(02/05/2018) Black History -- Johannesburg Gold

Remembering Hugh Masekela
And the Americanization of Ooga Booga

Today, my annual poem acknowledging Black History month is shared.  A griot, musician, storyteller, and teacher, Hugh Masekela was forced to flee to the United States (USA) from his home in South Africa (USA), and he carried with him the rich culture, heart, and treasure of its people to six continents.  Masekela proclaimed a “promise of the future” and, at the same time, he projected a look to the human heritage and legacy many thought were irretrievably lost.


THE GOLDEN ARROW:  After this I looked, and, behold, a door was opened in heaven:  and the first voice which I heard was as it were of a trumpet talking with me; which said, Come up hither, and I will shew thee things which must be hereafter.  And immediately I was in the spirit:  and, behold, a throne was set in heaven, and one sat on the throne.  And he that sat was to look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone:  and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald.  And round about the throne were four and twenty seats:  and upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment; and they had on their heads crowns of gold.  (Revelation 4:  1-4, King James Version, KJV)


THE DOUBLE DAGGER:  Acknowledging The Precious Things (02/01/2017); Prophesying By Music Ministers (11/06/2017); Poem — What’s In A Name? (06/05/2016); Poem for Amiri Baraka (01/15/2014); Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela:  An Acknowledgment (12/12/2013); GOD Speaking Through Song? (11/01/2013); Why Not One Bible? (11/02/2013); Recognizing True Prophets (05/02/2013); Jesus, A Party Animal? (05/03/2013)

JOHANNESBURG GOLD

For Jazz Giant, Hugh Ramapolo Masekela (1939-2018)
 Black History Month 2018

What for?  A dust pouch fat after blasts to make the rock release its grip

To be never unknown in a place where slick is hip

A brief applause that pushes the cigarette salesman away

The wail of the coal train whistling through the starless day

From this side of the cavern to the next, from this side of the pain, to the other

It's what I would do were I free to love again

It's what I would do because I love my brother.


What for?  I stand, I teach, Pan African oneness, Negritude, escape from apartheid death

Or Miles Dewey Davis challenging me, calling forth my every living breath

Mbaqanga beginnings heard where the little head boys don’t graze

Six continents to span, to finally say, I’m here, Diaspora home, and praise

Our ancestors saying, I am here, and, free at last, and my own man

I am here and free, in a strange, new ingot hoarding land.


What is wrong with moving, changing, growing, never still

Loving long enough for sons to receive an overspill

Hear me under the earth, come up from down below

Never let injustice quench the light of possibility, or cage Unohilo

We are always safe in the arms of love, and the bishop’s gift was not by coincidence

Hear the trumpet calling us to heritage without mystery to “Ooga Booga” with new excellence

©Michael Andrew Williams, 2018.  All rights reserved.

Acknowledging the fullness in the body of Christ, there is far more to be said, correctly examined, and spiritually apprehended.  Even so, I trust this fragment will be useful.  Be it unto you according to your faith.

