rootwork the rootsblog: a cyberhoodoo webspace

rootsbag: minimum maintenance and a mission to serve

TUESDAY

hello world

writing well if slow, work made qualitative leap last week,
all of a sudden i got the character complexity going

something i been struggling with all my literary life
is all of a sudden effortless

amazing, 55 years old, been doing this 32 years now
and still learning the tricks of my trade, amazing

had a good workshop in brooklyn this week
got some strong new people coming in
made some decisions about institutionalization
and preparing for the next generation of new ren

im outta here, back to the woodshed
just peeped up a minute to see whats going on

may do some commentary later in the day
depending on how much work gets done

in struggle
rdoc

FRIDAY

hey everybody
im so out of it i put monday for last post when it was actually thursday
also it seems that in addition to all that chilling, i seem to be afraid of this section
one of those its so important and what if i blow it fears

also it seems as i tentatively get going that a lot of these 70 or so pages
of old manuscript are counterfeit, id say this is about a 40 page project
once i lose the slush, which frightens me because i see this as a 300 page novel
and i just lost 40 pages of that, (well at least that helps my time factor)

then i start thinking how will this integrate with previous segments
and i start thinking about structural possibilities but i say no, not now
just dont have the leeway, my focus is ruthless, thinking tell the story, tell the story, just tell
that story storyteller, do your thing, tell the story, tell it boy, tell it like it aint been told, just tell it, tell it, tell it

its like im standing there and im macking and its an epic mack and i got to keep macking and weaving that magic mack until every thing around me is transformed and a new world is born

and its the story thats shaping the narrative and its already strange enuf thank you

i got to go into this phase without expectation and just go where it leads me
let it be whatever it wants to be and trust myself to come out on the other end
with a worthy product - i been training for this all my life

i apologize to folk who bored by all this
it aint about you no more, its just me and this damned novel
thats all i got on my mind

im outta here
hopefully i can do some commentary
tomorrow or something

rdoc

MONDAY
havent done a lick of work since thursday

bonnie been giving me the look but im cool
i told her im chilling - my bodacity left her breathless

a whole week down made me a little nervous too but what can you do
man can not live by work alone, sometime you got to chill

i figure the old internal computer was processing new paradigms
for last push - started working last night, just a little, a coupla pages
but i can feel a groove coming on i nope i pray

i have learned in 30 years of this struggle to create
to go with the flow

but im even more desperate for more gears now 
so my posting gon be sporadic likely

bonnie say and you havent even been posting either

most of the time its are you doing that weblog again
instead of real writing - now its and you havent even been posting

im chilling baby, im chilling, thats all i say, im chilling
what else can i say, it it aint coming it aint coming

and if i aint writing novelwork dont nothing else get done either - nothing
but i see that the bigdogs have joined the fray on neworleans
so i know thats in good hands

black commentator was on leave during the flood and sorely missed
but they back now and they barking like only black commentator can:

The Battle for New Orleans
Only a Real Movement Can Win this War

by Glen Ford and Peter Gamble
Black Commentator

"New Orleans represents a challenge to African Americans, unprecedented since the epic struggles of the Fifties and Sixties. The perverse reality, to which African Americans must rise, is that the man-made disaster in the Gulf provides what may be the last chance to build a real Movement, encompassing the broadest sectors of Black America. Cruel history presents the catastrophe as an unwanted opportunity, a test of Black people’s capacity for the operational unity craved by the vast bulk of African Americans. The pain and anger in Black America is all but universal, and demands collective action, the outcome of which will largely define the true State of Black America as it has evolved over the last two generations.

Let us put it bluntly: If Black America fails to configure its human, organizational and material resources to effectively resist the theft and ultimate disfigurement of New Orleans, then we will be forced to confront the existence of fundamental, crippling flaws in the African American polity.

There is much reason for optimism. Movements often need monsters, and George Bush and his minions are a horror show. The Katrina debacle plunged Bush’s Black approval rating to 12 percent, as  measured by the prestigious Pew Research Center. That’s only slightly above what most pollsters consider the approval category’s irreducible minimum - "about as low as you can go," according to Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies senior analyst David Bositis. Few doubt that the administration’s callous and ineffectual handling of the Katrina crisis ("negligent homicide," charged Black Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney caused the near-evaporation of Bush’s thin Black support.

