"...tableau"

A friend mentioned a book to me. “The Language of Flowers” I have that title. It was was of the few items I took with me to the street. It’s a small joyful book. Flowers their names how they got them, and their place in artistic mythology. Tho' battered I still have it.

As in a scene from a movie. I was resting,…not sleeping such is suicide out there. It began to snow. My first night in snow. Insulated with news papers I read the story of flowers.

A tear jerking tableau.

I can hear the heartful music. Ya has to know how to work an audience. Though at the time I was just trying to stay warm, and sane. The dramatic possibilities came much later.

This among the reasons I never did that play. The one act performance of my Houseless year. Always seemed manipulative.

I didn’t, and don’t want pity.

I wanted to know how people could be thrown away. Their worth stripped from them. They become ghost walkers. Unseen. Then as now I want to be seen. We are all living aware beings. We must be acknowledged as being alive, and of value.

"...Flow"

A few photos I took while “Houseless” on the Outside. 

There are many morning shots because come dawn I had to clear out. The alley shown is one of where I rested,…not slept. This till my sister put me up in hotels while a home could be found, and renovated. 

Even then I’d crouch, and doze in the corner of the hotel room. Laying down was not done.  On the street such is suicide. I’d position myself so I could see every angle out there. Even in a four star hotel I listened for movement. 

The habit was with me for years after. That first hotel night I felt heard 86 movements. I remember because I wrote it into a journal I kept. I had meant one day to do a one person act based on it. I never did. 

I left or tried to leave it behind me. It was a long while before I could sleep in a bed. Longer before I stopped counting sounds. Try that. Count the movements that surround you. You will find that even birds have shadows. 

This will give you a sense of the outside. I don’t write these notes to upset. I write because I must. Sometimes like now it just comes back. Like a memory of war. I can’t stop it only flow with it.

"...unknowing"

The Solstice. I time portaled. Peach Bonnet Wisconsin December 21st 3:26pm 1904~CE.

Yule decorations were up. Not as many nor gaudy as later years. They were homespun. Warmly sincere. The quiet strikes you. The air pristine.
The main street unpaved. Shops gas lit. ...So quiet.
A woman with a child came out of a Sundry store. A 7-11 to us. The woman nodded the child openly smiled. People not yet afraid of strangers.
I walked this place. This peaceful though complex human place. So unknowing of the terrors, and wonders to come.
I took a quick snap of folks across the way. This with a period box camera. As new to them as 3-D iPhones to us.
I'll come back in their Spring my next afternoon. This when Peach Bonnet will be in full leaf.

With that I shifted back to Tomorrowland.

*( I'm storing this story for Christmas eve...I hope I remember I put it here.) 

"...shot dead"

 

I found this online handy list of helpful instructions for Negros. Make a copy, and review it constantly.

“…it all comes down to not resisting arrest.”

Don’t stop resisting arrest. Never stop resisting resisting arrest. Also, don’t put your hands up. Police view this as deadly force. If you do put your hands up especially when ordered by police you will be shot dead.

Don’t walk to the store walk on the street drive a car ride a bus or train especially don’t sit on a park bench. These in many circumstances these are viewed as capital offences. Don’t defend yourself. while walking home unarmed.  A white vigilante stalking you in an SUV with loaded guns will see that as just cause to kill you. The police, but especially judges will agree.

If you insist on being a Negro working  in a gas station. Don’t play your music. A white man who might not share your particular musical preferences. They’ll call the police who may, and have at times shot Negros dead for this offense.

Don’t defend yourself. Not ever in any circumstance as this will be seen as attempted murder on your part. Don’t commit petty misdemeanors,…well you shouldn’t anyway. However this usually gets small fines or verbal warnings if you’re white. If you ain’t that can, and will get you shot in the face. Also, don’t mind your own business and be sure to mind your own business. Don’t obey or disobey the laws.

Don’t drive a car. Don’t question white authority. Don’t show too much deference to white authority as this seems fishy. Don’t ever question any white man woman or child. This can get you killed.

Don’t stay home hiding in your house. Police will kick your door in, and kill you. Then they’ll find out they had the wrong address. They’ll have a good laugh then go next door, and kill the right Negro.

Everything above has in recent times happened. It’s still happening, and will continue to happen.  So please keep this list with you at all times. Unless the police find it assume you’re subversive, and shoot you on general principal.

Otherwise have a nice day, and Happy Halloween.

"...ice nine"

Here's another memory from years ago. "I remember "Ice Fog". It never happens in the City. However I remember being with friends long ago driving around upper Vermont. We drove into something we'd none of us had ever seen before. A shimmering fog. We stopped got out, and walked in it. It was an actual fog of ice crystals. A fog of diamonds. So amazing. A routine miracle of nature. I say routine because nature just does this,...if we would just stop, and look."

"...dragonflies"

I set my portal pocket watch for farthest I’ve ever gone. Three thousand years. The fifty first century.

Specifically the Bronx May19th 11:16am EST, 5019~CE.

I figured that part of the former City would still be above water. …it was. 

There above the the remains of an ancient subway exit. The 241st Street/Wakefield Avenue stop. 

I climbed the overgrown stairway to the open air, and wilderness. What remained of the city was engulfed in tropical rain forest. Much as the Inca towers before it. 

Giant dragonflies flew above me. 

It was very warm, and humid. No trace of people as far as I could see.

However the city portions above the deeper ocean is home to insects, and small mammals. 

I sat on a moss covered log, and read my emails. How brief are empires. 

“…kind”

I went back to July 23rd 3:47 EDT, 862 BCE Manhattan. Wilderness, and rather cool even though summer. The long jump froze my dark matter pocket watch. There three days, and a night. This subjective time as it rebooted.

No native folks I could find.
Though they found me, and were watching. I awoke on the second day to dried fish, and nuts wrapped in leaves next to me. I spent three days living, and being fed, and protected by the Mannahatta people.
I never saw the kind folks that took care of me. On my last night I left them a small carved blue jay. 

I shimmered neon blue,...and was gone.