A Circle Unbroken

I’ll never forget, back in the day, when I was a student at LSU, a couple of friends, good ole boys from Slidell, Bruce and Bob, who turned me on to that historic record album, “Will the Circle Be Unbroken?” a collection of music and songs from our American heritage, performed and sung by the nitty gritty dirt band.

Their musical mission seemed to be to bring some classic American folk music back into the consciousness of our “turned on-tripped out” generation. The Nitty Gritty Dirt band guys were accompanied by some old-timers, including Mother Maybelle Carter and Doc Watson. The most vivid audible memory of that album was the voice of Doc Watson, a blind master of guitar flat-pickin, accompanied by his son, Merle. Little did I know at that time that the providential leading of an Almighty Lord would establish my life’s most productive and most satisfying years in a mountainside homestead in the same county where Doc Watson had lived, Watauga County, North Carolina. The county seat is Boone, where on the corner of King and Depot streets, you’ll see this parkbench with a bronze sculpture of Doc, accompanied, for a brief moment in time, by yours truly.

David Holt, an historian of American folk music, later conducted interviews, with video, of Doc in his home, near Deep Gap, where he and Rosalee had raised Merle. In those 1977 interviews, Doc would talk about their life in the Blue Ridge, their homestead and heritage. He would often mention his wife Rosalee. Maybe you could say. . . the circle was not unbroken between my appreciation of Doc’s legacy and the fulfillment of my own destiny. Back in my day, before i had moved to Boone, the Lord had enabled me to record two record albums. Something for Everyone Songs of Rowland was recorded in Nashville, in 1977, thanks to Tom Behrens. Later, in 1978, I recorded a Christian testimonial album, Revelation 5:9, in Asheville. Thanks to Eddie Swann and friends. I greatly appreciate the ensemble of musicians who helped me record those songs, old and new, on Revelation 5:9. One of those friends was David Holt, who happened to be living across Garren Creek Road from me at that time. I greatly appreciate his old-style frailing banjo in that session, with a little help from me friends, an ensemble of local musicians, including Dan Lewis on harmonica, on that old hymn from Appalachian history, Life’s Railway to Heaven. Life's Railway to Heaven Years after that recording, after Pat and I had moved to Boone, I was singing some of those songs at the Watauga County fairgrounds, North Carolina state fair. Doc’s widow, Rosalee, was listening, seated in the audience. After my set, she spoke to me kindly, commending me on my songs. As I said earlier, I’ll never forget the sound of voice when I first heard him in 1972. And I’ll never forget Rosalee’s appreciation of my song, later. As Bob Hope and Bing Crosby used to sing, long before I was born: “Thanks for the memories.” That will be my greeting to Doc, Rosalee and Merle, when I meet them in that heavenly circle in which will never be forever unbroken! King of Soul

Cleaning the Mess

an excerpt from chapter 19 of Glass half-Full

Marcus opened a can of turpentine. He tipped it slightly so that its upper contents would spill onto a rag that lay on the parking lot next to his car. With the rag partially soaked, he began rubbing on the driver’s-side door. Someone had painted a black swastika on it while he was working late. His cell phone rang. He opened it, looked at the mini-screen, saw “Grille,” which stoodfor Jesse James Gang Grille. In the last few days, however, whenever hewould see “Grille” displayed as the caller ID, it registered in his mind as “Girl,” meaning Bridget, because she would often call from there. “Hi.” “Marcus, have you heard about the explosion?” “No, where?” “At the Belmont Hotel, about 20 minutes ago. That’s where the FEF convention is. “Aleph told me he would be going there tonight. Has anybody been down there to see what’s happening?” “Kaneesha left here right after we heard it, but she hasn’t returned. I don’t think anybody’s getting in there for awhile. The police have got the whole block barricaded.” “I want to find out if anything has happened to Aleph. Don’t you think he would have left there by now?” “The TV News says the police aren’t letting anyone in or out except rescue workers.” “I’m headed over there in a few minutes, as soon as I get the car-door cleaned up. Someone painted a swastika on it.” Glass half-Full

