rootwork the rootsblog: a cyberhoodoo webspace

on the hoodoo book of flowers

hello world, ive had a publisher express interest
in the hoodoo book of flowers, somebody i would
trust with the text, she asked me to write a brief
statement explaining the project, this what i sent her:

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You’ve asked me to speak on whats behind this project. The Hoodoo Book of Flowers is most primarily an attempt to write an African American holybook, but at this point I will be satisfied with your basic sacred text, your basic mystical Work. It began though because I wanted to do a holybook for blackfolk based on African American culture, history and destiny. Call myself forging an African American Way.

This is also a hoodoo manual. I am attempting with this work to position hoodoo as one of the world’s Great Ways. Also trying to position hoodoo as a prophetic tradition within the Afrospiritual traditions of the Americas, Vodou, Lucumi, Obeah, Candomble, etc etc. with a prophetic dispensation to break old rules and forge new ones.

Prophetic because I consider both hoodoo and the Afrospiritual traditions to be in need of illumination and empowerment, I believe that a people’s condition/culture reflects the power of their indigenous spiritual systems. I look at the condition of blackfolk around the world and I judge afrospiritual traditions to have been inadequate and in need of illumination and empowerment, retooled calibration to a 21st Century sensibility.

In terms of the textual strategy it is both a wisdom text (holybook) and a hoodoo manual trying to shape the hoodoos of the future as cultural custodians, ideological orchestrators, and practitioners of high magic over folk magic. I have tried to tell a divine history of the world based on African American culture, history and destiny. My goal is to forge a new kind of people/culture, to once again equate the black struggle with the struggle for human dignity and once again provide a model for struggle worldwide. Consequently, I have a couple of movements you don't generally find in works of this sort, Empowerment and Destinywork, cause I want the blacks of the future to be consummate players, masters of strategy, the key that opens all locks.

Basic structure is the 1st 4 movements are living life well movements – Initiation, Struggle, Lifeworks, Changes. Then the empowerment movements, Empowerment and Destinywork, destinywork being my speculations on how to run the longgame as Babajohn Killens taught, how to shape generations. Then the last three are where I try to go Illuminated on them, my Godwork.  I very much wish I was a more purely Illuminated type but well, you know, struggle is more complicated than that.

Each passage is a blend of aphorisms, historicals, destinicals, stories (using two cultural folklorics, The Babajohn and The Queenmother of Memphis) and what I call De Geas of Rickydoc, a set of principles I want to impress on the generations – like awaken the sleeper, protect the weak, guide the strong  - but let me not get too deeply into esoterics.

In terms of its value to the human condition I hope to engage the evolutionary dynamic in the human experience and provide guidance thru the generations. It is addressed to future generations of hoodoos, African Americans and all humanity.

There is a standing tension in my work between being a voice for black people versus being a voice for all humanity. Unable to get past that tension I decided to make it one of the drivers of the text. By illuminating African American culture I hope to illuminate the world in a Magical Negro dynamic wrote large.

The structure of the text is a divination system, 81 movements (9x9) that represent life as initiation. Your basic wisdom text (they all pretty much cover the same ground, the golden rule, the 8 fold path, do unto others, know thyself, etc etc) the precepts of living well basically. The tight aphoristic structure is me trying to reflect how I think future media-influenced generations will process knowledge. Eventually I want each one of those fragments to stand on their own as prayers and/or mantras and such. Meditational devices.

What further makes the Work somewhat unique (as in not just an ambitious selfhelp book) is I am telling these Historical/Destinical segments stylistically based on Galeano’s Memory of Fire trilogy and Im telling all these Wisdom Tales because I want to nurture a tradition of African American wisdom tales in this text.  An African American Way.

The broken lines, the unconventional spatial structure, the afrolyrical riffs, it’s just the way I most comfortably express myself these day. Also the material dictated the shape of the text, only way I could move forward and get it done was to accept the way it wanted to be told. I would prefer to be more conventional stylist but when I write conventional I lose power. Also the stylee lends itself to a lyrical brevity I would not otherwise achieve and I hope the ‘poetry’ itself eventually brings its own value to the text. It’s weak now because I’m still concentrating on the content and have not focused yet on making it sing.

