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Ernest Morrell
ernpeace@aol.com
Who am I and nothing special or have not
been chosen for any noble purpose or been endowed with extraordinary
perception or the keys to understanding but two eyes who refuse to not see
and ears that hear a feeling heart and exist on this moment without race
or profession genre of art the labels fade and fall like crusted paste to
the floor and all I try to forge a space outside of the lines and make
sense of the nonsense seeking patterns of order in chaos a sanctuary in
the time of war and all I want is peace and friendship. Am not a scholar
or a doctor the degrees sit on walls and make parents smile the world
opens its wallet for degrees on walls and I got mine so they give me
theirs and I go day to day in this crazy race with about as much shit as
the next guy has we our cars and swanky apartment and still these dreams
that haunt in the night making me ever aware of my ignorance and shame.
How then to traverse and offer a meager tidbit to those who think in
closets and walk as puppets and maybe one or two to emerge and start a
trend and what I do who knows and cannot find the words but scribble and
mutter in gutters and trite riddles but these we understand only not the
overarching plan and have patience I digress but all comes back to middle
even in postmodern echoes.
Eclectic, perplexing, electric on the Internet and cyberspace in bytes and
gigs and laptops the multifarious smorgasbord of city life these days and
times and what a time to be alive not fact or fiction poem or novel just a
story and, in between, my vibe and all the lines are blurred and all the
straights are curves and all that’s left are bullshit words but plug
your nose and find a crown.
Is there truth in math the numbers part and show the path to god and
dollars and science the ultimate rational truth and white lab coats clothe
the priest of techno babble one better than church or one scarier and I
still do not know who I am only those brown but called black can lead
church but not numbers and that gives me a clue as to which one matters
and which induces laughter and idle chatter. Black mathematicians only on
the corner though you and I know there is no such thing as black or white
or race yet are slaves to the language and taste and I cannot speak the
language of hate without hate or else I cannot speak or even think within
myself but only in contradiction or opposition to myself and how can that
work I am not pessimistic only concerned that I do not in attempts at self
pacification, minimize the odds I face.
The world is odd or is that euphemistic talk for fucked and who knowing
this who would want to be normal and am I glad to be the wayward son at
least I have a chance when others knowing how grandparents, fathers,
mothers, uncles, aunts, and cousins all swam through the same shit
smelling sewer will tie up their trunks to take a dive sans consideration
of alternatives. I will say let me have another choice, it can’t be
worse and even if it is I gave myself the chance and that’s better than
doom am not pessimistic only know the color of the sun, how can I explain
I know its warmth and that a ball of fire gives life and that even chaos
has a center though, inside, it may have no substance, only heat and ever
wonder how a ball of fire provides the basis for life yet the only fire in
the after life is reserved for Satan to charcoal his sinful minions? How
will we live in heaven, a world without light, but I digress once more.
When the master leads the people are hardly aware that he exists the next
best is a leader that is loved next one who is feared and worst one who is
despised the master doesn’t speak, she acts and when her work is done
the people say, ‘amazing, we did it all by ourselves’ and why I write
and how you know I haven’t given up or given in or sold out or went
away; I triumph in my ambiguity and tap dance on my moment and make art of
the symbols at my disposal, I don’t want to leave only clean up a little
mess a janitor of life if you will consider this document a huge
wastebasket for you to throw away your troubles as you read about mine and
who am I the writer or the author or just the writer who is conceived of
by the author who is a character designed by the writer who is also an
author or maybe I am just god using language and a mediocre penman to
prophesy as Isaiah and Jonah were used and does god have troubles and
would you feel sorry for IT if IT did have troubles considering that IT
did invent ITS troubles and don’t we often do the same and feel sorry
for ourselves, what’s that about? Fuck it, life is a digression, but,
from what? I haven'’ figured all that out yet but don't panic and don't
look for progression or plot chronology all that made up to keep us all in
line (no pun intended) and the only perfect calendar is a circle all comes
back to center which is infinite.
This I cannot understand why we travel in circles looking for a corner to
piss in up at six to work by eight home by seven bed by ten so as to not
be tired for work the next day five days a week (two week furlough) twelve
months a year forty years to retire just in time for old age and death and
you will ask yourself where it all went the sunny days with the young and
vibrant days the sexual escapades you slept through too tired from towing
big brother’s line in time you’ll know too late and the young one’s
won’t listen so anxious to knock themselves out for status from a world
they don’t believe in and will you even know who raised your kids and
kept your lover company while you earned a check and will know boss better
than your parents you shudder to see there’s no space for them in this
style…meanwhile the children cry and die rich get richer and none the
wiser you sprint full speed to go hold up that wall and play your part the
asshole of the body politic and waste your life.
Don’t know fun or hobbies or travel or friendship or children or sunrise
or cool breeze or white wine or seaside or laughter or cherries or ice
cream and cookies and memories and family and
unity…happily…sanity…heavenly.
Dystopia, paranoia, chaotica, the vision blurred the yellow fog and dense
and gray and pissed I should have known or least have feared I see Malcolm
and his minions scatter the clay pigeons and buck shot oblivion. The over
arching, horizon the dream, I piece it together, the mezzanine but soon
must make a choice and Malcolm not the time yet I still write his lines.
What means these advancing years when after hours of amor and fun no
worries and worlds of dreams and time and nothing can harm us
invulnerability I stand at the edge of the cliff and laugh at destiny
romance and movies and drinks and did I say time and then the gravity and
grey and job responsibility commitment and the smiles turn to sighs and
time despised and the disease some call adulthood others the death of
youth and good times what means this onset of tears and mortgages I owe my
soul to the company store and boss known more than spouse or lover or any
other and poetry a long ago and write for work or fame but never write for
love it cannot pay your bills and ills and fortunes ebb and flow the
flower of my youth now fades in summer’s heat moments before the Fall
and three-pieced suited the Times in hand I shuffle like the
others….home in time to eat and sleep and shuffle once more and never
and goddamn and fighting every step and Malcolm the hero fights and though
my creation or the brainchild of the writer the writer not out of the
woods and even my lines under stolen lights on stolen nights sans slumber
I often wonder and pine lurking beneath the shadows of my mind
…and jot on napkins on subways and walls the urban scrawl on the urban
sprawl the urban urbane intellectual with words of art and knowledge of
the workings of the dark.
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