[Music] [Music] harper audio presents their eyes were watching god by zora neale hurston performed by ruby [Music] dee ships at a distance have every man's wish on board for some they come in with the tide for others they sail forever on the horizon never out of sight never landing until the watcher turns his eyes away in resignation his dreams mock to death by time that is the life of men now women forget all those things they don't want to remember and remember everything they don't want to forget the dream is the truth then they act and do things accordingly so the beginning of this was a woman and she had come back from burying the dead not the dead of sick and ailing with friends at the pillow in the feet she had come back from the sodden and the bloated the sudden dead their eyes flung wide open in judgment the people all saw her come because it was sundown the sun was gone but he had left his footprints in the sky it was the time for sitting on porches beside the road it was the time to hear things and talk these sitters had been tongueless airless eyeless conveniences all day long mules and other brutes had occupied their skins but now the sun and the boss man were gone so the skins felt powerful and human they became lords of sounds and lesser things they passed nations through their mouths they sat in judgment seeing the woman as she was made them remember the envy they had stored up from other times so they chewed up the back parts of their minds and swallowed with relish they made burning statements with questions and killing tools out of laughs it was mass cruelty a mood come alive words walking without masters working all together like harmony in a song what's she doing coming back here in them overalls can't she find no dress to put on where's that blue satin dress she left where all that money her husband took and died and left her what that old 40-year-old woman doing with her hair swinging down her back like some young girl where she left that young lad of a boy she went off here with thought she was gonna marry where he left her well what he done with all her money i bet she offered some guy so young she ain't even got no ass why she don't stay in her class when she got to where they were she turned her face on the vandalog and spoke they scrambled unnausea good evening and left their mouths setting open and their ears full of hope her speech was pleasant enough but she kept walking straight onto her gate the porch couldn't talk for looking the men noticed her firm buttocks like she had grapefruits in her hip pockets the great rope of black hair swinging to her waist and unraveling in the wind like a plume then her pugnacious breasts trying to bore holes in her shirt they the men were saving with the mind what they lost with the eye the women took the faded shirt and muddy overalls and laid them away for remembrance it was a weapon against her strength and if it turned out of no significance still it was a hope that she might fall to their level someday but nobody moved nobody spoke nobody even thought to swallow spit until her gait slammed behind her pearl stone opened her mouth and laughed real hard because she didn't know what else to do she fell all over mrs sumpkins while she laughed and mrs sumpkins snorted violently and sucked her teeth y'all let her worry you you ain't like me i ain't got her to study about if she ain't got manners enough to stop and let folks know how she's been making out let her gone she ain't even worth talking after lulu moss draw through her nose she sits high but she looks low that's what i say about these old women running after young boys phoebe watson hitched her rocking chair forward before she spoke well nobody don't know if it's anything to tell or not me i'm her best friend and i don't know maybe i don't know into things like you do but we all know how she went away from here and our shows you know come back they know houston you're trying to cloak no woman like janie starks baby friend or no friend and that she ain't so old as some of y'all just talking she way past 40 to my knowledge phoebe no more than 40 at the outside she's way too old for a ball like tk tk ain't been no ball for some time he's round 30 his own self i don't care what it was she could stop and say a few words but she act like we done done something to her pearl stone complaining she just wouldn't been doing wrong you mean you mad cause she didn't stop and tell us all her business anyhow what you ever know her to do so bad as y'all make out the worst thing i ever know her to do was taking a few years off her age and that ain't never harm nobody y'all makes me tired the way you talking you think the folks in this town didn't do nothing in the bed said praise the lord you have to excuse me cause i'm bound to go take her some supper phoebe stood up sharply and don't mind us lulu smile just go right ahead us can mine your house for you till you get back my supper is done now you better go see how she feel and you can let the rest of us know lord pearl agreed i don't scorched up that little meat and bread too long to talk about i can stay away from home long as i please my husband ain't fussy oh a phoebe if he was ready to go i could walk over there with you mrs sumpkins volunteered it's sort of dusking down the dark the boogerman might catch you no i think nothing couldn't catch me these few steps i'm going anyhow my husband tell me say no first class booger would happen if she got anything to tell you you hear it phoebe hurried on off with a covered bowl in her hands she left the porch pelting her back with unasked questions they hoped the answers were cruel and strange when she arrived at the place phoebe watson didn't go in by the front gate and down the palm walk to the front door she walked around the fence corner and went in the