I aspire with this work to position myself as one of humanity’s great teachers. I realize this is somewhat ambitious and accept the possibility this might be delusional on my part. But I have to write this text as if it were truly so. In my heart I have to believe I am what I aspire to be.

 

political doggerel, why not

SATURDAY

 

so i wanted to cut bernie but not necessarily bleed him
cause i feel like we will still soon need him
then i thought what about political doggerel
to sell the visions i want to sell, to say what i
want to say w/o really saying it, w/a little humor
to sweeten the deal and just enuf craft to keep it real
comes rather easy, must be it was meant
de voice of reason in a season of discontent
 

 

 

this debate was always a farce, as big a farce as it could be 
since when has the loser debated the opposing nominee 
now we got schoolboy taunts of chicken, is this where we are 
the roar of the crowd got bernie thinking he a star but the  
debate woulda been 2 angry men committing a cardinal sin 
cutting out a woman who should have been in

yes yes yes i know, he demanded hillary and she said no
but why would she bother, what would she catch
schoolboy taunts of chicken or yet another yelling match

 

 

DONT KNOW WHEN THIS WAS, WEDNESDAY MAYBE

so i wanted to comment on fb and twitter
about bernie and his debate but im still
trying to restrain myself from hammering
the bern like i think he needs to be hammered
so i thought try some political doggerel

a historical tech for saying it w/o saying it
putting a little humor in the mix to sweeten it

and so i did:

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

so bernie has asked for a debate
with trump his political soulmate
our dignity $10 million will cover
watching 2 fools yell at each other

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

came easy, i enjoyed doing it
got enuf craft to justify its existence
ima try to develop a facility for it in
this season of discontent

took about 20 minutes, a cheap kill
im gone, im on
51:HBOD (hoodoo board of destiny)

i put brer beetle up on facebook so ima put it here
reason im thinking doggerel is to stop using so many

of my stories there, we will see
the stories thing is part of my promotional strategy
and its been working, preparing the ground for my seed
generating interest in the hoodoo book of flowers
so when i do drop it folk will be waiting for it . . .

which mean get back to work rick

once upon a time brer rabbit come upon brer beetle slow strolling thru
the dust like he do and commence to mocking him, good lord brer beetle,
say the rabbit, you aint gon never get to the party at that rate - brer beetle
is offended, he say likely I will get there before you do, brer rabbit, they
get to disputing who gon get to the party 1st and before you know it they
got a wager on it and boom, brer rabbit has left brer beetle gasping in the
dust but when he get to the party there brer beetle is with the jack in his
cup, how you do that, brer rabbit ask him and brer beetle say I flew, and
he flutter his wings just so, and brer rabbit say i didn't know you could fly,
and brer beetle say that's cause all what I can do aint your business, brer
rabbit, just cause I go low don't mean I can’t go high when its called for

 

 

 

hbof excerpt:5M:45:GOVERNANCE

*45: GOVERNANCE:  taking state power is easy, holding it is hard

I would you be players all,

 de obamas come to play, game on

taking and holding state power is the ultimate game -
everything else is sidegame, only players need apply

if you gon play, play for real, be an astute playa
in the manipulation of your governing system

the mobilization of your constituency is the fundament of power, pay no
attention to those who would have us for feel guilty for racial organization

to take power in a state with a strong democratic principles
requires social capital, a strong & sophisticated constituency

incessant community organizing, empowerment and capital formation
through the education, politicalization & mobilization of your constituency. 

power encompasses, the citystate encompassed the tribe
the nation encompassed the citystate, continental powers
encompass regional and global encompass them all

be inclusive, be comprehensive, encompass them all

to rule you must serve - everybody talks good governance
but what happens when your own privileges are on the line

cultures that have thrived have been those that are organized about the
maximal development of social capital over the interests of their elites
elites who realize they cannot insulate themselves from general well being

in the year 1608 that the portuguese army under bento cardoso expanded congo slaving
operations with declaration that every chief in land was now owned by a portuguese, said
chief was directly responsible for a quota of slaves or would be themselves be enslaved

following year a 100 chiefs were sold into slavery, 100 were murdered, chiefs who
had been cooperating in the slave trade suddenly found their honor in resistance

you are only as strong as your weakest links

when blacks have been in a position to govern they have done so badly,
mismanagement and inefficiency has become part of the black narrative

the urban cities in America, the countries of Africa, the island nations of
trinidad and the melanesias, on every hand blackfolk fumbling it

