Burn.

February has proven itself to be a hectic month so far. Hands dry, a bruise on my arm, a slip in my pocket and a smile on my face seems to paint the perfect picture.

It seems as if the portrait is nearly ready to be hung on the wall, yet rather than depicting a ravishing duo, it reveals a young man by his lonesome, a compilation of letters laid out on the desk behind him. Yet this image of sadness is accented by the man's smiling face, a radiant glow blanketing himself and those around him.

For through the doubt and the dim he has stood strong. His validity has been renewed; his reason to smile, clear.


I am that man.

One Way

I spoke with someone who I used to be close with last night for the first time in a long time, and updated him about what had happened in November.

"I swear you loved that girl," was what he said.
"I swear I did, too." was all I could say.


We are a traveling people. Every morning we wake up with places to go and things to do, with feats to accomplish and people to impress. At times these goals may seem palpable, while at others they may seem covert, leading us to become punctilious in our decision making, taking time to analyze and review the paths laid out in front of us in order to choose one containing as little bedlam as possible. But no matter how redoubtable these roads may seem to us, there will always be unavoidable obstacles that will reprove and desecrate all who come their way to the point where all that remains can only be described as cadaverous.

Some of the corpses lay crassly upon the spot where they have been debased, while others choose to retreat and pick other paths. Yet some march along, straightening their backs and brushing the dirt off their shoulders as they do so. Their prosaic minds cocoon and then blossom into paragons of virtue, their cracked feet pound against the cracked gravel beneath them, their voices echoing proud in the valley of death that surrounds them.

I have chosen my paths and walked my roads. I have faced my obstacles with fear brimming in my eyes. I have been reduced to a mere shell of my former self, I have been degraded and perverted by many people and many things. Yet still I remained stalwart and arose each and every time I fell, implicit to all around me that I had no intention of ever stopping until I was absolved of my sins.

The fall I took some months ago was the hardest I have suffered so far, yet I willed myself to rise and take another step, for no, even as a mere corpse I did not remain idle on the pavement until it became my deathbed. I couldn't. I wouldn't. I arose, slowly but surely, and let out a disseminating scream to let everyone know that I was there, I was alive. I continued along the austere trail, stalwart, listening to the street-beat, the ground-pound. What could have been a dead end has turned into a march of restitution which I continue today and will continue for the rest of my life, for life is a journey, not a destination.

In God, I have found salvation, and in myself and I have found courage. In some I have found good, and in others I have found malice, but in all I have found truth.








There is only one way to go now: Forward.

Three Modes of History and Culture

I think about a time when I will be relaxed,

when flames and nonspecific passion wear themselves, away.
And my eyes, and hands, and mind can turn, and soften,
and my songs will be softer, and lightly weight the air.

By Amiri Baraka.