growing
groWING
GROWING
in my stomach.
growing
groWING
GROWING
in my mind.
not a tree,
not a flower,
not a plant of any kind.
full of absolutely nothing...
so what I am to you...
nothing.
emptiness that is.
growing
groWING
GROWING
in my throat.
the lump, the bump,
it won't go down.
I can't take it any longer.
I fall to the ground.
no more growing
groWING
GROWING.
because now I am small.
as small as these feelings you have.
as small as the time it took
for me to grow fond.
so I shrink now.
down to the very last drop of
the ocean
the lake
no just the pond.
the pond that will soon turn into a pit.
growing
groWING
GROWING
in my stomach.

Do you know that deep sinking feeling which you get at the pit of your stomach?
It drains all of the life out of you and makes you feel weak.
Muscles and joints don't feel as lively as you drag your feet behind you.
Distracting yourself from the sadness and the pain is almost impossible
The uncomfortable knot will eventually work it's way up to your throat.

As I lay here on my bed
My soul is falling
Down
Into a deep deep pit

No

Not falling
My soul IS the pit
And I fall into it
I am not drowning in my fear
Rather I see it as a marinade
Of gasoline and gunpowder
I dwell in it, soak it into my skin
And wait for the match to light

As I sit here
My arms and head are heavy
Though my eyes leave the ground
They always return swiftly
I no longer can look into your eyes
With confidence
I feel I have failed you
More than the rest
More than myself

I see you
And my whole being shakes with envy
My stomach is twisted with jealousy
All that I desire in life
You have
I find no solace in slumber
No respite in my dreams
Night after night
Week after week
I dream of my failures
I'm haunted by the ghosts of my shortcomings
And wounded by your spectre of success.

why why why?
Only one in what seems like a desert of none
one face, one smile
still only a mirage, a muse.
It's been so long since my mind t’was drenched.
sympathy
why, so dry, am I to die?
I shall ever climb myself out of this sandpit;
but shall it ever escape me?
The winds ride over this land turning all I see to dust anyhow.
A mountain in the midst of my muse would not last.
It would be swallowed up by all this water.

The band starts playing at a ***** and crowded backyard.
Rebellious youth gather to cast their vote with the stomping of their doc martin boots.
Beer cans everywhere, everyone's trying to let loose the raw stranglehold their society has produced.
The guitars go off and the ritual begins.
First they assemble in the heart of the pit.
In the center individual tragedies bring fourth the wrath of a God's army.
Anarchy you call it, Ha! I call it reassurance, reassurance that this anger is surely communal.

I never saw it more clearer, the youth's power to resist: If the government wont hear us, we will create our own sound even under the batons of fascism, we spit on your rule, your control of our art.

We wont bow down to a law with our names written all over it, while another politician walks free from corruption.
While another officer guns down an un armed child and calls it self-defense.
While suspicious mass shootings continue to occur and mass cameras grow in recording.
While you send more people off to war for another countries resources.
These thoughts explode out of me into shoves, screams, ****** cuts, reckless behavior, and then finally release. Pure psychiatric release.

Memories of past present and future invade my personal space, strangling me with their claws of deception.
I struggle against them, desperately trying to escape, the impression they leave suffocating and reaching with long tendrils for my most inner thoughts.
The darkness is almost touching me now, dancing, playing, teasing. Just so slowly spreading into my world and my life.
I can’t control it, only decide to live with it, understanding it and fighting it every day. Until i can’t fight it anymore, and then the small light which was burning slowly, was fading fast. It was close to me now, circling dangerously, i tried to escape but found myself jumping into the void, greeting it as an old friend.

It is one of those days
where I get stuck
in my pit

struggling to climb
needing to escape

Soon may be too late
late will be too long

Can someone lend me a rope?
I shan't hoist myself
not yet.
Send it so you may
safely descend
not to stay
only to visit
so I have company's comfort
here in my pit.

Maybe then they'll understand
why I slip so suddenly
and help me remember
there's always a way out.

The time will come
when the climb is
self-attained.
But I can't
not now.  

