The Tragedy of Our America

The crack in our “liberty and justice for all” has been there all along.

From the moment that a human was placed on a colonial auction block for sale, we were in tragic territory.

Our grand immigrating odyssey to escape religious oppression, our epic fleeing from ethnic oppression, our pioneer yearning for wild open land—it was all fractious, unbeknownst to us, the moment we tolerated humans being shackled in slavery. 

’T’was then we became double-minded behind the eloquence of our independence declaration, allowing our rift to lengthen further  when we dilly-dallied with terminology of “three-fifths” of a Person in the very first Article of our Constitution. We were already cracked in the head although we knew it not.

We admitted it not.

The reverberation of our ringing liberty signaled a grand, noble experiment in split-personality disorder reverberating from sea to shining sea for all the world to see.

We’ve been evading the issue for 300 years. Freedom was supposed to be our main deal—supposed to be what separated our grand democratic experiment from that ole fuddy-duddy monarchical feudal system back in the old country.

But our guiding principle was splitting from the start. We were cracked in the head, missing  a rhetorical point or two, not playing with a full deck, and we didn't even know it.

Or we admitted it not.

We were split in two when we allowed Kansas the legal machinery of enforced servitude while turning Nebraska loose to freely settle the wide open prairie.

Bipolar racism degenerated into suicidal atrocity when we turned George Custer loose to show Sitting Bull who was boss at Little Big Horn. Our  cracked cruelty bit the dust that day as the American project descended into new depths of Tragedy.

     Sitting Bull’s Eyes 

There has been something wrong with us all along. Our great quest for liberty and justice for all was deformed from the start. 

When we denied Dred Scott freedom for himself and his family, we were already on the slippery slopes of failure.

When we allowed the Fugitive Slave Law of 2850 to foil Harriet Tubman’s grand underground railroad project, we were moving in the wrong direction.

Even a goddam civil war did not solve the problem of our schizoid derangement. 

No, our  Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde malaise persisted past that bloody war; it dragged on into 20th-century malevolence, smoldering beneath pointy-headed sheets; it became set in splittering stone as we raised monuments to the heroes of racist rebellion; it slithered beneath legislative obfuscation of segregation, discrimination, spawning incrimination. . .

Until  enforced integration began making a dent in our misdeeds.

Our white privilege hypocrisy was still obstinately taking us one step forward, two steps back in our grand liberty experiment. All along the pathways of freedom, our motivations were rift, double-minded in all our ways as the ancient serpentine spirit of split-nature slithered past Dr. King’s good dream before assassinating him in the process. 

Rodney King’s bad roadside dream morphed into a national nightmare; it permeated our personality, sliding into  our social media scheme through a blindsiding video of deranged Derek-cop smothering Big Floyd under his knee.

 Now, staggering under the influence of a chief executive whose power-hungry pursuit is grounded in an agenda  to divide us instead of unite us— so as to conquer once and for all our noble impulse toward justice and equality— we are doomed to another bell-splitting death-knell as all hell breaks loose.  

Tragedy! Tragedy! I say unto thee. All is lost! Although founded in liberty, we are steeped in Tragedy! Tragedy!

Then I woke up. What the hell?

King of Soul

First American Looters

December 16, 1773.  Sons of Liberty protested unfair taxes imposed by the British .gov in the Tea Act of 1773. Armed renegades, many of them disguised as indigenous natives,  destroyed an entire shipment of tea by dumping the tea kegs in Boston Harbor. 

As days turned into weeks, months and years, revolution-minded Colonials wrangled their upstart rage into a Revolution. 

227 years pass.

May 26, 2020.  Citizens of Minneapolis gathered in the dusk hours to protest the police asphyxiation of unarmed local resident, George Floyd. 

As news of the gentle giant’s death was reported nationally through mainstream and social media, widespread protests were rapidly organized in cities across the USA. Irate Americans, many of them masked as Covid-resisters, marched through streets all across the continent and beyond.