intimate gate with a heaping plate a mulatto rice janie must be around that side she found her sitting on the steps of the back porch with the lamps all filled and the chimneys cleaned hello janey how you coming oh pretty good i'm trying to soak some of the tiredness and the dirt out of my feet she laughed a little i see who is yeah you sure looks good you look like you're your own daughter they both laughed even with them overalls on you shows you a womanhood and go on god you must think i brought you something when i ain't brought home a thing but myself that's a gracious plenty your friends wouldn't want nothing better i takes that flattery off for you fee because i know it's from the heart janie extended her hand good lord baby ain't you never gonna give me that direction she brought me i ain't had a thing on my stomach today except my hand they both laughed easily give it here have a seat i know you'd be hungry no time to be hunting stove wood after dark my mulatto rice ain't so good this time not enough bacon grease but i reckon it'll kill hungry i'll tell you in a minute janie said lifting the cover gail is too good you switch is a mean fanny around in the kitchen oh that ain't much tea jenny but i'm allowed to have something shown off good tomorrow cause you done come janie laughed heartily and said nothing the very colored cloud dust that the sun had stirred up in the sky was settling by slow degrees here phoebe take your plate i ain't got a bit of use for empty dish that grub should come in handy phoebe laughed at her friend's rough joke he was just as crazy as you ever was hand me that wash rag on that chair by you honey let me scrub my feet she took the cloth and rubbed vigorously laughter came to her from the big road well i see martha mighty is still sitting in the same place and i reckon they got me up in their mouth now yes indeed you know if you pass some people and don't speak to suit them they got to go way back in your life and see what you ever done they know more about you than you do yourself an envious heart makes a treacherous ear they don't hurt about you just what they hope don't happen man god don't think no more about him than i do there's a lost ball in the high grass i hears what they say cause they just will collect around my porch because it's on the big road but my husband gets so sick of him sometimes he makes them all get from home sam is right too they're just wearing out your sitting chairs yeah sam say most of them goes to church so they'll be sure to rise in judgment that's the day that every secret is supposed to be made known they wants to be there and hear it oh sam is too crazy you can't stop laughing when you surround him oh he says he aims to be there himself so he can find out who stole his corncob pipe phoebe that samuel just won't quit crazy thing most of these sinkables is so head up over your business that they liable to hurry themselves to judgment to find out about you if they don't soon know you better make heads and tell them about you and tk getting married and if he taking all your money and went off with some young gal and where at he is now and where is all your clothes that you got to come back here in overalls i don't mean to bother with telling them nothing phoebe it ain't worth the trouble you can tell him what i say if he wants to that's just the same as me because my tongue is in my friend's mouth if you so desire i'll tell them what you tell me to tell them to start off with people like them waste up too much time putting their mouth on things they don't know nothing about now they got to look into me loving tea cake and see whether it was done right or not they don't know if life is a mesocon dumplings and if love is a bed quilt so long as they get a name to none they don't care whose it is and what about especially if they can make it sound like evil if they wants to see and know why they don't come kiss and be kissed i could then sit down and tell them things i've been a delegate to the big association of life yes sir the grand lodge the big convention of living is just where i've been this year and a half y'all ain't seen me they sat there in the fresh young darkness close together phoebe eager to feel and do through janie but hating to show her zest for fear it might be thought mere curiosity janie full of that oldest human longing self-revelation phoebe held her tongue for a long time but she couldn't help moving her feet so janie spoke they don't need to worry about me and my overalls long as i still got nine hundred dollars in the bank tea cake got me into wearing them falling behind him tea cake ain't waste up no money in mine and he ain't left me for no young gal neither he give me every consolation in the world he'd tell him so too if he was here if he wasn't gone phoebe dilated all over with eagerness tea cake gone yeah phoebe tk is gone and that's the only reason you see me back here cause i ain't got nothing to make me happy no more where i was at down in the everglades there down on the muck it's hard for me to understand what you mean the way you tell it and then again i'm hard of understanding at times no taint nothing like you might think so they know you see me telling you something unless i give you to understand to go along with it unless you see the fur a mink skin ain't no different from a hat look at here phoebe it's sam waiting on you for supper it's already in waiting if you ain't got sense enough to eat it that's his hard luck well then we can sit right where he is and talk i got the house all opened up to let this breeze get a little catching phoebe we've been kissing friends for 20 years so i depend on you for a good thought and i'm talking to you from that standpoint time makes everything old so the kissing young darkness became a monstropolis old thing while janie talked