So the rope might still reside
lost to shadows only I could be
seeing.  
I just hope you carry a glimmer
of what's left of the world's lights
so this climb
and (m)any others
will be eased.
Then will come my ascent
yes, this time my own
when I won't need another
for each gradual advance
back into that
twisted little reality.

Tell us more, Old one-eye,
Spiller of darkness
Bringer of hope,
Builder of men.

What could I tell you,
Young and agile,
Dark dreams and light smiles

About the pits
So deep
We lost their names

Or the towers
That rose so high
We forgot about them

Or the fire
Intensely hot;
We forgot how to feel the cold,

How to embrace the night
And the morning.

There are tales of stars of battles
And heroes of blood.

There are no tales of makers of stone,
Iron and wood.
You are all those things, youths.
You are the knot in the rope,
The hand that tied it,

And the mind that knew how.

We pass the
walled incline
of Barbour Park

during the day
a foreboding
patch…an open
air market for
the slave merchants
hustling crack and
**** drippin ****
that's been stepped
on so many times
its a wonder the cut
can still chide a high
out of a wrangled soul

the park’s
modest elevation
is an advantageous
lookout for
runners dealing
dimes while
petty ante
gangstas
daydream
gun blazing glories
of their next big job

not long ago
the park was
refurbed with
an industrial
strength plastic
Jungle Jim,
soon after
the park was
condemned
as a no go
zone for kids,
the litter of
hypodermic
needles and
mounds of
lead spiked
soil, deemed
a public health
risk for youth...
quickly
repurposed
as a crib
for ballers…

back in the
day, the shady
pocket park
lifted Paterson’s
citizenry off
the heated
pavements of
a bustling
thoroughfare

a respite from
the pulsing
tensions of urbanity,
a secular sanctuary,
balancing the urgent
industry of commerce
with the propriety of
residential life

compacting a
brief escape
from the clanging
metronome with
a viewing stand
offering elevation...
a heightened
perspective on
life’s parade
marching
up and down
Broadway…

this urban
oasis planted
at the center
of Silk City’s
grandiloquent
boulevard,
occupies
the most
democratic
equidistant
transit point
between opulent
Eastside mansions
of livin large tycoons
at one end….
and the
industrial district of
The Great Falls,
rising at Broadway’s
western terminus,
assiduously
manufacturing
dollars for the darlings
of fortune and
subsistence for
workers yearning to taste
the crumbs of
prosperity that may fall
from the tables of
opportunity

the park once a
pleasant face of
the landlocked
4th Ward filled
with homage to
a nation's greatest
citizens, Hamilton,
Rosa Parks,
Lafayette,
Madison, Fulton,
Montgomery and
Franklin has
denounced the
virtuous pursuit of
their aspirational
yearnings

now playas
feast on
the mead
of sustenance
harvested from
emaciated streets

commerce has taken
up full residency...
the wards cottage industry
cannibalizing
homes, hoods and
homeboys

as the
4th Ward
grows ugly,
the healthy
matrix of
bustling
street life
breaks down
the peeps
weakened
lay prostate
offer veins
to blood *******
predators
roaming
distressed
going south
neighborhoods

wise guy
knuckleheads,
get busy
gaming
the system
short changing
themselves and
hustling game
to get by
in the sweet bye
and buy of life

at night
a back lit
Barbour Park
floods with the
yellow haze of
blinking Fair St.
lamp posts
and the pulsing
halations
crowning the
Baptist's
of St. Luke's

sentient figures
shift between
park benches
flitting among the
black torsos
of skeletal trees
blending into
the faded
complexion
of abandoned
swing sets

I swear I see
Hurricane Carter
shadow boxing
dancing
around a gangling
Elm, jabbing
away, lifting
a sweet uppercut
working combos
of left hooks
and right crosses
hoping to drop an
intractable
presence
banging away
at a body politic
forming the walls
of taunting
inequities

Hurricane stays
busy delivering
body blows
to burst
through the
prison bars
surrounding
Barbour Park

Music selection:
Bob Dylan, Hurricane

Paterson
01/30/13
jbm

A fragment from extended poem Silk City PIT.  
Published today to honor the death of Rubin Hurricane Carter.
May he find the freedom in eternal rest that eluded him during his lifetime.