I would you master the art of ruling well
and once in power exemplify service, walk
in grace and de geas of rickydoc

a disciplined commitment to good
governance as cultural imperative
o if you must rule, you must rule well  -

homage due to the martyrs of the voting rights
movment who paid full service dues so we could vote

come brother hartman turnbow, when his house was firebombed for the crime
of voting, old boy bought himself a 12 gauge: i dont know where all that there
braveness come from, i just found myself

come sister fannie lou hamer:  'sometimes it seems like to tell the truth today is to run the
risk of being killed. but if I fall, i'll fall five feet four inches forward in the fight for freedom.' 

come chaney, goodman and schwerner, come viola liuzzo, medgar evers and the 4 babies of
birmingham - blackfolk beaten, killed, thrown off the land, in their name I would you not just
vote but practice full service electoral politics, every office, everytime – paid in full

got to be ruthless and strategic in everything you do – take power
then use that power in service of the greater good

there was once this ruler, a terrible tyrant, who one day heard that the babajohn
was preaching against him, and so he had the babajohn brought before him and
said I have heard you are a man of power, if you do not display this power I
shall have you killed, the babajohn said I regret I have no miracles to show you,
I do not do tricks, and the ruler said, well then you must die and the babajohn said
and so I shall, as shall we all – now it can be easily understood that the babajohns
equanimity offended the ruler and the ruler reached out to strike him down but
when he touch the babajohn the ruler is instantly transported to a strange and bustling
city that he did not recognize, he did not speak the tongue, he had no money, no
understanding of its ways and realized that he even looked differently from the others,
he had nothing, he knew nothing, never worked a day in his life, and so he begged,
living in doorways and on the street until he had enuf to pay daily rent on a hovel in
the worst part of town and then he worked hard and made do till that time he was
robbed of everything he owned and left hospitalized and had to start over and the time
the police took his money and arrested him when he complained and beat him when he
resisted, and the 2 years he spent in prison because of it, reminding himself daily yes
I am a prisoner but in my heart I am a king and when he was released he spoke the
language and knew the world and so he started over again and he worked hard and he
learned a trade or two and used his money well and he met a good woman and he
married her and they had 3 children, one of whom they buried early and some degree
of grace and somedays somedays he missed being a king, being waited on hand and
foot, good medical care, and his wife would smile indulgently at his tales but his 2
remaining children believed them wholeheartedly and tried to conduct themselves in
a manner royal and you know sometimes this life wasn't that bad, not really, and he
made do until the day he reached out to console a stranger who had fallen and found
himself standing in the throne room he had left some 20, 25 years ago and the babajohn
was standing there in front of him with like this infuriating calm and the ruler was duly
infuriated, you conjuror, the ruler fumed, how dare you, you have taken 25 years of my
life and made me to endure the most tragic indignities to my person, no my prince, said
the babajohn, only seconds have passed since you raised your hand to me and the
courtiers said this was so and the ruler was cast into deep thought while the babajohn
was allowed to leave, leaving behind in place of the tryant a newly engaged ruler,
called the explorer king for the countless teams of explorers sent to the 4 corners of the
earth, each with a picture of a woman and 2 children, but what amazed the kingdom
most was his benevolence, his connection to the people, his concern for their welfare
and his penchant for justice, it is truly, they said, a miracle

there has never been a perfect society, injustice
is inevitable but you can always be a better society

demand that your own society live up to its ideals and
nudge other societies, other traditions onto higher ground

nudging folk at de crossroads
a little rootwork on the high way

i would you take responsibility not only for your own destiny
but the destiny of all peoples, all jah creature great and small

I would you be playas, playas all

demoja

 

ADDENDUM: reading over it its okay but it does not feel holybook strong, no sense of numinancy that i can see but at this stage i just got to go with whatever i come up with, assume that i will have something worthwhile at the end of the process and if i dont then it was not meant to be because i gave it everything i had, finish the project rick, let the generations decide . . .

