octavia butler and downhome visionaries: calling the roll

WEDNESDAY

hello world, guess this week just been all personal
apparently im still tripping, ima have to break this spell

this is recent email i sent out on hoodoo way list
decided to post it because it speaks to my vision of hoodoo

the discussion thread regards hoodoo institutionalization
and a collective hoodoo text

been working my own and failing, i consider it a lifetime project
but im fully aware that most of the great holybooks are collective works
stretching over generations (except for the koran maybe?)

will give up the book of flowers if i must but hopefully the
hoodoo way archives will make a good nucleus

probably open that list up, invite more folk in

still black, still a hoodoo paradigm
still more liable to say no than yes

but if you in interested in (or curious about) hoodoo destinywork
get in touch, lets talk

be well
rickydoc flowers

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

hello everybody

i apologize for the tone of that last email
and all that personal information wasnt necessary

putting balls in the air and feeling humble
like im surely about to fall on my face

all these big ideas, who am i to try

ive moved the hoodoo way, sending out invitations
i dont know whats to become of this list

ima just keep letting it be whatever it wants to be and keep
trying to bring strong folk in

that hands thing, thats kinda bodacious
i fear making a fool of myself

but enuf folk have responded positively that the move
got to be made now, win or lose

ive become aware of just how presumptious a move it is

feeling real humble these days, and i want to back out
and back up but i do so love the hoodoo tradition

and though some in the tradition dismiss me as an intellectual hoodoo
and not a real practitioner, i believe im the hoodoo future

dont nobody work a soul like i do

with all my heart i love being a hoodooman and i love
what the hoodoo tradition is and what its capable of

i want it to be evolving and truly powerful in the world
i want it to be an illuminated tradition that makes invaluable
contributions to human destiny

i want it to be real in the world
in a way that it currently is not

and i know folk will protest that we are powerful as we are
but that view is not reflected in the worlds reality

not compared to the other spiritual traditions of the world
we dont get respect in atr circles much less the world

i would that we be acknowledged powers and influential in
human affairs, i would we be true force

i would that we be powerful enough to guide our peoples destiny
to ensure the survival and prosperity of our generations

illuminated enuf
to be guide and guardian of humanitys destiny

showing the way

i dont know what the next step is
but i know we have to take it
flying blind and figuring it out as we go

i would like to institutionalize the hoodoo way (the tradition not the list)
i dont know what form will work, i know it would have to be very loose
to accommodate hoodoos individualized and eclectic nature

and i would like to do a hoodoo holybook
thats been a goal of mine for decades

i figure a holybook is the strongest game on the board

the great holybooks, the bible, the koran, the iching, etc
give their cultures a fighting chance in the march of human destiny

they contribute to human evolution and the human condition
aint nothing like a good holybook

if its done well a hoodoo holybook would shape our generations
for centuries and eons

i make these suggestions with the utmost humility

but it seems that we have stumbled upon the possibility
of being able to make it happen if we so choose

tell you the truth these ideas scare me
but i just dont see how we can not make the move
these are strange and momentus times and they just
begging us to bust the move

moving the list, hope you come along
if but for the ride

be well
rdoc

MONDAY

roaring sometime and whining too

bonnie objects to the tone of some of my posts
i think she considers them too whiny

nigerian friend of mine, ec, says i whine too much
keep those blues moments to yourself he says
you should only roar arthur, roar all the time he says

im feeling you, i prefer it when im roaring too, but what makes a literary blog like this
work is sincerely expressing what you feel and i often feel unappreciated

post below already counterfeited, got a couple of emails encouraging me
to hang in there, saying we appreciate what you do arthur

thats all i need when i falter
occasional pat on the back buck me right up

i told bonnie i said look you want a man w/testosterone poisoning
or do you want me

kinda makes me smile that the personal is so foregrounded by blogwork
my mentor in the game, john o killens, used to complain that my political work
wasnt personal enuf - not of enuf of you in it arthur he would chide, the people
need to see you

who would have thought that the rhetorical instrument of my generation would
turn out to be the blog - much too personal for my comfort, but im trusting my
literary instinct - ima show you my heart, the goodtimes and the bad, ima show
you what i got

ima roar when i can and whimper when i must
but whatever i do here its gon be true to my heart

thats where i get my power

my love to you all
rdoc

hello world

feeling a little down
just got back from the delta

bone tired and
got so much catchup schoolwork it
aint funny

found out most of the active
folk on the hoodoo way have migrated
to a new list

my fault, i let the hoodoo way languish
hoping it would maintain itself without my constant
attention and now its crippled and so i call myself
closing it down but the notice that i was closing it down
caused a lurker to step up and remind me its still some
strong folk on that list

