“The police aren’t there to create disorder, they’re there to preserve disorder.” – Mayor Richard Daley, Chicago, 1968 “Anarchy is order; government is civil war.” – Anselme Bellegarrigue, France, 1850 This past summer, reacting to the mass nationwide uprising that erupted following the police murder of George Floyd (ironically, on […]
notes to self rant/ rally/ housework (III and) continuing. . . this is for all the traffic jammers and the head bangers, for fights over parking and jumping to the front of the line in your face, to hell with everybody else, “where’s mine?” “I gotta get mine!” too busy […]
June 24 Every once in a while well maybe not every when the wind is especially fierce there’s a rawness without sorrow or wound, shouted into storm, the low the high the good the bad. Well maybe not bad but it feels that way, like a slap across the face […]
Testimonial Testify For a time, in some places, only men could testify. “Testify” rooted with testes testicles. Tongue tied to crotch; talk of truth as— biology. Biblical Abraham had his servant swear a solid: “put your hand under my thigh, and I […]
Backs might have been breaking in Louisville, in Portland, and in Kenosha, when the ghosts of Black radicalism were called upon once again to bridge the chasm between the liberal democratic tradition of representative democracy and the radical demand for abolition democracy.1 By late summer 2020, that demand had municipal […]
(for Mike Ladd) Modern politicians tend to fawn over entrepreneurs and disparage state action. But once in power, even the most radical free-market ideologues practice a form of bastardized Hamiltonianism. This reflects an important historical truth: capitalism is produced and reproduced by the state. –Christian Parenti, Radical Hamilton (174)1 Finally, […]
Ruckus squawking overhead, each moment seagulls grousing as if the world were theirs. Somewhat out of sorts, a casual form slogs along the strand gazing at sky’s noise, a forceful finger lifted to the din, his gruff deliberate bark snarling BASTA! Awkward, slightly corpulent, no longer quickly springing up to […]
the roses too/ bloomed red that year/ at the wrong time/ (far too early)/ a warning/ (which once again we refused to heed)/ thus against the fields of white frost,/ they were as though stigmata/ (breaking a holy flesh)/ earth signs, bloodletting/ animals at night/ injuring one another/ (my father […]
Anyone who lives near a large body of water can appreciate the power and majesty of the tide. It ebbs and flows, a preternatural breathing that radically affects everything and everyone around it. We set our clocks to it. We structure our lives around it. Our security as well as […]
The first time that I heard the word “otolith” was in a brief video from the Natural History Museum (NHM) in London. In it, their “curator of fish,” James Maclaine, demonstrated the new scanning technology that would allow him to examine the undigested stomach contents of the Museum’s rare, preserved […]
As in the United States and England, statues have been toppled and street names debated in Canada. The statue of John A. Macdonald came down in Montreal on August 29, 2020. Ma(d)Donald you ask? Well, in this case, the first prime minister of Canada (1867–1873, 1878–1891), associated with completion of […]
I remember reading Black feminist scholar Audre Lorde’s essay “Age, Race, Class, and Sex: Women Redefining Difference,” and I was captivated by her use of the capitalization of Black, Color/ed, Black women, Black lesbianism, and Black men throughout the essay, while at the same time demoting “white” and “america” to […]
Darkest Before Dawn?August 29, 2021
To Outwit HistoryAugust 29, 2021
“An act of survival and a strategy to heal:” Suné Woods Interview and PerformanceAugust 29, 2021
Dred Scott’s Blues: Three MeditationsAugust 29, 2021