All African American eyes are on New Orleans, that once-flawed, now devastated jewel of the Diaspora whose people have been dispersed to the far corners of the United States: Alaska, Utah and, literally,  who knows where, in addition to large Black population centers. The dissolution of a major African American city - far eclipsing in scale the destruction of Black Tulsa in 1921 - has seared the collective Black psyche. The pain and anger in Black America is all but universal, and demands collective action effectively coordinated by those who purport to be leaders. In the process, new leadership - and  hopefully, a "new" New Orleans that is fit for mass Black habitation - will emerge."

full article on black commentator

okay, a couple of quickies and im outta here
i got so much work to do

speaking of which mr im so busy came up with this idea to reach college students

ive always wanted to start some black college political/cultural/intellectual group that spreads to campuses cause i like the idea of catching them while they students and choosing they passions

a training ground for young players

so im thinking im going to offer a monthly (hopefully not weekly) column to
the campus black student paper with a african american college student focus

then if they take it try to syndicate it to other black college papers and use that platform
to form some black college student organization the nature of which i have not quite decided

like i got time for that, i will put it on the to be done list
along with a dozen other great ideas in need of followthru

okay, some quickies and mr im too busy is outta here

defense department starting to use the discredited bodycounts
of vietnam as a measure of military progress

as of this week:  2000 dead us soldiers, 30000 dead iraqi civilians
give or take, and no telling how many wounded - smart move defense deptartment

another graduation

death of rosa parks: she got her work done
you go girl

miers withdrawal, i kinda hate to see her go,

no telling what manner maddog replacement
will placate the rightwing

id rather have a vague and perhaps incompetent rightwing warrior
than a slavering and perhaps competent maddog anyday

some folk make the case that bush doesnt care about abortion
his concern is being allowed to wage war as he sees fit
and his goal with both roberts and miers is a compliant court

(can you imagine, bush threatens a veto of mccains no torture bill
unless cia is exempted from torture ban - its already a
shame that the senate has to pass such a bill)

golden spiderwebs

gop still trying
to lure blackfolk into they little trap

a lot of the rightwing victories are cause they
got no shame - will spit on you and tell you its raining

boyz in the hood

billl cosby went to compton to push his
vision of black empowerment, interesting to see him
trying to do some followthru - his problematic approach
coupled with the class issues that attend katrina
has brought issues of class and commitment to the fore

this is a good thing - dialogue on critical issues
is always good

im gone, duty calls

ive got 2 pages written of about 70
to be done in next 30 days

i will keep you posted

rdoc

 

SUNDAY
didnt do a lick of work yesterday

dont i wish

this company has been claiming that they
can use your dna to find out where you come from
in africa, a lot of black celebrities doing it
as pr for the company

sounds like a trick to me yall
playing off our longing to know

im just as tempted as anybody else
but it sounds like a trick to the old rootdoctor
and i dont play that

like quickdraw mcgraw say
i'll do the tricking around here babalouie

americas angriest blackman

speaking of cartoons
a fellow who bills himself
americas angriest blackman
now has his cartoon on the cartoon network

was reading about where in one segment he mounts a trial
of r kelly for his transgressions (since nobdy else seems able to)

and he has r kellys advocates, young black folk festoned w/
gold teeth, braids and long fingernails get into a fight
with accusers like cornel and rosa

and at one point has one of the defenders hit rosa parks
with a chicken wing and tell her to 'sit down, thats what
you known for anyway"

o this gon be hot, this gon real hot

this was originally developed for fox tv
but they couldnt handle it so it went to the cartoon network

some of his fans feared that he would pull his punches for tv
but mcgruder dont know how to pull no punches

apparently dave chappell walked off his recent comedy show
in a dramatic hollywood style breakdown because
he didnt like whitefolk laughing at the black stereotypes

i know how he feels, when im doing a performance and
theres nothing but whitefolk in the audience you feel
like a minstrel sometime

carl rux got a piece called no black male show today
no not today

i was trained to do performance to move the people,
to move resistance and generate action by the people
but most of my stuff is college circuit these days
even though politically based, folk mostly come to hear me sing and dance

(you know, thats on me, from now on ima include more exhortation
w/each performance, more griotic/political commentary)

mcgruder say he dont care:

"dave and I talk regularly. I think I have a better compass [than chappelle], so I think it won't bother me as much that white Americans are laughing at the stuff some blacks are embarrassed by," mcgruder says. "i think we as black people spend way too much time worrying about what white people think of us.