THE BLACK PHOENIX
Washington, DC

(01/15/2014) Poem for Amiri Baraka

     Today, I share a poem acknowledging a creative artist and teacher, Amiri Baraka (nee Everett LeRoi Jones).  Also, there is more on divine revelation through believers.  I was a young broadcaster in FM radio learning and exploring jazz music as an expression of African American culture when I first heard a daring fusion of speech and music featuring the playwright and poet Jones with the New York Art Quartet (also known as NYAQ).  As nothing I had ever heard or read before, their performance of Black Dada Nihilismus (1964) impressed me with the ferocious intellect and power that are to be conveyed by the spoken word as art.  Our poets should also be firebrands and speak to the issues of our living, not simply the awe of existence or our polite sentiments as those who are now “genteel”.  Poets also must howl, kick ass, and show tough love until hearers and the world around them are “scared straight” and flee from complacency.  Every writer must walk the thin line between hypocrite, showman, and bearer of truth.  What it means to live forever must be succinctly redefined without arrogance before the eternal.  Is it any wonder, the Greeks aligned themselves to Muses, and the shepherds of Israel are fluent speakers of acrostic poesy?  Through Baraka the many hard issues of censorship, FCC regulation, freedom of speech as well as the duty and privilege for thought leaders and writers came into view with overwhelming clarity and power.  At that time, I received Jones as the “Father of my Black consciousness,” and since then he has been a major influence in my thinking and writing along with Jesus Christ.  On this past Sunday, in memoriam, a local public broadcast station radio program host featured Baraka’s performance with the New York Art Quartet of Music’s Underwear (recorded June 14, 1999, from the album “35th Reunion”).  The program host later explained by email, broadcasting Nihilismus instead would have gotten him into difficulty.  (Meanings for the chosen names:  Amiri is Prince, Baraka, is “blessing, in the sense of divine favor.”)


THE BATTLE AXE:  GOD is Showing You (01/14/2014)—A foreign nation and its ruler may be made known and visible by an ambassador who embodies the lawful authority of his sovereign state.  Similarly, believers serve as envoys and representatives for the unseen kingdom of GOD.  Those who are born again, must also learn and “grow up again” by meeting the same life challenges, tests and trials as all others alive upon the earth.   In the same way a spectator should know something about the process, rankings, and rules for the game before they can be fully comfortable with the crowd in the stands for a football playoff competition, a person should receive proper preparation to correctly evaluate and recognize divinity and godliness appearing in others, and in themselves.  See 1st John 2:  1-5, 1st John 3:  15-17 and 1st John 4:  1-3, 6 and 12-14, KJV.

 

He Done Gone and Died
For Amiri Baraka the African American Musicologist, Playwright,
Poet and Scholar (1934-2014)

LeRoi, who could smile so wide
He done gone and died

A quiet, poet’s death
Not like the other Bison
Falling wordless under arrows
The bullets of the West,
The Eastern tourists
Urban meat eaters,
Reveling in their
blood sport from a distance

Theater is where you find it
Make it
Catching the conscience of the king
Playing out the truth
In toilets, subways
The First Church of Dada
or
Sailing ships that lifted like a ghost

Showing life
To be or not to be
His own
A thing of black
Beauty, a new aesthetic
A new politic
And new voice not to be smothered

Who else could have shown us
The means of production
And socialist art
America’s true poetential for revolution
And Marxist magnificence
The thought of social violence
As the tool to gain humanity
For nation-building, baptism
rebirth

Hearing our primitive rhythm
Our genius as old as time
Proud not poor
Hip not beat
Rich not square
Hard not foul
Country not nationalist
Cool not compromised
Angry not hateful
Rushing like the A-train
To get it done
And where it has to go

Not lamenting
Laureates lost
Newark’s neglect
Paradise, pomp
The clearinghouse bonanza
Where the mind’s packed
In champagne
Waiting for a curtain call
Another dress rehearsal

Like gun runners, airmen
Act like you know
Make wordmusic, song bombs
Glittering spears of speech
that loose us from this mortal coil
LeRoi just upped himself
And split the scene
Let there be applause.

LeRoi, who could smile so wide
He done gone and died

 

©Michael Andrew Williams, 2014.  All rights reserved worldwide.

     There is far more to be said, properly shared, and spiritually understood.  (For example, many argue against divine law as an obstacle to complete freedom of speech declaring their right to blaspheme has been abrogated. However, blasphemy is a manifesting of sin that may dominate awareness and self-will in created beings and living creatures. As such, blasphemy is self-destructive and cannot be supported by frameworks of commitment, common sense, consistency, respect and righteousness that disqualify blasphemy as affirmation of ones life essence.) Even so, I trust this fragment will be useful.  Be it unto you according to your faith.


A good man out of the good treasure of the heart bringeth forth good things: and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things.  But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.  For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.  (Matthew 12:  35-37, KJV)


THE BLACK PHOENIX
Washington, DC