 

speaking truth to the people when it matters

WEDNESDAY

got 3 yesterday and felt burnt out, gon go for 4 today
if i miss it again ima consider accepting 3 a day
on 45:governance now, half way, im so tired of this project
still maintaining research, so many books need extraction . .

i might post governance when its done, show you im still on it . .
this a slate article talking about what voting for nader cost us

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wrote this on facebook but didnt post it
i put another story up on the hoodoo sites
even that is embarassing me, ima step
back from social media, folk want your
personals and im not really there for that
i need to stay focused, get my work done

feeling a little discouraged i think
think i got a taste of the blues

 

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

I suspect folk often wonder what im doing here with my occasional posts, my little hoodoo wisdom stories and such and my clear disinterest in folk magic, this me trying to bring hoodoo into the 21^st century, trying to forge a better way - as you have by now deduced ima different kind of conjureman, what I call a high hoodoo, folk magic don't interest me, my interest is in high magic (playing w/reality, enhancing the human condition, personal illumination, identification w/the divine) and cultural custodianship (shaping generations), I aspire to be a prophet of the hoodoo way and after me hoodoo wont be the same,

as part of that ideological process I have to establish dialogues with factions of the hoodoo world (and others) - my engagement here and elsewhere is designed to show you that there is another way, basically most of you just posturing, doing kiddie hoodoo, the hoodoo you have read about, slaverytime hoodoo, about 100 years out of date hoodoo, problem is the hoodoo tradition is a living tradition and by the time the appropriators read about it the cutting edge has moved on, my colleagues say its not our job to teach you, unfortunately I think it is, cant have you bumbling about and calling it hoodoo, that debases the tradition, most of you will reject this but one or two will listen to de geas of rickydoc, that's all I require – and so I will continue to maintain a dialogue, such as it is, and make occasional posts here designed to establish myself as a cultural force to be reckoned with, de high hoodoo

 

 

MONDAY

so im bured in the text, finally got my groove

im trying to do 5 segments a day,w hich is impossible
but if i do it i will have a draft by end of month
im on 41:GUIDANCE, lets be reaaonable and say 4
cause im heavy research too, im gone

 

SUNDAY

one from this morning, im kinda bummed out
lost a friend yesterday, she put me down cause
i had to put a project on hold cause im dug into

this text and im thinking damn its cost me
But i cant do drama when im in the woodshed
driving toward a text, im stressed to the
breaking point already

also ive lost friends for defending hillary
over bernie, that last post i put on FB cost
me i know, im kinda bummed out but i
got to keep soldiering on, i just saw that

chicken george is going to be at fort pillow
in the new roots and fort pillow is a large
part of my novel, boy i feel like im losing
control, i got to focus hard on this book
im going to come out of this with a
viable draft so help me

the best hoodoo tale from
this mornings batch, said
i would stop putting them up
but i guess im desperate to
put them on record,, est a
rep for wisdom tales or
sometthing at this point
im just lost

part of the problem w/putting
them up raw like this is that
they arent connected to
realworld problems, stories
dont come to life unless they
are addressing real world issues
the recipient has an investment in

im gone, i got the blues

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

so one day stagolee come upon the babajohn and asked,
what is the difference, conjureman, between heaven and hell
and the babajohn said you idiot, don't waste my time with ignorant
questions - stagolee, quick quick to take offense, snarl and draw his
pistol, finger quivering on the trigger - now that, said the babajohn,
is hell - thoroughly embarrassed, stagolee put away his pistol and
apologize - and that, said the babajohn, is heaven

 

 

FRIDAY I THINK

okay, told myself i was done w/primaries and would stay in woodshed but apparently I like speaking truth to the people when it matters - I had to step back though because I was getting kinda impatient with bernie and the children’s crusade his campaign has become and feared making comments I would regret later as I have to assume this will all work itself out and as the finality of his loss sinks in I got to assume (in spite of nagging doubt) that bernie will quit demonizing hillary and the democratic party so ima let his folk accept it at their own pace –

this is fact: bernie has lost this one, fair and square, full stop -

anything else is magical thinking, he does himself and his supporters a disservice by stoking their anger/resentment and implying that the election is being stolen, doing so not only evidences petty behavior but stinks of desperation and loss of focus, his continued influence will depend on how he chooses to play the endgame, right now hes not doing too hot and has lost the moral highground,

