Yvette Lisa Ndlovu’s debut short story collection, Drinking from Graveyard Wells, glimpses into the lives of African women, be they goddesses or ghosts, broke college student or town gossip. This is a collection of blood-boiling big ideas, asking: what if life and death are simply unfair? What if the white boy gets to become a millionaire by building a rideshare app based on Zimbabwean customs? What if the patriarchy persists, even in the afterlife? Ndlovu, a real-life sarungano, writes to make us rage right alongside the women in these stories while still insisting that the lessons we learn from storytelling are remedies, but not in the way we might expect.
A real triumph and delight of Drinking from Graveyard Wells lies in its fearless condemnation of the powers that be—even the gods themselves. “When Death Comes to Find You” envisions a capitalist hellscape: a world where debt in life transcends to debt in death and diamond miners must participate in an immortal toil. The story asserts that “even the afterlife is made for the rich.” In “The Soul Would Have No Rainbow,” a granddaughter receives a letter from her late grandmother revealing that “in the heavens all the gods were arrogant bastards.” Ndlovu forces us to reckon with the possibility of cosmic inequity, that omnipotent power still corrupts.
Despite the seemingly hopeless conception of an unjust afterlife, Ndlovu does seem to offer up the antidote. “The Carnivore’s Lollipop” introduces us to ngano, fables and fairytales from the Shona tradition that, in this collection, often work as warnings of divine justice.
Ngano about reparations are interspersed throughout this story as the narrator is duped into a multi-level marketing scheme, buying and breeding boxes of ants to sell back to a drug company. When the company gets dissolved by the CEO, we realize what reparations look like when people who are in possession of ants (raised on a carnivore diet) decide to show up to the protest. So often, marginalized people are asked to turn the other cheek in the face of injustice. But, in these stories, Ndlovu offers an alternate solution: revenge. In “Red Cloth, White Giraffe,” a woman must remain on earth until her former husband pays off the rest of her bride price to the men in her family. The threat on the other side of this is that the woman might become a ngozi, an avenging spirit, capable of levying a visceral justice.
In “Plumtree: True Stories,” we receive a series of vignettes, many of which introduce new iterations of ngano and Black spirituality. The title reads as a radical act, casting Black spirit as true, as fact, and as essential, placing Ndlovu firmly in the midst of Black writers like Akwaeke Emezi and others whose work gives credence to the divine.
Drinking from Graveyard Wells explores what it means to grapple with those in power by allowing us to imagine the gods as absolute bastards. The collection insists, too, that storytelling and oral histories serve as reminders that justice isn’t freely given, it’s taken. Kicking and screaming, Ndlovu’s debut collection demands to be seen.
Erica Frederick is a queer, Haitian American writer and MFA candidate in fiction at Syracuse University. She currently serves as the fiction coordinator for The Best of the Net Anthology. Her work has appeared in Split Lip Magazine and was selected for Best Microfiction 2023. You can find her work at ericafrederick.com.
“For me, forgiveness and compassion are always linked: how do we hold people accountable for wrongdoing and yet at the same time remain in touch with their humanity enough to believe in their capacity to be transformed?” –bell hooks
I found myself sinking heart deep in spongy popping popcorn ball snow flaking hail. I had already dug my car out the day before giving me a false sense of security and freedom. But in just 1.5 hours the sudden downfall of the blizzard completely smothered my story of escape, like whiteout.
Gina Duran digging out her vehicle – photo by Gina Duran
I came to the conclusion that moving to the mountains would help mend the folds and tears of my fragile onion skinned heart of the past 10 years, and that writing environmental poetry would help me do it. I wanted to let go of unrequited love and putting my hands in soil helped, being amongst the trees brought the blizzard inside me to a sullen whisper, and the acappella of birds delivered a soulful melody. I had finally found home.
The only other time I felt like home was in my presence was when I swore I felt true love for the first time. I called this woman Mon Cœur. I know this time it’s that I finally feel connected to the earth. Trees and plants release volatile gasses and phytoncides to prevent rot, which are beneficial to humans. Just looking at trees helps calm the nervous system. In a May 16, 2016, article of Psychology Today, Richard E. Cytowic M.D. explained, “New studies suggest that viewing even an image of a tree or a forest canopy bolsters the parasympathetic division of the central nervous system that naturally induces calm.”
The fact that I ended up owning 300 plus potted plants was because of the theory that soil contains fungi, which helps decrease depression when released into the air when dug up. So, rest assured you could find me barefoot in the rain making mud pies next to my serrano and habanero plants. (Hey, a good mud tea party with a canine companion can do wonders.) So, when the blizzard first rushed through our small San Bernardino mountain town, I wasn’t devastated or smacked with fear. I decided I would cool my sympathetic nervous system in the snow, easing my anxious nerves. Living on my own was rather soothing—until I was trapped inside. The plan was to hike, take photos of the garbage left by callous tourists, and take notes—not write about a natural disaster. But global warming had its own plans.
The week before, I was diving backwards into four feet of snow, making a snow angel in front of my downstairs neighbor’s door. “You are definitely a California girl,” she laughed , directing her comment towards my pink shorts and wet hair. Yes, I am. Typical warm blooded Southern California Latine, diving into the snow like a 10-year-old girl in my shorts. As if I had never seen snow.
But today I got news that our only grocery store, Goodwin’s roof caved in. Just after our only hardware store’s roof caved in. The women in the parking lot next to ours were now waiting anxiously for a snowplow. (I wanted to escape with them.) They were digging and planning. They said I could join them, pets, and all. Then they told me that one of the houses caught fire. The fire department thought it might be electrical. Apparently, a tree took out several peoples’ electricity too. The women were rushing. They didn’t even know if the highway was open yet.