even if it becomes for a moment a conversation
with myself i should maybe maintain it

move it to yahoo, keep growing it inch by inch and step by step, my
favorite modus operandi, and im thinking maybe i wont close it down,

just let it keep on being whatever it will be
(and go for magnanimous w/new lists)

god i so want to let that chain slip from my shoulder,
i got so much to do and im feeling so overextended
but i dont seem to be able to get out from under

i am of the line of o killens
and i been trained to maintain good game
no matter what

thats what keep me in rest for the weary

the one thing in this world i might fail at - making novels, making the
beautiful and magical works i see in my head work on paper

in hopes that oneday the people will love me for what i do
like the love they have shown octavia, my works they redeem me

thing about being a novelist/mythmaker
is that even if your ideological orchestrations in the realworld fail
as they so often do, the very effort itself feeds your work

and authenticates it

when i write about a wouldbe prophet it will be informed by an
attempt to have walked the road - win or lose ima walk the road

then i write about it, win or lose
i mythwork it

for i am mythmaker, a weaver of
conjure and a worker of storm
a caster of bones and tomorrows truth
i make myth and myth makes tomorrow
as i define so shall it be, for you see
my friends, i am a conjuror . . . .

guess i best get on the hands
else that train leave the station without me

its liike a cycle - periods in the world, contending in the bloody arena
alternating w/periods of withdrawal for reflection and renewal

i been in withdrawal, trying to get rest done
but i got to do some arenawork now
got to throw down and got to throw down now

tires me out just thinking about it

the old gray organizer just aint what he used to be
but i spec i got a good campaign or two left in me

win or lose
its a luta continua

win or lose, gon be
in struggle

rdoc

TUESDAY

still down in the delta
spose to been gone

something about spending your days at the hospital
tending to a mortally frail parent put you in a mind of
melancholy reflection

then i hear octavia butler died and its like bummer
how old was she again

58, thats my generation, checking out, the roll being called

octavia was real important to my literary generation
swinging that afroam scifi when it was just two of them basically
now theres a whole universe of them

and i probably owe more to the patternmaster than im willing to fess up to

i think what moved me most about octavia was that she was a
fellow visionary who manifested her vision of human destiny thru her works

what disturbed me most about octavia butler was that she had such a pessimistic vision of human destiny, all her futures devolved, i had to quit reading her

still i feel that special connection to her, specially when reading her obits about the medical problems she struggled to remain productive thru and i always admire that in a writer

dont nothing but death stop this show

and even thats questionable for a visionary
just another plane of engagement

me and my sister trying to keep my mama on this plane
just a little while longer, probably more for our sakes than hers

shes tired but she still seems to enjoy the special moments

being deep into family mortality cause you to get reflective
when you get my age you carry a number of significant regrets
but you also basically accepting of lifes little ups and downs,

its heartbreaking ambiguities

spent time with my nephews, 6 of them, and it was wonderful
asa fred arthur cleveland james evan
they been thru the fire and seem to have walked thru

one of my big life regrets is that i have not been there for them
when they needed me and must redeem myself

if they let me

they are all big strapping fellows and taller than me now and folk kept
asking if they were my basketball team, its like i

got my own posse

me and asa went to check on the flowers bottle tree in riverside park
not only was it still there, right there on the bluff where its guarding both the river and the city, but folk obviously been making libations, it was surrounded by beer bottles, the communitys contribution

and i was thinking while i was there this is my ground
i claim this ground for the black destiny, here the old gods still rule

its all surrounded by industrial ground now and has that beleaguered feeling
kinda like blackfolk, and i know in my heart its not the magical ground i make it out to be

(flash: use that in rest, have it be all magical when hes strong but when hes weak he will see it and the neighborhood for what it really is, a tired little urban pocket)

still got to go to my fathers grave, been stalling cause i been so slack i kinda assume my father is disappointed with me

i always get over there eventually because i may not be 100% but i suspect my father doesnt expect 100%, i suspect my father, the wisest and greatest of men, understands

im doing what i can

before my name get called

octavia got her work done
i can only hope the same will be said of me

gotta go
gotta get back to the hospital
gotta clean this up later

rdoc

awaken the sleeper
protect the weak
guide the strong

Comments

[Sheree Renée Thomas]

Dear Arthur, hold on down there, hold on. We got you, your mother, and the rest of the Flowers in our prayers.

[rdoc]

hey homegirl

thanks for the prayers
the feeling is mutual
all blessings on you and
your family

hope your work going well
was thinking about you
when i said there is a universe
of octavias children

all blessings on you and
what you do

all my love
arf