I have avoided jacking bernie up, in part because so many folk I love love him, but I have to say I have lost my initial respect for what hes doing, I think he has crossed the line into politically unethical behavior that violates the good hes trying to bring about, he drinking his own kool aid, but I will continue to hold my fire because I got to believe we will all be on the same side again when true battle begin, I have to believe that and will conduct myself accordingly -

as for the deadenders threatening to sit out november or vote for trump let them go, anybody that does not understand the importance of this moment let them go, rest of us about to go head up with the real forces of evil, folk want to sit it out let them, woulda had to work around them anyway

the kingdoms fire

well, i did something new just now, really been appalled at the
bernie folk, how they harass and their contempt for those of us

who support hillary, they kinda out of control
and i was thinking as i was working on stories

wondering if i could write a story about whats
happening like a true griot would, so i started

one and this what i came up with, im kinda proud of myself
some of this came from this book im reading, why nations fail

its basic premise is cultures fail when their elites control
them for their own benefit and repress the people and they

thrive when the people are able to wrest power from their elites
apparently i had that in mind while primarily hitting on the bern

put it up and facebook and expected it to be a sensation
but it didnt get many likes while its one of my favorites 
because its directly tied to contemporary social challenges

i love it, makes me feel like true griot

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

there was once a kingdom of donkeys and a kingdom of elephants, the
kingdom of donkeys was a caring kingdom that believed in encouraging
all its donkeys to live out their greatest potential, while the kingdom of
elephants was a repressive kingdom organized to enrich its elites and
exploit its people, but they were about equal in strength and one could
not conquer the other and so they settled into a war of attrition, fighting
for every inch, every generation, when one day a great fire was lit in the
kingdom of donkeys that burned fiercely in an effort to consume all that
was not pure, one by one cannibalizing its allies until none were left pure
enough to warrant not being burnt, whereupon it turned on itself, burning
its own until no allies were left and the kingdom of elephants was able to
pick its bones and enslave them all

------------------------ 

my invocation for the black graduation went well
by the way, one of those i wish i had taped, when
ever i do the call your own ancestors bit im always
braced for that silence of no one calling, its not as much
fun if you have to cajole them, it loses something, but they
called them out right away and i was able to keep
riffing on it, there were unexpected rounds of applause
that would throw me off my rhythm, one in parrticular

when i started calling down martin et al, they started
shouting and clapping and you could feel it - it went well
that kinda connection inspired me to step up and act out
kalimba was right, my amp was tight, i was adorned
in 101 talismans, anklebells and my most formal robes

it was one of my more successful invocations i thought
i always surprise them, nobody invoke like me . . .

------------- 

Attend me lord legba, it is I, rickydoc
trickmaster, ask this gate be opened

We have gathered here this evening at the crossroads and when my
people gather together like this in peace and love and harmony at the
crossroads, that place that gathering place, that place is holyground,

I would like to thank the ancestors whose dreams got us this far, to the
crossroads, I would like to thank harriet tubman the great conductor, come
see us safely home, and I would call out my own parents, arthur and
eloise, ibayo, and perhaps you can call out yours, the grandmothers and
greatgrandfahers who made a way out of no way, so you could be here today
ibayo ibayo ibayao  and I would call on babajohn killens, the great griot master
of Brooklyn, come martin come Malcom, come zora neale and ida b,
come bless this thing we do, ibayo ibaayo ibayo

And finally I ask the ancestors to bring blessings upon the future, 
in you, my fledglings about to venture forth into the world

I envy you, this generation, carrying the hopes and dreams of
all the folk who have come before you, its your world, your vision
that will shape the future, we achievers, you and I, we have been
blessed, ehh, and there are certain responsibilities that come
with blessings of this sort

you look at the condition of black people today and its
hard sometimes not to despair but you must remember
how far we have come, slavery, southern peonage, the
great migration, the civil rights movement and the
age of obama, our struggle has always been epic
and we have always overcome, weve climbed
some difficult mountains, you and I

and yes weve come such a long such a long way
but we still got so far to go, I need you to hold on
when times get hard and you cant get weary, hold on

and when you come to the crossroads, always take the
highroad, always strive to be greater than you are

may your works serve many generations, may life
be good to you, may gods blessings be on us all,
demoja, demoja   gods blessings on us all