thing about mcgruder though is that sometimes it look
like he dont care what blackfolk think about him either
he willing to speak the hard truths

boondocks on tv yall, the cartoon network
i advise you to tape it cause
i suspect its not gon be on very long

rdoc

SATURDAY
showtime

the special counsel investigating the leak
just put up a website for public announcements

ooohhh, somebodys going down
showtime - lets get this party started

that times reporter ought to get charged with
lying to the people, aint that a felony too

a million more million more marches

i guess you will notice that i havent said much
about the million more march
im not really down for marching and speechifying
these days, though this account gave some stirring
words from the speakers

but i feel like the days of marches is over
strategies of the weak and the powerless

and i get the feeling that reparations has run its course thank god
i dont see any indication where reparations was a focus of
any of these speakers
all of them seem to be emphasizing self help scenarios

i also dismiss apocalyptic radicals who sneer at any strategy
as also useless, waiting for america to fall is not a strategy

i have put a lot of thought into what a 21st century
strategy of black empowerment would entail

i got two warrior clans, community activists and black elites

community organizing is always the primary strategic posture
we have to do all that we can to organize our communities
to empower them and make them functional and even beautiful

my two warrior clans often dont work well together and i spend a lot of energy
trying to integrate those two threads of struggle
the cosby thing, a crossroads moment, is indicative of that tension

im an elite myself
attempting to function as an instrument of the community

elites, in particular committed elites, are generally hesitant to name themselves so because its not good game, its insufficiently humble, its graceless and strategically questionable but as part of my rootsblog rhetorical strategy, im going to chronicle my game as i run it,  and one thing you got to understand is that i dont have any shame about being an elite and running elite game, or as i prefer to consider it:

counterelite

the basic thrust of my game is to influence the influencers, all classes and all sectors
i want them all to look to the hoodoo man for game advice
activists all sectors are my primary audience
the very same ones unwilling to look at new paradigms of struggle

im consistently being called a racist in hoodoo circles
because i refuse to quit speaking out for blackpeople

i ignore the cant we all just be people folk
and there is no race but the human race folk

and try to explain to them if i and and other black achievers
accept that premise it leaves the black community
adrift in a floodplain of  pain, with no leadership, with nobody
to guide and protect them in an increasingly complex society

no, thats not going to happen
i am susceptible to the we all just human argument
but i will never abandon the black community, never

thats why im always giving adam banks play
i so admire his commitment to the community

so anyway ive been putting some thought into the necessary vehicles
for the next phase of struggle, the mainstream activist organizations
seem to be stumped, the naacp, the urban leage, the nation, the
black radical congress, the leadership commission, what are they doing

doesnt seem to be anything that will change the fundamental status quo
or maybe im just being impatient, because i know that change is a
generation thing, you have to change the souls of black folk if you
want fundamental change

i have decided that it takes 3 generations to effect fundamental change
what we know in our heads our children will know in their minds, their children in their souls

but the shortgame, how to effect immediate social empowerment
of black communities and the poor and exploited in general

how to secure individual and communal security from rapacious institutions
this is a big issue with me, i hate it when big powerful institutions dump on
folk, take advantage of them and exploit them and do all kinds of harm to them
i hate that with a passion

and its clear to me that we have to do micro organizing
we each and every one of us has to commit to community organizing
whenever and however we can

and we got to be willing to speak hard truths to the people
we got to stop accepting excuses for african american dysfunction
on all levels

okay, im about to get too involved in this one
i think that i will have to do a full paper on
where do we go from here

but you know i did that once about 20 years ago, a piece called
why way black america, for essence magazine back when they were
political, and nothing changed, tried to lay out some strategies in mojo rising
and nothing changed, dont know why i still have such faith in the power of the word

i guess you have no choice but to keep on hitting that lick and accepting
the glacial pace of social change

in the words of those great philosophers the three stooges
step by step and inch by inch, sloooowly we turn

i maintain this weblog in spite of the fact that i put so much work in it
for so little readership because its a different dynamic with the world
and every year that i holdon i figure i will make my vision that much more manifest

i just got to make sure that when i speak i speak in words of power
and i dont waste my time with the unessential
and even if i dont get any play in my lifetime, my day will come

i noticed the other day that jesse jackson talking about we need
"longdistance runners" and was like, well, folk finally catching up to john o

i aspire to cosmology

so the pressure of daily wordage connected to current events
helps me work out the dimensions of my cosmology

for instance this week came up with phrase :"our mission of service"
and thats important to my vision, to infuse blackfolk with a 'mission of service'
because it is only in service that you lead and my ideological goal
is to make african american culture so strong it becomes a if not the
definitive culture of the future

