A
non-New Orleanian brought out of anonymity into a kindred blood stream
A
mutt culture of Zulus, Rexes, and Yats parading for trinkets and libations
Knowing
Dylan’s hard-rain, bullets and whips and corrupt politics
Telling
the Earth through ourselves what we will never be allowed to be
Like
the children of fieldworkers staring at the plantation porch
We
are here and they are there; the sunlight will rise and the cycle
Of
faith will reprise in the pews of smiles despite
Taking
in the familial roux of artistic extensions rich and poor entwined
Lives
in postulated neighborhoods as one tapestry that no one needs proof
Faith
is the admonition of fear for a love of jazz melodies carried over on slave
ships
From
Bamboula rhythms slipped into Congo Square doing what we do without knowing why
Except
it is reflectively native to a soul of how one man’s ancestors slave
Is
now his grandson’s savior walking with lightning and stepping with thunder
Out
of the grave and death like a smiling friend with his shadowed hand
Draped
over our shoulders to bear an appreciation in the darkness
Sweetness
in the chicory to wake each morning, seeing the Saturday night bullets
And
Sunday morning trumpets bellowing the sadness blanketed in the happiness
Smiling
for the fear will not enslave these tears into perdition of acceptance
The
perseverance of charcoal and concrete, shotguns and balconies, beautiful and
crazy
Joking
with death over beignets and hot sauce, debris roast beef and oysters
French
bread and okra gumbo swirling over shrimp stock and auctioned stocks
Sold
in Jackson Square man-markets next to St. Louis cathedral rooted holy ground
We
see the old and the real; ain’t so easy to swirl that flour and oil and roux into
a lover
And
I see you trying to shake my above-ground grave, watching you ask why we stay
In
love, in love, despite the road of muck and disparity, craving the rest of
America’s reality
Thirty
years of a football team Tulane Stadium into the Superdome watching Gilliam run
To
season after season of losing on the field and revelry in the bleachers
Marching
to the band of those Bamboula rhythms whether we know where the roots of music
Come
from or not, growing like folded up humans birthing unadulterated joy,
Despite
knowing it is going to rain again tomorrow and be hot as hell humid
Like
trying to escape the wolf’s mouth and we bet on our Catahoula mutt and battle
it out
With
the assumption of evolution because the whole world knows the demon of Hilter
And
we are better mixed with the Andouille, oysters, and our trinity than any
God
damn potato and collard greens staring at each other from separate plates
Like
men in quarters and porches never saying a damn thing
We
see the Superdome as our church, and this Superbowl Sunday
The
world is coming home to worship not in New York stock-market vanity, but in
The
survival spirit of stirring the roux and seeing that chocolate brown flour
coming through,
Given
time, given slow time to meld, into heaven out of hell
Some
say abandon tear it down, some say the water is too high
There
are too many damn black spots on our ceilings
And
we say it’s the spots that make us alive, clean, rebuild coming back stronger to
survive
Parade
out the sadness to a drum beat and a horn blow and
Monday
night Saints-Falcons 2006 week three, we come back home
First
series and Steve Gleason blocks the punt through, a touchdown
And
the other levee broke
Tears
of happiness blanketing the sadness, just happy to be alive, yeah you right
And
I wasn’t even in the city, still sitting like a vagabond in somebody’s else’s
living room
Pretending
this alien land could be home and the punt block rushes memories
Of
exactly what home is because this hobo-life was like a lobotomy to forget
What
makes a people and a people, and makes America just a mix of the Earth
And
a man who would learn to use his eyes to speak because his body is crying
mutiny
Gave
so much to a people of dreams sometimes I think his body exploded in that moment
He gave his limbs to the unvierse as a conduit to be greater than a single man
And
became part of our dirty-heaven as our energy could no longer be held in his shell
He
did not ask for the moment, he didn’t know it, but he poised his soul open in
faith that flowed
And he has been surfing that wave every day since breathing love in his Rivers
And this city feels Steve Gleason as part of our rhthym
Iko
Iko unday, Jockomo feeno ah na nay through two outstretched palms
That
could shove all that water back from which it came and give us permission to
smile with tears
The
permission of thirty-plus years of losing seasons knowing faith is a currency
of the mad
And
we are truly the madmen and women of love, lost in its flood, smiling at the
beating sun
When
we can no longer see our feet rooted to this soggy ground
Lifting
ourselves up to the midnight sounds of the mosquitoes buzzing our ears
Hands
holding the notes of our trumpets and recipe lists in our heads
Still
remembering because we will never forget; so thankful, so thankful that we are
still here
Can't add much, except this is really excellent. The peoms as a whole have been really strong.
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