 

divine histories and hyatt's hoodoo, conjuration, witchcraft and rootwork

 

part of what im doing w/the hoodoo book of flowers
is tell a divine history of the black world/and all humanity
with historical riffs inspired by galeanos memory of fire
the wry historical humor tone, satircal, magical and

divine when i can, occasionally i see current events that
inspire a quick lick, read this one in the times this morning
dont know if it will make the cut, ima do a draft thats nothing

but cutting out the weak passages, the ones not truly significant
this one is cute but it may not make the essentialist cut:

in sao paolo state, brazil, the city of santa barbara d’oeste, in
the cemeterio dos americanos, there is every april an annual
party, the festa confederado, held by the lost colony of the
confederacy to celebrate the dixie culture their ancestors tried
to rebuild after fleeing to brazil after the civil war, complete
with a slavery that resisted brazilan abolition, already the last
in the americas, to point of lynching the abolitionist police
chief, joaquim firmino, in front of his family only months
before brazil officially and finally abolished slavery and
every year on this day the confederados at cemiterio dos
americanos dress up in hoop skirts and gray kepis among
the confederate battleflags and the tombstones in a desperate
bid to keep the dream alive – the south shall rise again

its okay but its not essentialist to make the cut, ima keep it in
case it gets contexted in a manner makes it more significant

i have got to go, i got to do 3 segments a day to be done
by the end of the month, but the problem is im full court
researching again, i recently went digging thru the attic

looking for my 5 vol set of hoodoo rootwork conjuration and
withcraft, its like this legendary 5000 pg set of oral histories
of hoodoos that harry hyatt did maybe a 100 years or so
ago, i first read it at the schomberg back in my hoodoo youth
its pretty much considered the hoodoo bible but its total slush,
unedited oral histories/authorial commentary full of repetitive
magical recipes which interest me not at all but its also interviews
of a 1000 or so traditional hoodoos, talking about being hoodoos
back in the day and some of them are true seekers

i recall a dr yousee, so named because he ended every sentence
with uousee, and pretty much all of them have something to say
and they speak in this folk language of the spriit that influences
my own lyrical style to this day i realize glancing thru it so anyway
i have known that this is a major researcch endeavor i need to
schedule and every once in a while i would go thru the shelves
looking for it and couldnt find it and was panicking thinking it had
got away from me somehow over the years and thikning i would
have to schedulle a week in the city to go thru the schomberg
o did i mention that this is a rare set and its worth 6500 on amazon
on the market and there was no way i was going to be able
to replace it

there is a pdf on reddit if you google it, seems to be legit, lot of
folk on the thread thanking him for it but since i have a hardcopy
i dont have to gamble on downloading something viral
if i didnt have a hardcopy i would be all over it

but did i have a hardcopy, i had this image of the set in a small box and
im thinking for the last 3 months go thru all the boxes of books
and papers in the attic and thats where i keep my papers in
plastic bins, there are a lot of them and boxes and boxes of
books and this was not an effort i was looking forward to but
ive been trying to cut my research books down to essential
so i can get thru this this summer and that set was on the
essential list so upstairs i went and i searched and searched
thru dusty boxes and the last box, in a corner by itself was
the right shape and there it was, im surprised the neighbors
didnt turn me in for a noise violation i was laughing with
such abandon but now i got to go, thats a whole heap of
research thats been added to my pile, im only going to
do volumnes 1, 2 and 3, i recall 4 and 5 were all recipes

so anyway i have been thrown into an existentialist quandary here
my set is pristine, unread, ie worth about 7000 on amazon, i paid 100
back in the day (long story) i started marking it up this morning and
im thinking im about to damage a major investment piece but whats

the point of having a book i cant use for what its intended, and im
thinking a hyatt set marginalized by rickydoc flowers will add to its

historical value, im keep that in mind while i mine it, last time i read
this work i was a baby conjure in my 20s, im now a full grown conjure
in my 60s reading it in context of my own text's needs, its going to be

an experience, im gone, i got so much work to do, i got to do 3 segments
a day to be finished by end of the month, im averaging one, if this keeps
up ima have to cut my daily schedule down to 2, i refuse to accept 1

all my love

demoja

de queenmother bind de baron

im getting kind of good with this, about 30 mintues ago i had
an idea about capturing death, sat down and boom, still raw
must be clocking 3, 4 of these a day, ima weed out the weak
i think this the last one ima put up, i need to be trying to publish
these somewhere

