boarding with Relatives in Port-au-Prince

CROSSINGS–1986

Power

CROSSINGS–ARTIFACTS

Carved Ivory Head of a Woman
A Congolese Cotton Shirt Embellished with a Portrait of Mobutu from the Collection of the Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam
A Closing

CODA: CROSSINGS–2000s

Because
Crossings

Notes
Acknowledgments
Bibliography