11 posts tagged “writing”
You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches, and so forth? Isn't negotiation a better path?" You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent-resister may sound rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and halftruths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.- MLK
FULL TEXT HERE: http://coursesa.matrix.msu.edu/~hst306/documents/letter.html
Call me Sally Field.
I submitted a piece of fast fiction to LitBits a while back (thanks Amanda) and they actually posted it here: http://www.litbits.ca/
It will be up all week.
Just don't tell my mother, 'kay?
The Rugrat is writing poetry. Existential stuff. No rhyming meter for her.
She's eight for goodness sake.
We've still got the teen years to look forward too. Thank God for Jack Daniels.
The morning that Buggy returned from a 2 week stint in Solitary, America awoke to find the bust of Marcus Garvey added to the collection of dead presidents on Mount Rushmore.
This sentence has been rolling around in my head for a while - the concept, for years. Wrote it down in a notebook a few weeks ago. Been gathering research on Mount Rushmore and Garvey and prisons and such for some time now (del.icious.us.com is a beautiful thing). But I haven't really done anything with it.
So a few minutes ago I opened a file and typed in the first sentence. Had to get started sooner or later, right? The first novel is nowhere near getting published ready (still needs at least one more re-write), though a friend has finally read it from cover to cover (and she's going to call any day now, right Tracy?)
But it's time. Time's a-wasting and waits for no man, and tomorrow isn't promised.
Besides - maudlin conjecture to my imminent demise aside - it might be fun.
"We got a lot of transients and what would be known now as the homeless. A lot of these folks were – on first glance – a little off. They dressed funny and smelled funny. They talked to themselves and to people that weren't there. One of them was a woman called Fanny who hung out around Dupont circle. She was a bag lady I guess but she always carried herself as if she were a woman of breeding. One time in March – I must have been around 10 or 12 – we were released early from school for some reason or another I and headed to the circle. It was the fist warm day of spring and I wanted to enjoy it. I got myself an ice cream cone and sat down to watch a couple of the old men play chess. I loved watching these old guys. The commentary they provided was far superior to the game itself. Just then I spotted Fanny walking into the park carrying a couple of clear plastic shopping bags. She headed straight to the fountain at the center of the circle and put the bags down whereupon she promptly began to remove her clothing. The circle was full of people that day stopping to enjoy the weather but Fanny was oblivious. When she was completely naked she pulled soap and washcloth from one of her bags and stepped into the fountain to bathe. Looking at her you would have thought she was in her own private boudoir. When she finished she reached again into one of the bags and pulled out clean clothes and put them on. She then picked up her bags and left. The really remarkable thing was that no one, save for a couple that were obviously tourists, took much note. It was just Fanny being Fanny."
Gentlemen’s Entertainment
We’re great at perfuming the pig in this country. From the concept of “part of this balanced breakfast” to “money back guaranteed.” One of my favorites is the euphemism for titty bars – “Gentlemen’s Clubs.” An aside here for the skittish and prudish among you. I will not be using the more popular and less offensive “strip club” in our little excursion my loves. Because let’s face it, what are the patrons of these establishments looking for? Why titties of course. Big, round, freakishly and unnaturally uplifted titties. Walk into any titty bar and do a quick review of the dancers. Be they blond, brunette, tall, short or in some cases even plump, they all have one attribute in common.
So let’s call it for what it is.
It amazes me that an owner of one of these establishments could call it a Gentlemen’s Club; as if everyone within its walls was sitting around in big leather chairs smoking cigars and discussing the vagaries of the stock market or plans for the next charity bazaar.
Put it another way. When you walk into a sushi bar what do you expect? Sushi. When you walk into a titty bar, what do you expect? Titties, not Gentlemen.
CHAPTER 2 – COMING TO TERMS WITH YOUR PERSONAL PSYCHOSIS
And about this time I had a vision - and I saw white spirits and black spirits engaged in battle, and the sun was darkened - the thunder rolled in the Heavens, and blood flowed in streams and I heard a voice saying, "Such is your luck, such you are called to see, and let it come rough or smooth, you must surely bare it.” – From The Confessions of Nat Turner
From: Khalif Barnes <nubianprinz@hotmail.com>
To: Deanna Barnes <dbarnes@detgazzette.net>
Subject: A Favor
June 15, 2003 3:45 AM
D,
What up big Sis? I hear from Mama that you’re taking a few days off. Good, you needed it apparently with the way you stepped to me in that letter. But I’ll get to that in a minute. First I just wanted to drop you a line to say “hi” and ask you a favor.
