LIBERATION CHANNEL MEDIA
Friday, February 03, 2006
Freedom's Epitaph
Freedom's Epitaph
The streets are empty except for an occasional car the roars down the rain-slick pavement.
A gust of early morning wind scatters paper, leaves, and other debris to momentary places of rest.
The sign over Gentry's Grocer sways to and fro like a battleship in labor, as a dog saunters across Melvin's Gas Station lot, stops near a pump, raises a shaggy hind leg and continues its journey--finally disappearing the two-story houses that line the street.
Lamp posts are resolute, almost as if at military attention, in the drizzle as each drop passes within their brilliant light.
The poolroom at the corner projects a faint shimmer into the darkness surrounding it. The same darkness that earlier succumbed to blaring music, street-corner gambling, neighborhood vice, Christians on their way to Mother Bowman's Tabernacle (a building that once housed a nightclub), Muslims enroute to Dar-Ul Masjid for the last prayer of the day, and little children on their way to Gentry's for goodies and mischief.
A variety of empty wine bottles line the wall beside the barbershop. They are a vivid proclamation of deterioration to all who use this major thoroughfare.
There is blood on the sidewalk from last night's stabbing and robbery of an intoxicated white man who sought directions while passing through the area--evidently from the wrong people. Time will have to wash all the blood away. The rain has failed.
Dogs begin to howl at the distant wail of sirens. They had done the same hours earlier during the emergency that involved the crimson spot on the concrete. Their sounds tend eerie vibrations to this now vacated area of Greensboro.
There is a man laying in the fetal position in Mother Bowman's doorway. It is as if the brick and mortar of the church has become his mother--protecting him from the environment but incapable of shielding him from what is supposed to be.
The hazards of living are imprinted upon his face; a face that reflects the total anguish of self-depravity.
Acrid odors of wine and an unbathed body blend with a surge of wind heading North.
Maybe the derelict's search for freedom touched many points of the globe before ending in the bottle's snare of deadly sweet juices.
Can there be hope for this man who now languishes in the calm repose of dreams upon the steps of a nightclub/bar, now turned holy? Somehow the memory of the music, the profanity of the bar and, now, the fire and brimstone preachings that occupy the memory have coughed and spat this being to his present reconciled position.
The eternal paradox is himself.
He stirs--momentarily, mumbles pitifully to himself as much as he does to God his epitaphical question: "Why?"
The word continues to linger as if a chimed note in a well-polished orchestra, while the conductor of death batons the musician to finis.
The streetlights flicker in soldier-like salute to the dead as the rain mixes with the dribble of foam flowing from his mouth; and the wind whistles in to guide his soul to freedom.
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The streets are empty except for an occasional car the roars down the rain-slick pavement.
A gust of early morning wind scatters paper, leaves, and other debris to momentary places of rest.
The sign over Gentry's Grocer sways to and fro like a battleship in labor, as a dog saunters across Melvin's Gas Station lot, stops near a pump, raises a shaggy hind leg and continues its journey--finally disappearing the two-story houses that line the street.
Lamp posts are resolute, almost as if at military attention, in the drizzle as each drop passes within their brilliant light.
The poolroom at the corner projects a faint shimmer into the darkness surrounding it. The same darkness that earlier succumbed to blaring music, street-corner gambling, neighborhood vice, Christians on their way to Mother Bowman's Tabernacle (a building that once housed a nightclub), Muslims enroute to Dar-Ul Masjid for the last prayer of the day, and little children on their way to Gentry's for goodies and mischief.
A variety of empty wine bottles line the wall beside the barbershop. They are a vivid proclamation of deterioration to all who use this major thoroughfare.
There is blood on the sidewalk from last night's stabbing and robbery of an intoxicated white man who sought directions while passing through the area--evidently from the wrong people. Time will have to wash all the blood away. The rain has failed.
Dogs begin to howl at the distant wail of sirens. They had done the same hours earlier during the emergency that involved the crimson spot on the concrete. Their sounds tend eerie vibrations to this now vacated area of Greensboro.
There is a man laying in the fetal position in Mother Bowman's doorway. It is as if the brick and mortar of the church has become his mother--protecting him from the environment but incapable of shielding him from what is supposed to be.
The hazards of living are imprinted upon his face; a face that reflects the total anguish of self-depravity.
Acrid odors of wine and an unbathed body blend with a surge of wind heading North.
Maybe the derelict's search for freedom touched many points of the globe before ending in the bottle's snare of deadly sweet juices.
Can there be hope for this man who now languishes in the calm repose of dreams upon the steps of a nightclub/bar, now turned holy? Somehow the memory of the music, the profanity of the bar and, now, the fire and brimstone preachings that occupy the memory have coughed and spat this being to his present reconciled position.
The eternal paradox is himself.
He stirs--momentarily, mumbles pitifully to himself as much as he does to God his epitaphical question: "Why?"
The word continues to linger as if a chimed note in a well-polished orchestra, while the conductor of death batons the musician to finis.
The streetlights flicker in soldier-like salute to the dead as the rain mixes with the dribble of foam flowing from his mouth; and the wind whistles in to guide his soul to freedom.
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