i recognized in that phrase a step, so ima hit that over and over
until it becomes a recognizeable part of my vision and becomes
a stepping stone for further speculation on the concept of 'service'

while working out my cosmology, rootsblog also gets the word out
to those who are interested

i guess i am so far out there that i should expect a small readership
but hey jesus didnt have but 12 disciples and look what he did

when you aspire to prophecy, being out ahead of the pack
comes with the territory

im outta here, obviously going to have to do a full piece on
where do we go from here, got one up already but it was done
maybe 5, 6, 7 years ago and needs updating bad

but once again, minimum maintenance, ie touch up but no real revision
cant touch that until i get this novel done and on that note, back to work

be well my friends
my love to you all

rdoc

FRIDAY
of mules and men and zora neale

interesting discussion on the rootworker list
over whether zora neale plagiarized mules and men

folk started passionately debating whether
her work was historically correct or was it a lie

my contribution as follows:

------------------------

fellow travelers

as a practitioner of the african american griotic school
of literary hoodoo zora neale was more than a folklorist

she was a mythmaker

in her efforts to shape africanamerican folkculture
into hoodoo myth
she took liberties with reality all the time
in her 'nonfiction' as well as her fiction

thats what literary hoodoo do
first and aboveall we are mythmakers
playing games with reality

and not only did she have no shame about it
she was very good at it - she was her own best myth

if you really want to get a sense of her mythworking powers
read her text on highjohn the conqueror
and compare it to contemporary takes on the conqueror

but as one of the first practitioners of literary hoodoo
she was often clumsy with it, most of her work
will not stand a historical test

and only the uninformed would apply it
mythwork works on a different plane of the
human condition - might as well question jesus

as for plagiarism all writers steal, its just a question
of how well they do it - some writer once wrote:
amateurs borrow, professionals steal (ie do it so well nobody can tell)

and zora neale was often clumsy in her Work, she was a pathfinder
and she often stumbled

but zora neale stole and she lied and did whatever she had to do
to make her vision manifest

thats what literary hoodoo do
mythwork

and i salute her for it, flaws and all
zora neale hurston did mighty fine Work

and at its best it will continue
to speak to generation after generation

thats my girl

rdoc

THURSDAY
god how time flies, is it thursday already

had a good day yesterday
clocked some hours, got some pages

was reading where american troops in afghanistan
killed taliban soldiers, placed bodies facing mecca and burned them

then taunted taliban forces as too cowardly to
retrieve the charred corpses

the old rootdoctor tell you it just gets worse and worse
and will continue to do so as long as the administration
continues to wink at torture by its troops

as long as the initiators of this policy of torture
go unpunished and only footsoldiers are held accountable
american ideals will keep dying through this drip by drip
media water torture

brotherme brotherblood brotherblack
('blackinized' greeting among black soldiers in vietnam)

yusef komunyakaa was on campus yesterday and i
violated sabbatical principles by going in to hear him read

what could i do, brother always showed me respect
in that quiet way of his (i think its the vietnam connection)

i could do no less

adam banks book is out
race, rhetoric and technology: searching for higher ground
ignore amazons statement that it isnt out yet, order it anyway, just got out yesterday
(god i love being ahead of the curve)

adam works in rhetoric here at syracuse
one of keiths trainees from penn

adam came on campus and shook it up
stone mack and ambidextrous too, works w/both hands

started this thing where he does one of his classes
in the community, down at the groove, hes done 3 semesters now
and the last class has something like 50 folk
from a wide range of ages and interests
its really amazing

so his book just came out
race, rhetoric and technology: searching for higher ground

which considers the implications of race and rhetoric
in the technology driven era of
21st century african american empowerment strategies

(full disclosure: i got props in the acknowledgements
probably more than i deserve but i aint complaining)

new orleans and the delta
teamwork

ive kinda backed up on neworleans
sill gon monitor it and comment when called for
all but i figure now that folk like kalamu and jerryward
on the case that my role is more backup
than trying to lead that charge

and feeling like i should be doing something
for the folk in pakistan if for no other reason
than how the world took the delta to heart
after katrina

feels inadequate what little i can do

i think i would like african americans to go into
ngos (non government organizations) in large numbers
in keeping with our mission to serve

our mission to serve:
i think i will play w/that
some more in future posts

rdoc

conjuration and minimum maintenance: i wanna be one of historys great hoodoomen

TUESDAY
hello world

im back
i been back about 3, 4 days now
but i been hiding from everybody and everything
the old rootdoctor is on minimum maintenance