--------------------- 

did I ever tell you about the time the queenmother of memphis captured
death, de last time de baron come calling, top hat held respectfully in his
hand, evening queenmother, he say, evening, she say, mind if I sit, say death
go right ahead, she say and he sit beside her, what is it now, he say, two, three
hundred years, something like that, she say, makes me look bad, he say, and she
say I will be along directly, few more things need doing and im done - then, chitchat
over they approach the business at hand, the queenmother had just helped a
client thru a rough birth and when the baron come for the newborn she just was
not in a mood to let the child go and so she deny death permission to cross her
door and when he come in anyway he find himself at the crossroads, straight on
midnight in a duel of power he know he will lose, cause everybody know the
queenmother of memphis own the crossroads and she left him there caught up in
a bind and death left the world and at first she and all humanity was pleased with
this state of affairs but soon the world was way too crowded and folk in need of
release was signing online petitions to the queenmother and comatose elders was
camping in her front yard murmuring let my people go and she notice that folk
didn't Quest for immorality like they used to, child care went down, art and charity
both, and folk no longer felt the need to be good people because you know well
fuck it we immortal anyway and it appear there more tragedy in a world without
death than there is in one with it and so the queenmother return to the crossroads
and 1^st she try to cut a deal with death, consider this, she say, what about you only
take those who deserve to die and the baron say that's everybody, this aint no
punishment, this a graduation, I tell you what I will do, the baron say, those that
accept this I will let them go easy, I will do that, a life in the spirit and i will let you
go easy, and so it was the queenmother of memphis set the baron free cause
a life without death is not a life worth living

 

 

hbof excerpt:5M:45:GOVERNANCE:babajohn and the king

there was once this ruler, a terrible tyrant of a ruler, who one day heard that the babajohn was preaching against him, and so he had the babajohn brought before him and said I have heard you are a man of power, if you do not display this power I shall have you killed, the babajohn said i regret i have no miracles to show you, i do not do tricks, and the ruler said, well then you must die and the babajohn said and so I shall, as shall we all - now it can be easily understood why the babajohns equanimity offended the ruler and the ruler reached out to strike him down but when he touch the babajohn the ruler is instantly transported to a strange and bustling city that he did not recognize, he did not speak the tongue, he had no money, no understanding of its ways and realized that he even looked differently from the others, he had nothing, he knew nothing, and so he begged, living in doorways and on the street, until he had enuf to pay daily rent on a hovel in the worst part of town and then he worked and learned a trade or two and worked hard and saved his money but for that one time he was robbed of everything he owned and hospitalized and had to start over and the time the police took his money and arrested him when he complained and beat him when he fought back and the 2 years he spent in prison because of it but he had to remind himself yes I am a prisoner but in my heart I am a king and when he was released he spoke the language and knew the world and so he started over again and he worked hard and he saved his money and met a good woman and married her and they had 3 children, one of whom they buried early and somedays he missed being a king, being waited on hand and foot, and his wife would smile indulgently at his tales but his 2 remaining children believed them wholeheartedly and you know sometimes this life wasn't that bad, not really and he made do until the day he reached out to console a stranger who had fallen and found himself standing in the throne room he had left some 20, 25 years ago and the babajohn was standing there in front of him with an infuriating little smile and the ruler was duly infuriated, you conjuror, the ruler fumed, how dare you, you have taken 25 years of my life and made me to endure the most tragic indignities to my person, no my prince, said the babajohn, only seconds have passed since you raised your hand to me and the courtiers said this was so and the ruler was cast into deep thought while the babajohn was allowed to leave, leaving behind in place of the tryant a newly engaged ruler, called the explorer king for the countless teams of explorers sent to the 4 corners of the earth, each with a picture of a woman and 2 children, but what amazed the kingdom most was his benevolence, his connection to the people, his concern for their welfare and his penchant for justice, it is truly, they said, a miracle