Grocery store parking lot – photo by Gina Duran
No grocery store, no food, no hardware store, no shovels, closed roads, caved in roofs, fires, electrical outages…all signs of a state of emergency. Chances of death increased greatly.
Suddenly, hail began to smother the black asphalt. Clinging to my black hair like sticky styrofoam balls. I needed to grab food. I kept losing cell reception, but I looked and saw my phone was working, so I called to send my love to my friends and my son. In that moment, I didn’t know if I would ever get off the mountain. My plan was to have food and a shovel and connect with the community to devise a plan for escape. My parents would say something about “piss poor planning” and the importance of having multiple plans, but as I walked to the store I had to relieve myself of my doubts and fears so they wouldn’t muddle my plans for survival. I told the one I used to call Mon Cœur that in case I died…she interrupted me. You’re not going to die. She didn’t want to hear how proud I was of her or that she was a good friend… She wasn’t ready for that call. I could hear it in the silence—between her words. Like the trees, she says a lot without words. I told her I would do whatever I needed to do to survive now. I told her all I needed was my shovel. I told her I would not ride with the women . Though they would most likely make it down the mountain without me, they seemed unsure about my animals and asked if they would pee in the car. I wouldn’t leave without my fur babies. I also didn’t know how long they planned on waiting in the blizzard for the road to open.
When I returned home, my car was almost completely inundated by 6-foot walls of snow. I called my son as I ran up the mounds and began stomping and compressing the snow to make a platform to reach my snow-covered roof. I began crying and telling him how proud he made me and to never give up. I wanted him to know I would never give up. I sliced snow from the roof of my car with my arm. He told me I was going to be okay, and I didn’t need to tell him these things because the storm would be over soon. I told him I loved him and that I knew it wasn’t over for me, but it was still important to let him know, because life is uncertain. Then we hung up. I wasn’t going to let me or my car get swallowed up.
I fell chest deep into the snow and I became enraged. “F this.” I growled. If I fell in deeper the snow would devour me, so I started slamming my arms down to compact the snow and pulled myself up. Then I began stomping my feet, creating a platform from the inside of the mound. I dragged my body out and pushed snow from the hood of my car into the holes—compacting it like it was the enemy.
I began punching and cursing at the snow. I couldn’t help but envision Lieutenant Dan, in Forrest Gump, raging against the storm. For once I stopped caring if anyone was watching.
When will my storm ever clear? I thought. I wanted to shred the snow with my bare hands. I cried and flailed my arms, thinking of everything that I had to release in my life. Suddenly, the roof was cleared, so I slid down the heap of snow and ran hip deep to the shovel resting against the building. I didn’t know if I would ever run out of rage. Rage for the way I am treated as a queer person. Rage for the way I was treated for being an Indigenous Latine. Rage for being gossiped about. Rage for being abused. Rage for being homeless. Rage for finally finding a home but meeting the wrath of God on the side of a mountain.
I dug myself out of my snow rift of sorrow. The hail turned into snowflakes. I puffed like a bull and trudged my way back upstairs. I would change my wet clothes, eat, and come back to shovel more later. And when I did, the snow stopped. I looked up directly at the sun and saw its rays beaming brightly on my car—bouncing off snow—burning my face. The storm was calm now.
I managed to move snow that gathered around my car and freed the street under my tires in 80 minutes. Tomorrow will be easier, I said to myself. And it was. People in the complex came out and started to help clear icicles and the trash can, while I cleared space for a walkway and an escape.
The National Guard flew overhead but never stopped to aid people in Crestline. That was infuriating. I found out later that they gave aid to Mammoth. It turns out everyone was feeling the complexity of emotions I had been. Afterwards, I dug a path for some of the elders in the community, while my neighbor watched, smoked a cigarette, and flirted with me. I was not interested. Anger from his laziness fueled me more. My parents would have told me to rest later because you must always give 110 percent. Then I would snapback, that is 100 percent. I told myself that anger wasn’t for my neighbor; it was for the extra 10 percent I could never give. My mother taught me to never depend on a man, so I was prepared to dig on my own. I looked at him and said It’s okay, I’m fine on my own. I went numb and dug. One of the women paid me in gratitude, so I no longer cared about the guy. Meanwhile, Goodwin’s did a food drop off to feed the community—including those who could traverse the snow from neighboring cities. People stood in a long line of the Goodwin’s parking lot—with the collapsed roof dancing in the store windows as a backdrop. I decided to wait till Friday for my food pickup.
That Saturday a plow came through and my friends in the neighborhood and I dug through the berm with determination as a team—stabbing through the ice sealed road with our shovels—we freed our cars. Then I grabbed all of my animals like I was escaping a fire and I freed them and myself from the mountain.
I didn’t die on the mountain, I freed myself. I freed myself of the rage and insecurities of what people thought of me. I forgave my parents for pushing me to survive. Instead, I’m grateful for the knowledge they passed onto me.
As I drove down the mountain, I saw the gleam of the glowing sun reflecting along the melting ice of black road and flickering amongst the green sprigs of foliage shading the face of the mountain, and I was grateful for its sublime poetry.
Gina Duran founded IE Hope Collective, which provides workshops for marginalized youth. She was Editor of Boundless 2022: VIPF, and hosts The Collective on KQBH. Her book “…and so, the Wind was Born,” with FlowerSong Press is a part of the Her Story Mixed Tape collection, at the Autry Museum.
