Dr. Yunina Barbour-Payne is a scholar/artist whose interdisciplinary scholarship involves Africana studies, Appalachian studies, folklore, and performance. Her teaching and research areas include Black performance theory, Black theatre and performance, Theatre with and for Youth, Black feminisms, Black Appalachian performance traditions, and Affrilachian (Black artists' experiences in Appalachia) aesthetics. Barbour-Payne is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow and Rising Scholar at the University of Virginia. She earned a Ph.D. in Performance as Public Practice from the University of Texas at Austin where she was a Donald D. Harrington Fellow. As a scholar/artist, Barbour-Payne has experience as a performer, dramaturg, director, and playwright. Originally from Louisville, Kentucky, she locates the Ensemble Theatre in Houston, Texas as her artistic home, being the first theatre to support her work as an actor on stage, director, and writer of theatre for and with youth. As an actor, some of her favorite roles include Clyde in Ground Floor Theatre’s production of Lynn Nottage’s Clydes, Edna Thomas in Penfold Theatre’s world premiere of War of the Worlds, and Sally Mae in the Ensemble Theatre’s production of Too Heavy for Your Pocket. In addition to her stage work, Barbour-Payne combines her love of history, art, and performance through her commitment to museum theatre. In addition to her museum theatre work, she is a dramaturg with Gesel Mason’s Performance Project’s Yes AND, a performance project that recenters Black womanhood as the norm and operating force in the creative process. Her life long work merges her artistry and scholarship as the founder of the Affrilachian Memory Plays, an archived-based performance inquiry for celebrating Affrilachian identity in its various creative iterations.
Tobacco Fields
CHARACTERS:
GIRL #9 “NINE”: An eighteen-year-old Black Kentucky GIRL. Though she has a tomboy demeanor “NINE” has glimmering potential of being fine as Dandelion wine, and everyone knows. She is often disheveled in appearance, yet lively in spirit.
GIRL #7 “SEV”: A twenty-one-year-old Black Kentucky young woman. She is gentle and nurturing in her demeanor. She has a great talent for storytelling.
MAMA: A Black Kentucky woman in her late thirties. She is visibly with child. She has spent her entire life in the country. She is a talented cook, quilter, and homemaker.
BOY #5: A twenty–three–year–old Black Kentucky young man. He has spent his entire life working the land and is exceptional in the fields. He has a roguish demeanor. He is a twin.
Scene
Various locations on a family tobacco farm in rural Kentucky
Time
Late August 1967
SCENE 1
SETTING: We are in a shabby, bare country home.
The home takes up a very small amount
of space. It has only one room, with a
rocking chair, a bed, a table for the
kitchen and the rest is field.
giggling. MAMA has fallen asleep in the
rocking chair. An older boy sleeps on
the floor. It is well past bedtime.
The room is small and swells with the
excitement from the girls. GIRL #7 is
reading GIRL #9 a story from a personal
notebook.
GIRL #7
(whispering)
In the beginning was the Word
GIRL #9
And the word was loud
GIRL #7:
(GIRL #7 shushes and giggles)
With a long A….
GIRL #9:
Two legs, two arms and a small head
GIRL #7:
Some high and low points
GIRL #9:
Low like valleys and high like mountains!
BOY #5:
(grumbles)
GIRL #9:
Shhh
GIRL #7:(whispering)
Long as the Ohio river
(she moves to the hallway)
GIRL #9:
(following)
Moving like curvy mountains on a page
GIRL #7
With 2 F’s
GIRL #9:
And 5 A’s
GIRL #7:
(counting)
5 A’s?
GIRL #9:
(re-counts)
3 A’s
GIRL #7:
And the word stuttered
GIRL #9:
Af-f-f--
GIRL #7:
And struggled
GIRL #9:
Af-f-f r-il -Affril - ach
GIRL #7:
And stumbled
GIRL #9:
A-f-r-r-i-l-a-c-h-i-a-?