for the record

somethings i do strictly for the record
because i want to have this on my historical record
these two pieces, one an email i wrote to my colleague

mary karr and the other the graduation intro i did
for my thesis students graduation, i dont expect
they will interest you, im stashing them here
because i think they will be of interest to future generations

or rather i should say i hope they will be of interest
schools out and theoretically im abot to get seriously busy

on the hoodoo book of flowers, i am desperate to
get back on that novel, my two colleagues, dana
just had her innocence novel come out and getting
good play, geo showed up the reviewer copy
of his new novel, im getting fidgety, a years
worth of work on my novel is what this has
cost me so far, when i picked it up i figured
it was a two week run, as you may recall
rod told me i was in a fantasy bubble but
i ignored him, i shoulda known better

okay im gone, let me put these up and

see if i can get a woodshed grove going,
im on 20:love, or somewhere there
this i hate to write: 61 segments to go

(took the mary karr piece down, decided that
was strictly between me and mary, once blogged
a conversation with another mary, gaitskill, that
almost cost me a friendship that is dear to me
got to have a sense of what you keep to yourself
it was just an email telling her how much her
approval of what i do means to me)

 

THIS WAS MY INTRO FOR JAMES WOODROW YESTERDAY:

before I start, let me apologize for my cussword I got a cussword in here, and I say it twice, I apologize for it beforehand, in fact let me make up for it with a quick benediction for all my fledglings about to venture forth (conch) yes, we have gathered here this fine sunday morning in the name of the word, the almighty and sacred word, and when my people gather together like this in peace and love and harmony that place that gathering place, that place is holyground, and as you venture forth into the long hard grind of literary achievement i want to remind you, this one last time, the only thing fatal is giving up, I cannot tell you how much l love the literary life and so will you, for all it has cost me, for all the dues I have paid, I love being a writer and cannot imagine being an anything else, may your works serve many generations, may the immortal gods of literature be good to you, may gods blessings be on us all

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

so, random picks and Im assigned james woodrow walley, and im like how is it I get the duck dynasty guy but then I think might be it was meant, kinda interesting the viet vet got assigned the Iraqi afghani vet, and then, I mean like you know we both impressively bearded guys out of the delta, (both fond of daily benediction) and we both intrigued by the confluence of the spirit and the word, when he first got here he had this hardcore jarhead shield up, one workshop he said I like to shoot wild hogs and I said well where do you do that, and he say in they fucking face, and he said it like I was slow or something, like where else would you shot a wild hog, and it was hard to tell if he was putting you on, but it wasn't hard to get to the great soul he tries to keep hidden, the one in divine dialogue with the human condition and the meaning of life, boy do have a little devil in him, on that we must agree, he a mischievous fellow, somewhat of a trickster I believe, but he also got a good grip on god, old boy a very complex individual, and he has brought that complexity to his work, you cant hide your little soul, partner if you gon put it into your stories like that, for all the world and all the generations to see, heart on heart in heart, working the same immortal material that has challenged would be literary greats since homer and the illiad, just what is this thing war, all these questions that challenge the soul, questions that have no answers, cause you see james woodrow more than a vet writing about his war experience, james woodrow a writer writing about his war experience, there is a fundamental difference there, not only grappling in his work with the often fascinating adrenalin call war can be for the young and impressionable, but grappling most intensely with issues of craft and vision, deploying innovative narrative strategies that take his work and his potential to uniquely wallenian spaces, boy been stylizing on me, pulling off moves that leave him bedazzled, much less me, one I come to the conclusion james woodrow the real thing, and two - not only do I consider him potentially a true voice of his era, I consider him a friend - go figure, strange program, carry strange magic, you often bond with folk you had no idea you would ever bond with and the duck dynasty guy from deep miss, that's my boy, right nana? that's my boy - all thru the text he got his marines hoooahing each other and that hooah is hard to translate cause it can mean so many things but it brought to mind the phrase from my era when a soldier conducted him or herself in a manner their peers considered above and beyond the call of duty  - outstanding   outfuckingstanding   come on with it james woodrow - hooo  ah