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Abstract

bi.</p><p id="c71b"><i>Nzambi.</i></p><p id="90cf">Thanks to <a href="undefined">Jonica Bradley</a> for this week’s provocative prompt — Zombies. Her fascinating links took me into zombie zone, where I read about <a href="https://www.biologyonline.com/articles/dead-man-walking">Clairvius Narcisse</a>, a real-life case study of zombification, documented in Haiti. He claimed to have been buried alive, disinterred two days later, kept drugged, and made to work on a cane plantation with others similarly enslaved. One day one of the other workers somehow managed to kill the slavemaster with a hoe. Clairvius escaped. This story is my imagining of his days on the cane plantation.</p><p id="bc9d"><i>Nzambi</i> is a Congo word meaning “spirit of a dead person”. As Congo is one of the languages spoken in Haiti, I borrowed it for the story title.</p><div id="f52c" class="link-block"> <a href="https://readmedium.com/brain-dead-need-brains-91f02c487203"> <div> <div> <h2>Brain Dead, Need Brains</h2> <div><h3>Thrifty Words 50 #31 & 100 #10: Zombies</h3></div> <div><p>medium.com</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image:

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url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*wZPQ1zhbrNLkF391)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><p id="118a"><b>More Micro-fiction:</b></p><div id="48c9" class="link-block"> <a href="https://psiloveyou.xyz/the-letters-that-spell-your-name-f62e8acbb47c"> <div> <div> <h2>The Letters that Spell Your Name</h2> <div><h3>Fiction Friday</h3></div> <div><p>psiloveyou.xyz</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*zpvLKZee5fhyVlwz)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div><div id="f15d" class="link-block"> <a href="https://psiloveyou.xyz/taken-54b2fffe37bc"> <div> <div> <h2>Taken</h2> <div><h3>Fiction Friday</h3></div> <div><p>psiloveyou.xyz</p></div> </div> <div> <div style="background-image: url(https://miro.readmedium.com/v2/resize:fit:320/0*OAeRBifTys0z6xIH)"></div> </div> </div> </a> </div></article></body>

100 Words

Nzambi: Neither Dead nor Alive

Thrifty Words 100 Challenge #10: Zombies

How long have I been neither awake nor asleep?

Daily, we labour, between sugarcane rows under relentless sun. Hacking, hauling. Fingers cut from the blade. Blood gushes, but I feel no pain.

When they let us fall, do I dream?

A woman, crying over my body. A coffin lid, obliterating daylight. Thud-thud of coffin nails.

Why can’t I hear my heartbeat?

Dawn. Our only meal. I taste nothing.

Powerless. Nameless. Deathless.

Lord, help us!

They don’t need to keep us chained. We’re our own prisons.

Night.

My mind’s a nailed-shut coffin.

Who am I? Not dead. Not alive. Nzambi.

Nzambi.

Thanks to Jonica Bradley for this week’s provocative prompt — Zombies. Her fascinating links took me into zombie zone, where I read about Clairvius Narcisse, a real-life case study of zombification, documented in Haiti. He claimed to have been buried alive, disinterred two days later, kept drugged, and made to work on a cane plantation with others similarly enslaved. One day one of the other workers somehow managed to kill the slavemaster with a hoe. Clairvius escaped. This story is my imagining of his days on the cane plantation.

Nzambi is a Congo word meaning “spirit of a dead person”. As Congo is one of the languages spoken in Haiti, I borrowed it for the story title.