BOY #5:
(grumbles, Dreaming)
No
GIRL #7:
And finally stuck
GIRL #9:
Affrilachia
GIRL #7:
And the word was
GIRL #9:
Affrilachia!
GIRL #7:
And the Word was!
Affrila- (They both Scream)
MAMA:
(off)
Girls!
(Enter MAMA, in a worn night gown and slippers.)
MAMA:
(reprimanding) Girls! Now you know you are supposed to be in bed.
GIRL#9:
It was a snake mama!
MAMA:
Snake?
GIRL #7:
Yes ma’am, there on the floor and it’s humongous!
MAMA:
A humongous snake on the floor? If that isn’t the… (she sees the snake)
Oh my… Clyde!
(TRANSITION OF TIME)
(Later that day in the tobacco fields at sunset. A Tractor is heard. The girls are coming in from the field)
GIRL #9:
My eyes burn.
GIRL #7:
(fixing her hair) It’s alright, here use this, it’ll get better in a week.
GIRL #9:
A week! I hate the fields. I hate them. I hate them!
GIRL #7:
Remember the story?
(pulling the notebook from her pants.)
-Long as the Ohio river (grabbing GIRL #9 in a dance)
GIRL #9:
Moving like curvy mountains on a page
GIRL #7:
With 2 F’s
GIRL #9:
3 A’s
Affrilachia!
(They both laugh and stumble to the ground overwhelmed with good feelings.)
GIRL #7:
Here, come listen.
(She reads to her in a big sister performance kind of way.) I call it ‘raised by women…
(GIRL #9 looks unimpressed.
GIRL #7 puts down her book.)
Let’s play a game. I’ll start by saying “I was raised by,” and you finish it. Ready?
I was raised by
Some high yellow, red bone, red-haired
Green eyed
Cherokee knowing-
(prompting GIRL #9)
GIRL #9:
cherry eating, tobacco cutting
Will rush you off the phone in a heart-beat kind of women
GIRL #7:
(laughing) Mmmhmm! I was raised by …
Some macaroni and cheese making
Polk picking
GIRL #9:
Pimple popping
GIRL #7:
Bible reading
GIRL #9:
Church going
GIRL #7:
(laughs and sings) Choir singing
GIRL #9:
Ushers ..
AND Sunday school teaching
GIRL #7:
Sister of the preacher seating
-“isn’t it funny that they don’t believe in women in the pulpit-
(GIRL #9 delights at the truths in her statements)
Kind of sisters
I was raised by women.
GIRL #9:
You got your stories, but me I don’t have talents like that.
GIRL #7:
Sure, you do
GIRL #9:
Nuh uh- none that I know of.
GIRL #7:
Have you ever tried writing?
GIRL #9:
No, hate it.
GIRL #7:
What don’t you hate?
GIRL #9:
I dunno, dunno what to write
GIRL #7:
All you have to do is imagine.
GIRL #9:
Imagine what?
GIRL #7:
Anything. Close your eyes. Close them. Now what do you see?
GIRL #9:
black
GIRL #7:
not literally…
GIRL #9:
…..I see… I see….A woman… from the city.
GIRL #7:
A what?
GIRL #9:
A city woman. She’s tall, bigger than daddy, and has hair and her skin- like mine.
GIRL #7:
And what does this fine city woman do?
GIRL #9:
-Did I say she was big, way bigger than #5 and athletic, and smart. She never misses school and never even seen tobacco-only mountains.
GIRL #7:
Mountains?
GIRL#9:
City-woman was born on a mountain top.
OH AND
She saves people.
GIRL #7:
Is that right
GIRL #9:
Mmhmm and she’s a snake killer, she travels the world killing snakes -and she’s comin’
GIRL #7:
Comin’ where?
GIRL #9:
Comin’ here.
GIRL #7:
Here?
GIRL #9:
Yep, she’s on her way right now. She’s coming to save me from these fields.