Purloined Poetry

Once upon a time, I knew a fiddler up on a roof. . . Under the canopy of memory. . . I don’t remember growing older. When did they? and a secret chord that David pleased that pleased the Lord Though I have walked through the shadow of death, I did fear no evil. for Jesus’ resurrection has reassured me. . . So even though some things went wrong, I stand before the Lord of song, with mostly on my tongue: Alleluia! On the other hand. . . All lies and jest, still a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest. Let it be, let it be, the wistful words of wisdom… the several things that I’ve done all right and it’s singing songs Ole man River; he don’t say nothing; he just keep rollin’ along. He just keep rollin’. . . way back. . . way back. through the Mississippi darkness, rolling down to the sea. . . We came to Big Muddy and we forded that flood on the Tennessee mare and the Tennessee stud. Like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel. . . looking out from that crummy hotel room in Washington square. . . I could have told you, Vincent, this world was never meant for. . . Where have all the flowers gone, anyway, long time passing? Let the Life go by; I don’t care as long as I. . . can be on the street where we live.

I’ve looked at life from both sides now, and still somehow, it’s life’s infusions I recall. . . at age 74. . . I am I said and no one heard, not even the chair. But hey! It’s all good, y’all. I’m here to tell ya. . . so Jah say And even though some things went wrong, I stand before the Lord of so song with nothing on my tongue but Allelluia. Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no . . . .whatever happens.

A Life Journey

From Roncevaux pass across the channel, around Brittania, up to isle of Mann, a strain of Euro mankind turned westward. A young man sailed for the new world, through the harbor where the tired, the weary and the huddled masses were yearning to be free. Round and round, down and down, through mountains, southward,the people and the young man trod; they floated, by wagon and by train,through rain, down to the sunny South. At the father of American waters the Carey ancestors floated down the Euphrates of the new world, to Ur of those called to the delta, to the bayou, almost to great Gulf. And there, Pilgrim was born, in Ur of the new world, the land of many waters, where he was raised in the Roman way of worship, with host and chalice, balanced out with a sprig or two of Baptist faith, lingering in the pages of time, and he grew up and he traipsed the halls of acadamia, searching for paradise lost, comprehending the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune that flesh is heir to. And after he had grown some, he took to himself an orange, and he noticed the veins in the leaf, and the light and the balance. Then he was in that stage of life when a man must discover his own path, and so he turned eastward, to the panhandle of health and wealth, the peninsula of sunshine. He prospered; he figured out a thing or two, but after a season or three, he gravitated to the land of the high country, over themountain and through the Appalachian woods to the buncombe of liberated free youth, guided homeward by the face of an a an angel. . . drawing him to a destiny yet to be determined. . . he knew not what.

As Roland had sounded his horn at Ronceveau in ancient times the young man sounded his songs out upon the mountains of destiny, the turntables of time, contemplating the little big horn and the windows of the world, among other things. It was all good; but trouble, tribulation and vows unvowed compelled him back westward . . . to the land of open spaces, to Waco, and no more whacko whipso strangeo. And so he had an encounter with the One who broke the seals of time and destiny, the ancient seals of creation, destruction and new creation.

Then later. . . after an unsettled runaround in the wild west, he returned to his adopted high country home, he met the woman of his destiny, and they settled into the good, prolific life on the old trail where Boone had found the way westward, back in the day, where spring’s new hope, born of leaves decaying, settles into the ancient Appalachian forests of time.

Glass half-Full

Deep South 1964

from chapter 5 of King of Soul But Liberty and Justice for All is not something that just happens. As compatriots with liberation and deliverance, liberty and justice emerge triumphant from the very embattlements of human history. Where their zealous advocates manage to grab some foothold in the landscape of human struggle, freedom is fleeting not far behind. Noble aspirations are all summoned up when the careless slayings of men demand value more sacred, more holy, than the mere clashing of weapons and the expiration of breathing bodies. In our present exploration’s story, the bad news is: there is an inevitable outflow—the shedding of blood—which propels violence to ever higher levels of atrocity. The good news is: where there’s shedding of blood, Soul is not far beneath. In the summer of 1964, all of these elements of human struggle converged in an unprecedented way. Way down south, in the piney woods and sweltering fields of Mississippi, a new activist strain of blood-red camellia was taking root in that freshly-tilled civil rights black delta loam. As God had heard the cry of Abel’s blood arising from Edenic soil, he heard now the beckoning of enshrouded laborers, those dead and these living. Their muted cries called forth liberation; they demanded deliverance. So while black folk of the deep South were struggling to register their right to vote as Americans, a vast brigade of like-minded souls from other regions caught a whiff of their newly-planted liberty, and so the new brigades took it upon themselves to go down to Mississippi and lend a hand.