i got two months to finish this novel but im doing so much raw manuscript
that im going to have to hit it again w/the redpen cause i dont care what it looks like
i do not put raw manuscipt out as a polished product

so what i have to do is 75 pages or so of raw manuscript in a month,
then redpen the whole 300 page manuscript in about 5 weeks

cause i got to go to memphis for xmas about dec 15th
ive done the family thing for about 30 years straight, cant stop now
and who knows if i will be able to work then
you know how it is, family crises seem to line up and wait for you
to come home to go nuke on you

its an impossible deadline but what can i do
its showtime and failure is not an option

so im really withdrawing into the woodshed for the rest of the year, dear surfer
the old rootdoctor has gone to the mountaintop

i really want to put the hoodoo book of flowers up
did some rough work on it while i was in jamaica but i got to stay focused,
cant get fainthearted now
im impatient to put it up so folk can see how much ive done on it
just how much historical knowledge my strategic speculations are based on
its gon surprise folk just how much thought and study ive put into this
but thats just pride talking, i got to stay real

threw divination every morning whilie i was in jamaica
would go out on the beach before other folk did and draw me a divination bowl in the sand
and throw over and over (got to do it so much it becomes instinct)

at one point wrote in the sand around the bowl:
hoodoo divination, learning my trade, will throw for free

if i get my nerve up i will do that at the coneyisland juneteenth middlepassage celebration -  as part of my annual griotic presentation there, while im waiting to perform, i will set up a divination post in the sand and practice on my fellow travelers

but right now its focus focus focus novel novel novel
and its an interesting phase because im having to reconcept it
ive written myself into a hole and have had to go back to the outline
and coming up with all kinds of riffs on the basic premise

which is tucept jubilation highjohn, a hoodoo sorceror who aspires to prophecy - trying to shape the future of humanity through conjuration, mythwork and ideological orchestrations-  what im calling destinywork

basically through mythwork that he is constructing in the novel
(as do i in reallife though the novel as text/spell and my own life as myth)

even though the mythwork in rest is more him trying to immortalize a woman
and it is in trying to impress her that he publically manifests as a wouldbe prophet
but now that im on the last lap, all kinds of riffs coming up as i try to tie off my narrative strands

for instance i had the gods playing a small role but now they are playing a larger role
he as a wouldbe prophet is worrying the gods because he serves them but he also defies them and i want to say something about humanitys relationship with the divine
(and anytime you working the gods in fiction its a delicate task to make that work)

and i got highjohn and an african american pantheon claiming to the gods of africa that have taken root here that this is their turf and that you are guests here, cause i dont like african americans being lorded over by the yoruba, fon, congo, etc (they all tend to look down on hoodoo as childs play) - got to reWork that relationship

and i got all this speculation about the future of hoodoo as a tradition about the nature of prophecy and human destiny i got this future scene thats supposed to play with the role of mythwork in human destiny and i want to play with time and dimensions through that and with human evolution or rather the dynamic thereof and i really really got to play with african american destiny with its politics and its morality and its relationship to the rest of the world and its relationship to human destiny and on and on

got to do my black nationalist thing and got to do my universalist thing, and play w/the tensions between them, man its just a big mess, and its already all in the manuscript, its just not well done yet

i got so many other balls in the air along these lines that they threaten to weigh the book down and even thats all speculative at this point cause i got to write these scenes in a more viable manner than they are now, with the focus on interpersonal relationships rather than all these issues that so obsess me -

and then all the narrative games im playing, the layers and levels, and havent even started working the poetry yet and making it sing pretty and deep - if i can pull off anything remotely resembling the vision of this Work that i see i will be satisfied

its the vision of all this novel could be that drives me now, i dont care about publication or money or nothing, i just want to see this thing exist, my finest conjuration, my greatest spell

okay, this looks like another wandering post, discipline flowers discipline
i am just so backed up with things i want to say to you world

i put a lot of thought while in gods country, (somthing about the ocean in negril makes me feel close to god), into what i want to do with this weblog and rootwork.com
there are so many aspects of my game that have really lain fallow this year,