GIRL #7:
Oh just you! What about me? You gonna leave me here?
GIRL #9:
(she opens one eye) I’ll ask her to bring you too.
GIRL #7:
Oh good, just make sure my hair is done first. (Beat) I think you might just have a talent. You’ll be alright.
GIRL #9:
You sure?
MAMA:
(off) Sev come in here
GIRL #7:
I’ll be right back.
(She places her notebook down on the ground)
(The stage is left empty with GIRL #9. She picks up GIRL #7’s notebook and pen from the ground and begins to write.)
GIRL #9:
Dear City-woman, (pause) I was raised…… I was raised….. I was raised working in tobacco. I was raised working on 80 acres of farmland in a family of 11. And we work. All 1- 11 of us. We raise chickens, pigs, cattle to sell, milking cows- in tobacco, corn and wheat fields. (She thinks) When it tobacco cutting season- girls not treated like girls in the country. Is it like that where you’re from? A body is just a body—
#5:
(#5 enters from behind her)
What you writing girl?
GIRL #9:
Nothing.
#5:
Don’t look like nothing. (he takes the notebook) What you doing with Sev’s notebook?- You stole it! I’m going to tell her you stole it.
GIRL #9:
I didn’t, she let me see it!
#5:
Did she really? No, she didn’t- I can tell you lying. I’m going to tell her.
GIRL #9:
I didn’t!
#5:
What reason I got to believe you?
GIRL #9:
-please!
#5:
You don’t want me to tell her?
GIRL #9:
(GIRL #9 shakes her head no.)
#5:
What you going to do? What you going to do to make me believe you?
GIRL #9:
(pause)(She looks around for an answer) ---
#5:
(laughing) You gonna give me a kiss ain’t you – you gonna give me a kiss right here-
(He holds his finger on his cheek.)
—then I’ll believe you.
(GIRL #9 reluctantly kisses him quickly)
(#5 gives the book back to her by pressing the book to her breast. The book slides to the ground as his hand stays pressed. GIRL #9 snatches the book from the ground.)
Well then, I guess I believe you.
(GIRL #9 nods.)
(He exits.)
(GIRL #9 watches him leave, anxiously picks up the notebook and opens the notebook back to her page)
GIRL #9:
Sometimes… (she thinks about telling) Sometimes…(looking at the tobacco around her) Sometimes… #4-9 go working on our neighbor’s farm- picking the ground leaves for tobacco. See with tobacco, the lower leaves ripen and have to be harvested first. I usually do alright. I can stay low to the ground—
GIRL #7:
What you writing?
(GIRL #9 screams)
Girl you screaming like you just saw a snake!
GIRL #9:
I didn’t take it, you left it and I just started looking through it, and writing like you said, but I didn’t take it - swear.
GIRL #7:
You’re all right, here, you can have it. To distract yourself from the work.
GIRL #9:
Sev, You sure?
GIRL #7:
Sure.
MAMA:
(Hollering, as if she is about to go into labor) Sev— come heh- I need you.
(GIRL #7 exits. GIRL #9 works then distracts herself. At first she thinks aloud. GIRL #9 is in the thick of the field. Exhausted from work, she finds a spot, pulls out her notebook from her pants and begins to write.)
GIRL #9:
You gotta get the ground leaves before they turn brown otherwise that’s money that you loose -that’s what daddy say. So I get low to the ground, and I done invented this technique where I can use my fingers and my teeth. And I hum a song while I’m doing it, so it feels like a game. So I hum and pick, and hum and pick and hum and pick. And I was doing alright til-
GIRL shouldn’t be dreaming in the tobacco fields. (He snatches the book.)
GIRL #9:
I’m not sleeping.
#5:
Don’t look like that way. I’m going to tell daddy you was sleeping in the fields.
GIRL #9:
No, I wasn’t
#5:
(taunting) You was just lying down.
(She shushes him.) (He mocks her shushing)
You don’t want me to tell him?