If you start getting calls from Master Card asking about overdue payments on a gold card just ignore them. I’m getting that all straightened out on this end. Half those charges I don’t even know anything about. And I’m going to pay the rest off just as soon as some things I’m working on come together. By the end of the month I should be getting some commission money for a consulting job I did a few weeks ago.
I used you as a co-signer for the card. I hope you don’t mind. That’s why they’ll be calling. I don’t know why they’re tripping. White boys get all kinds of extensions on credit all the time.
Now to your letter from the other day D. That was cold. Why you so hard on a brother? I’m just trying to make my own way it the best way I can. I showed the letter to Mama and it hurt her D. Made her cry. You need to think about what you’re doing to the family before you fire off something like that.
We need to sit down and come together as a family and set aside our differences. We’re family D. We need to build each other up not tear each other down like that. I’m going to pray for you D.
Don’t forget about that Master Card thing.
Peace I’m Out.
One Love,
Khalif
CHAPTER 1 – SLIPPING INTO DARKNESS
May 23, 2003
Mr. Khalif Barnes
4457 Washington Blvd.
St. Louis, MO
You are a fool Khalif. Moreover you are unoriginal, woefully unoriginal – which only compounds your foolishness. You actually believe that by reading buying a book and wearing putting on a dashiki (A DASHIKI?) you can claim the revolution?
Negro please. The last fools that who attempted that tired route were too far removed from any real struggle to understand what they were talking about. Dilettantes, working from stories they’d heard passed down from older brothers and sisters. Dabbling in affairs they had no intimate knowledge of. They were a whole generation removed from any real oppression. You are twice removed.
Describe struggle to me Khalif. What does oppression look like? Let me give you a hint. It has nothing to do with being getting booted from Princeton my brother. “The MAN” had nothing to do with that, while your grades had everything. The MAN does not even know you exist Khalif. The MAN can’t get to keeping you down for your sorry ass already being on the job. You are in community college for a reason Khalif. You are an idiot.
You need to put down that copy of SOUL ON ICE Khalif and pick up your Sociology book. You need to stay away from those late night free form poetry slams and visit a tutor. You need to quit quoting revolutionary philosophy to those little airheads that who hang around the coffee shop long enough to study. You are going to get one of them PREGNANT Khalif. And then where will you be?
You need to stop worrying our mother with your foolishness and find something – anything - productive to do. Preferably something legal that pays. Because she is calling me Khalif – Daily. About your foolishness. About your constant complaining about nothing. About your utter lack of anything even resembling a point. About your changing your name from Kelvin, the name of our DEARLY DEPARTED FATHER. About how she fears for you Khalif. She loves you so Khalif. Loves you to your dirty drawers, though God, in His infinite wisdom, only knows why.
And I am tired of it Khalif. Can you even begin to understand how tired I am? No, I doubt you can, not having any PURPOSE IN LIFE. But she is calling me Khalif, calling and complaining and whining fretting about you and your foolishness. I have a job Khalif. I have a column to write. I have deadlines that my editor reminds me of regularly. I have a life.
So stop it. Stop it IMMEDIATELY! Turn over a new leaf, come to Jesus, grow up and be a man. Our mother is going to die one day, and when she goes, I will not take up the slack. I will let your sorry ass starve and die. That is a promise my brother. Trust me on this. Bank on it. I look forward to it. Because I do not have the TIME to coddle you. I will not hold your hand. I will not pray for you. I will not offer you succor and shelter. But given the opportunity, I will step over your diseased, flea-ridden body in the street without a thought.
Our mother is going to die one day and I would like for at least some of those days to be pleasant. I want her to be at peace Khalif. I want to be at peace. I want her to stop calling me about your sorry ass. She deserves peace and so do I.
Did I say how tired I was?
Your Loving Sister,
Deanna
----- So the rewrite has begun. God help us all. Comments welcome.... (harsh) criticism (for the sake of my wan little psyche) will likely be ignored.
Melly is a Canadian blogger currently living in Northern Israel providing first hand accounts of the attacks on her parent's hometown by Hezbollah. What's striking - along with her honesty - is the resolute nature of the Israeli residents to stay home - the sense of "home" - while faced with the very real threat of dying. Melly wrestles with it:
So tomorrow, Sunday, we're going back. A few of us might even try to go
back to work. We'll see. We don't want to fall into a false sense of
security arising from staying in the south for a week and not feeling
the immediate danger.
I have mixed feelings about going back
north, of course, but even I feel the need for some home comforts in
between the sirens and the rockets.
"Comfort in between sirens"... isn't that no comfort at all? I can't imagine wanting to go back to a place that's being bombed. But home is home I guess.
Highly recommended reading (even though I feel vaguley like a voyeur for it). More here: http://allkindsofwriting.blogspot.com/
Found via boing boing