Go down, Moses, was the call. Go down, collective Moses. There were many who heard that call; there was even a man named Moses, Bob Moses from Harlem. He, and others who stood with him against discrimination, planted themselves in Mississippi at the crossroads of injustice and opportunity. Down here in the verdant lap of Dixie where the honeysuckles twine sweetly and the slaves had mourned bitterly, a battalion of wayfaring strangers from far and near came to cultivate the new growth offreedom. They were filling a void in the whole of the human soul. Robbed of freedom, the Soul of Man wails out a distress call; then in regions afar, theSoul of Man hears, and resonates with action. Deep calls unto deep. https://www.amazon.com/King-Soul-Louis-Carey-Rowland/dp/1545075115 Glass half-Full

London 1937

My novel, Smoke, published in 2011, begins a story set in 1937. The first scenes take place in London, May 12, Coronation day for King George VI, grandfather of the present King Charles. For the love of a woman can change the course of the world. As Helen’s face had launched a thousand Greek ships, so the affections of an American divorcée had turned the tide of royal authority from one brother to another. From one duke to another. Made ostensibly of sterner, though stammering, stuff than his older liege, Albert--soon to be called George VI--would, in only a few short hours ascend those few hallowed steps in Westminster to sit upon the throne of Edward, James, Henry and all those other regents who had ever commanded the armies or fleets of British empire. The people of England were expectant, exultant. No mean Mr. Mustard here. No, they were ready to receive a new king, now that the whole affair of Edward’s abdication had resolved itself into the ashtray of history. And all the more so, since the role of the regents was now largely ceremonial, having little effectual responsibility except to maintain that proverbial stiff upper lip with a vigilant eye upon the horizon where an eternal sun was perpetually setting, but never, of course, on the British Empire. God save the King, but it would be Mr. Baldwin, or Mr. Chamberlain, Mr. Churchill, orsome such privileged commoner who would ultimately compel English hearts and guts to bear sacrificial defence of their storied shores.

The story begins as the American businessman, Philip, accompanied by his friend, Nathan, a Londoner, are looking into a shop window, when suddenly an old man takes hold of Nathan’s arm and promptly collapses on the pavement, dead. Then the London bobby shows up. . . The policeman asked Nathan if there was anything else he had noticed about the deceased. “He handed this to me,” said Nathan, “even as he was falling to the ground.” It was a folded white paper, with this handwritten message largely scrawled in black ink: Wallris-- John Bull’s ransom will smoke out the black shirts tomorrow. If not, your bridge could burn. Chapman .. . . while a crowd of people stood and stared. They’d seen his face before. Nobody was really sure if he was from the House of Lords. https://www.amazon.com/Smoke-L-Carey-Rowland/dp/1495330834 Glass half-Full

Tree Fallen

Fallen tree down on the ground, did your demise send out a crashing sound? I know the Lord who created you. I know the Lord who laid you in my view.

How many years did you stand, tall and strong, before it all went wrong? How many seasons came and went before to forest floor you’re sent? I wander slowly in these woods, shaded by all these leafy hoods. Clear blue sky, in the heavens high, did you send wind to make trees fly? Flying downward to the ground, did this tree make a crashing sound? How many years did this stand tall, before the crashing, fatal fall?

Losing leaves, bleeding sap, this mighty tree laid down to take a nap. Timber, timber, standing tall, did you cry out in God’s fateful call? Oh mighty tree, oh mighty tree, methinks you’re a lot like me. Someday I shall fall down like you, when I then join the heavenly crew. Glass half-Full