As days turned into weeks, a viral-video of Big Floyd’s  cop-inflicted murder propelled thousands of  Americans to become more and more infuriated. They marched in vehement protest against the obvious injustice of Officer Derek Chauvin’s smothering his gently-pleading victim. 

As protesters gathered across the nation, their  intentions became more difficult for police and other law enforcement personnel to identify. Joined by multiple interests groups and, in some cases, extremist instigators, protestors in some places descended into rioting and looting. Unpredictable crowds became unmanageable in some cities. 

Law enforcement officers across the nation faced very difficult decisions. Protecting private property and restoring law and order became no easy matter, no walk in the park, and certainly no walk in Lafayette Park. 

In the midst of nationwide mayhem, the chief executiive expressed adamant resolve to protect private property, while voicing no sympathy for the deceased citizen whose unjust death had sparked the protests. Our temporary chief executive  demonstrated no awareness of the injustice in that original offense—the murder of an innocent American.

Rather, he seemed preoccupied with using the news development to foment political division among his people in pursuance of his own obsession with power.

 Lines of ideological and political association became blurred in the fog of teargas and an insidious fog of class war.

As public law and order deteriorated, the President’s stubborn insensitivity silently implied his approval of police overreaction, as law enforcers were convincing themselves further and further that protection of private property would be their highest property.

“Don’t tread on me,” enraged American Colonials had said after the Tea Party ignited their wrath in 1773.

“Don’t tread on me,” enraged Americans are saying now, after one lethal-weapon knee  treading on George Floyd’s lifeless neck.

In American history, the upstarts who instigated the Boston Tea Party are lionized as heroes. 

They were mad about taxes, so they destroyed British property.

In our third century as a nation, enraged protesters have regrettably provoked some destructive overreaction.

They were mad about the murder of their brethren; then some property got destroyed along the way.

Will the judgements of history render our present dissidents as heroes?

Or will the dissidents of 2020 go down as rioting looters?

I tell you what. When I get to heaven, I’m going to ask those Boston TeaParty protesters what they think about it. 

Which is the greater offense to spark protest in a free society—Unfair Taxes by King, or Murder by Cop?

And just how pertinent is some lunatic-fringe  looting when compared to the ongoing crime. . . killing of American citizens ( George Floyd, Brionna Taylor, Ahmed Arbery, Michael Brown, Eric Garner, Freddie Gray . . . Emmett Till, Dread Scott, 3/5ths of a person here, 3/5 of a person there . . .) killing by their own appointed protectors?

 

Glass half-Full

Big Floyd's Houston Launch

Fountain of Praise Church gathered in Houston today to send George  home to Jesus, because it was through this city—Third Ward and Cumi Homes and Jack Bates high school that George Floyd lived his formative years.
Here are a few thoughts and words brought forth along the way during his memorial service; these remembrances and truths become a small part of  the legacy of George Floyd. In today’s memorial service,  many like-minded Christian believers—inspired by these words, songs, praises— renew their resolve to partner with God in redeeming the world.
From Pastor Remus Wright:
“. . . when this mortal will have put on immortality, then will come about the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. . .”
Big Floyd is now re-united with his Creator, Savior.

George Floyd changed the world.
 “Let justice flow down like the waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
A warrior mindset in the mind of murderous cop killed George, when the officer’s mind should have rightfully been to perform his duty of protecting the people in that Minneapolis neighborhood where George was smothered, in eight minutes and forty-six seconds, under the knee of a bad cop.
But now, in the wake of his death, we wirtness and hear the worldwide celebration of George Floyd’s life.
“What good can come out of Nazareth?. . . What good can come out of Third Ward Houston?” someone said at the funeral today. . .
His little brother said George is going to change the world.
Yes, that has already happened, and continues to unfold and proliferate in an incredibly big way that nobody could have ever predicted.
The mayor of Houston pointed out that what men meant for evil God has used for good.
His family and friends said . . .