'minimum maintenance' is giving a project just enough to keep it alive
until you can get to it again and everything is suffering,
weblog, rootsletter mailing list, rootwork.com, the hoodoo hand societies, newren writers guild, my brooklyn workshop, everything is on hold and demanding attention
everything needs to be brought up to speed and i just dont have the time or focus right now

i cant do a thing until i finish this draft, then everything is going to come down on me
well truth be told, its coming down on me now, im just ignoring it
i will have to pay the cost of leaving my initiaives (& finances) on minimum maintenance
for a whole year - gone be some serious catch up in the spring
but thats always been the price of woodshed and ive always been willing to pay it

cause this novel is my life and i cant play around with it any longer
15 years i been working on this novel and thats long enuf
i got to get this bad boy in shape to fly, at least a viable draft
so that if i have to work on it next semster it will be cleanup work
not the kind of fundamental work im doing now

that i can do while carrying my schoolload

okay im out of here, i got a days work to do
i will work on this post over the week to bring it up to speed
would like to make some kind of social commentary
but im just too deep into the woodshed
feel like im working in a graveyard 3 miles down

god i have all my life wanted to be a great writer
but i also want to be a one of historys great hoodoomen
one of the legendary ones who tried to take care of the tribal soul
keep it healthy and growing in harmony, custodians of the tribal destiny

historically i wanna hang out with gullahjack, davidwalker, natturner
boukmandutty and zumbi of palmares - oldschool practitioners

ima 21st century version

i long ago decided that i would as an activist work the spirit,
work the soul of the black world, because i believe that only souldeep
changes will get us out of this historical trickbag we have fround ourselves in
i am a cultural worker and i believe in my own griotic (and hoodoo) power
to effect change in african american destiny

as i have been trained by babajohn o killens
the great griot master of brooklyn
and uncle ish in conjure and mumbo jumbo
players in the great game

black activists have long understood that if your only program is black empowerment
that wont fly in america, you always trying to move the american people to their greater dreams
and save them from their self inflicted nightmares (bush & the rightwing ascendency) so your policies have to benefit all americans and indeed all humanity

they must be a better way

if you trying to empower progressive impulses it has to be a program designed to develop progressive alliances - through generically progressive policies that benefit everybody - healthcare, education, working wages, etc, etc, etc

we are probably the most determinedly liberal ethnic group in america nowdays
taking over a role the jews have abandoned as theyve become a more affluent
part of the establishment (perhaps abandoned is unnecessarily provocative, plenty oldschool jews)

this same process can be seen in contemporary african american culture
and its flirtation with republicanism
as you become a more affluent population you get more politically diverse
but im not really worried about that (katrina pushed bush rating w/afroams to 2%)
not as long as their policies dont match their rhetoric

and my mythwork supposes that blackfolk gon stand firm against the rightwing tide
that africanamericans have been given a mission to lead humanity
into its ever greater self - a mission of service unto eternity

i have not yet been able to express the full implications of that sufficiently enuf
to fire up the african american cultural imagination much less the worlds but soon come

along with other components of my mythwork and my ideological orchestrations
rest for the weary is my best shot for expressing that vision

in the spiritworld (which is just as real but different) i aspire to be a great conjureman
a great magician forcing reality to bend to my will

in the realworld i want to be a great writer and thinker
influencing african american and human culture as great writers with a mission do

along the lines of the druidic james joyces words: "I go to encounter for the millionth time the reality of experience and to forge in the smithy of my soul the uncreated conscience of my race."

i am sorry when young writers are chastized by narrowminded activists as not really making a political contribution and they fall for it and dont understand their own power, dont understand the power of the word and the role that they play in shaping the cultural soul through their works and lives

and their ideological orchestrations, a primary power that only folk like us can do, that only folk like us understand - as ishmael reed once wrote, "just cause you cant see the stones dont mean i aint building"

what i like most about being a novelist is that whatever i do, whatever happens to me, its just material for my novels

anybody else talking about being a great hoodooman, a wouldbe prophet and hoodoo diviner, they liable to get labled a space ranger but me, i can spend as much time as i want throwing divination on the beach as long as i write about the experience

i just make my character a diviner and its all research
i can spend the rest of my life trying to be one of the worlds great hoodoo men - wouldbe prophet of the hoodoo way

and win or lose its just research material to make my novelwork authentic

and if i get questioned i can laugh it off and act like im not really serious about it -  its just fiction

but just between you and me
its have power will conjure

cause thats what i do, as a novelist and conjuror and wouldbe prophet
i play with reality, and thats what rest for the weary
does, it plays with reality

that fine line between life, fiction and dreams

this is the text

in struggle

rickydoc trickmaster
wouldbe prophet of the hoodoo way