GIRL #9:
GIRL #9:
GIRL ain’t safe anywhere in the country, ‘specially not in no tobacco field,’ #5 come up on me. And afterward, I was still. I lay out in the tobacco field next to the ground leaves pricking my back and in my hair. I laid there while my mind left my body. I laid there with my hands outreached hoping someone would be there to help me. (Whispering) It doesn’t sound as painful as it is. Hoping someone would place their hand in mine and pull me close. I closed my eyes, thinking on city-woman. She’s coming to rescue me from the tobacco fields. I see my city-woman- all black on, leather gloves, that briefcase and sunglasses. My city woman never goes to the field ‘cept this time when she’s come here to save me. I reach my hand out to my city-woman who is coming to surprise me with flowers in hand. I can hear her talking love to me. Her voice is deep like water wells. I lay there, tears hard on my face and I can feel city-woman’s presence blowing them dry. And she’s humming my song and drying my tears/I even feel heat next to my hand and I know it’s city-woman’s glove. I’ve never felt leather before but I feel it now as the heat from her hand slides in mine. I open my eyes to see city-woman. Instead-
#5:
You gonna give me a kiss to make sure I don’t tell. Ain’t you? (She goes for his cheek.) Naw Right here –
(He kisses her long, too long on the lips. Then drops her book.)
Well then, I guess I won’t be telling this time. (#5 exits.)
(GIRL #9’s screams)
GIRL #7:
(runs to her) What is it!?
GIRL #9:
I seen a Black copper head! it slid in place of city woman’s hand.
GIRL #7:
What?
GIRL #9:
When I realized it wasn’t city-woman I jumped, and me and the snake both fly into the air.
GIRL #7:
You dreaming Nine.. when I said find a distraction I didn’t mean go to sleep. Daddy’s gonna get you.
GIRL #9:
It’s true! and While I’m flying, I turn my head and see daddy and #5 standing side by side at the end of the field. Both me and the snake hit the ground. And I hear daddy laughing at me. In between laughs he’s scolding me for laying down on the job. He laughed and I laid there. Said he didn’t know who was higher.. me or the snake. #5 was laughing so hard he had to hold his stomach. And I was there, lying in a field of tobacco.
GIRL #7:
You gotta be smarter next time.
(GIRL #7 exits)
GIRL #9:
Like I said - Nothing good happen in the field. ‘Cept sweat and tears.(beat)I ain’t staying here. I ‘m leaving soon as my city woman come. And when she do -I ain’t coming back….
(She sits, opens the book and continues to write. GIRL #7 is hidden in her own corner of the field revising.)
GIRL #7
In the beginning was the word
GIRL #9
I was raised by …
GIRL #7
Long A
GIRL #9
Some multitasking
Independent thinking
Cooking and Cleaning
Feeding the whole family and then some because “You don’t take things for granted’
Kind of women
GIRL #7
(said like a curse word) Two F’s
GIRL #9
Some snake fighting
Field surviving
Tobacco pulling
Achieve every dream because
“You’ll be alright”
Kind of women
GIRL#7
Three A’s
GIRL #9
Some –
Heart county,
Country living
GIRL#7
And the word stuttered
GIRL #9
City Moving
GIRL #7
And struggled
GIRL #9
Memory of an elephant
I’m going write a Story
GIRL#7
And stumble
GIRL #9
Call you a snake
And tell all the family business
kind of women
GIRL#7
And finally stuck.
GIRL #9
I was raised by women.
GIRL #7
Affrilachia.
(MAMA looks into the fields from the kitchen of her home, with a new baby girl in hand. MAMA, GIRL #7 and GIRL #9 are standing on three sides still and silent.)
(Blackout)
(END OF PLAY)
###
Torch Literary Arts is a 501(c)3 nonprofit established to publish and promote creative writing by Black women. We publish contemporary writing by experienced and emerging writers alike. Programs include the Wildfire Reading Series, writing workshops, and retreats.
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