I can't do a book review of The Song of Solomon, because I don't understand it well enough. What doesn't escape me hints of depths that escape me utterly, so disconnected I am from the lives and the tribulations of its main characters.

Yet I can relate, of course. Such is the beauty of art, that one can be brought into relation with characters which, were they real, we'd find it very hard to even meet, let alone spend enough time together to enable any deep communication to take place. This is how far apart I am, geographically and socially, from Black American Culture.

So, I can't offer a review, not at present, anyway. I can relay a sense of blinds being taken from my eyes, or beginning to be taken from my eyes, in a simple yet embarassing confession.

My main take away from The Song of Solomon is a fairly simple realization. And it is embarassing in the exact measure that it is precious. And the fact that it took me reading this book well into my adulthood to realize what should have been a very obvious thing indeed really says something about my outlook which, in this regard, is, I feel, representative. And it is this: that people who are poor, illiterate and live a life of marginality might preocupy themselves with the deep question of what this life is all about. And, furthermore, that they might have deep insights to offer, insights which are perhaps unavailable to someone who grew up in the relative comfort I happen to be born into.

There's more to it, of course. There are really powerful scenes. There's other realizations, like that someone born in the 60s might be the grandson of someone who was born a slave. That's how close that experience exists within the generations. That might be really obvious to people who carry that familial memory, but I'm from a culture that sees all of that as ancient history (which is an obviously self-serving outlook). There's beauty, and the thrill of the discovery, and the reality and relevance of worldviews which are totally other to me. Much as I might indulge in different modes of thought, my main outlook is that of the dominant culture. The possibilities of life, the trust in the jump, the belief that exists in as simple an act as moving somewhere you have never been before and only heard of vaguely, for instance, it is so utterly alien to me that I feel the book is, in many ways, stranger than any science fiction I have ever read. And yet it is a book that, though it alludes to something powerful and misterious, is not in any way trying to be cryptic, but, quite the opposite, is generously offering its outlook in as direct and unpretencious a manner as it can. It is just that I find myself utterly unequipped to receive it, like I never had to grow any of the receptors which are fundamental for the understanding of the story.

But I grow them now, I think. I grow them by exposure to them. So here's why I cannot review a book. I cannot review what I cannot grasp, for I have only just started to develop the sense organs that could, fully developed, might perhaps be able to grasp. But I tire of this, and feel yet another of the precious gifts of this book in another realization: Why grasp? Why must I perceive everything with a grasping hand, that seeks to make mine and to manipulate to create advantage? Can I not reach my hand out to stroke, to caress, to feel together?

For Mercy.