Big George was everybody’s shelter, a ghetto angel, gentle giant.
All students and graduates of Jack Bates high school love, admire and fondly remember Big George, a great athlete and friend.
Cyril spoke for all the Christian believers present  when he said To God be the Glory for Big Floyd’s incredible life.
God took a rejected stone and made it the cornerstone of a worldwide movement.
We need to be partnering with God to redeem the world.
George’s daughter said “My daddy changed the world.”
We see that happening now.

One person expressed this hope: Racism did not start in our lifetime, but racism can end in our lifetime.
That's what I call faith like a mustard seed.
“All things happen for the good of those who love the Lord and are called according to his purpose.”
Nakita Foxx and Houston Ensemble sang: “We offer Praise.”
Rev. Al Sharpton urged all believers to put on the armor of God to fight against principalities and powers in high places. . . to resist wickedness in high places.
We still have a lot of work to do to get this racist mess straightened out.

Seismic reformational life-changing work has been launched in the wake of big George’s life, in the name of Jesus Christ.
Make straight a way in the wilderness— a path of righteousness for our Lord.



Many thanks to TVstation  KHOU-11 of Houston, broadcasting this memorial send-off so that we could experience its power and historic thrust in other parts of the USA and the world.

Glass half-Full

Freedom rings from our Mountainside

Yesterday, about a thousand—I guess—people gathered here in our Appalachian town to march, cheer, listen, and show solidarity with black citizens of our United States of America.
Our positively excited assemblage of people reminded me of the good ole days. Back in the ’60’s-70’s when I was an LSU student we would conduct such gatherings to express public dissent against unjust killing and mistreatment of humans.

Our march yesterday in the bright June sunshine was organized and led by Raheim Andrews, a home boy who graduated from the same high school as my three offspring.



With urging from Raheim, and a little divine help urged by Reggie Hunt, we gathered peacefully and joyfully to emphasize the truth that Black Lives do indeed Matter.
. . . especially the lives of now-deceased citizens George Floyd, Brionna Taylor, and Ahmaud Arbery, whose names will go down in American history.
Toussaint Romain, deputy general counsel at Appalachian State served as keynote speaker, passionately linking our collective message with the legacy of Dr. King:

“I have a Dream!. . .”
“From every mountainside, let freedom ring!”

That  freedom ringing from the mountainside includes our local voices reverberating beneath our Boone mountain, Howard’s Knob, in the background. . .



Here's a personal aside: to hear my musical portrayal of Dr. King’s mountain inspiration, listen at:
      Mountaintop
      http://www.micahrowland.com/carey/Mountaintop.mp3

Keynote speaker Romain strongly emphasized that this movement is all about fixing a broken justice system, not just disciplining a few bad cops.
Boone Police were very friendly and helpful in their conducting the crowd along King Street.
Alex Fuller and Montana Mills, local young people, also spoke to encourage us that racial justice can be achieved when folks are willing to come together and work toward fixing our broken justice system.

For a more thorough coverage of our march from ASU to the Watauga County courthouse, go here:
https://www.wataugademocrat.com/raheim-andrews-speaks-at-justice-walk-in-boone-6-7-2020/youtube_0b1d1df3-96ce-5c8d-8124-f031daabc32e.html

King of Soul 

The Killing of George Floyd

No criminal was he.
but rather, the victim of one,
as on the video we see.

No violent man was he.
but rather, a disciple of
the Prince of Peace he be.

No vagrant was he.
but rather a tireless worker
for the Lord in eternity.



As the slain blood of Abel
cried out to the ground
up to the Lord a sound

So now does George’s breath
cry out to the atmosphere
for God, and us, to hear:

“I can’t breathe,’
cried he
as the killer
pinned George down
to the ground.
Now Big George’s breath cries out
from the ground,
a righteous sound!
On the net it’s found
around the world, all ‘round.

“A life well done, my faithful one,”
the Lord says to George
as Big George went home
never more to roam.

As for the one who pinned him down,
the writing’s on the wall
to be seen by all
all the world around.

Mene
Mene Tekel
Upharsin
Peres

In Mene appolis,
in Mene appolis
You forced him,
Derek.

The writing’s on the wall
to be seen by all:
“I can’t breathe!”
As America seethes.

King of Soul