Bell Angel Evergreen Chime (the fast closing dusk)

There was dusk, and it closed in fast. The creative one glanced out a window at a squirrel grey and remembered things. He was determined to think of interesting and positive, life affirming phenomena and people, to frame the world on the side of goodness. There had been a bell on a door, and also a bell in a church top structure,- the bells were soulful and well made, reminded him of times he didn’t live through, but had seen in old films and maybe old books. Small towns. Well made things mechanically, structurally, maybe many hand made things.

He imagined there was an angel sometimes, just over things, between the tops of bookshelves or Christmas trees and the ceilings. Wouldn’t that be a nice place for an angel, guiding us, concerned about, seeing, whispering softly,- benevolent, ghostly but in a good way?- and the evergreens. They were brave, choice or not, to stand out there in all the seasons. He thought people took them for granted. But they were something wonderful in life. The snowy ground sometimes, and then the green, and the clear blue sky. He had just said to someone recently while walking, ‘Today is not the day, not the ideal day. It’s one of those ones you have to get through is all. It’s one of those days for sure. It’s freezing and windy without many redeeming qualities. It’s when the snow was there, and the wind had subsided and one could just enjoy the calm day.

That is the thing. In the forest. By the evergreens. You know. That is it. Much better.’ And then the idea of the chimes. Leave the chimes. They have soul. Silver on black strings. They don’t sound a lot but sometimes. Other people, a gratitude for them. The beloved with the dimples, brown eyes, wisps of hair falling down. The blonde, good hearted and outgoing. The artist, having knowledge and kindness, interested in the paranormal and always giving keen insights into things she was. And the woman whose eyes were all colours, all different colours at once,- a true and long friend that one.

One day in the countryside, or one day in the south by the sea, there will also be chimes. By the rural fields alone but not lonesome, at home themselves in the bright noon sun, a small breeze, like an angel, like an angel out from the ceiling area. Or, maybe better yet, chimes in the south, maybe even made of shells from the sea!- making their nice noise, by a place where there are palm fronds verdant and stucco walls painted the lightest of orange colours. By the crests of the sea waves and the electric lights blue green yellow purple orange blue like Christmas lights themselves, flowing light on thick grasses and some fence, on a cement bench with turquoise tiles in the top like the one or ones from long before. Everyone has forgotten. They even laugh. But they are hasty and haughty and full of ambition and pride and ego.

I remember. I  appreciate. The grace of it all. The angels, they know. They don’t laugh. They honour place and person, pastoral atmosphere and seaside sanctity, rural restless wildflowers and ferns feral, and even, maybe especially, the fast confident dusk. The dusk of winter so strange and all.

a tempting red sky

wake up pissing

blood, think nothing

of it

still enough vinegar

in your soul to kill

any mortal man

a tempting red sky

these are the nights

you’ll drink gin

from an old cup

you used as a child

might as well,

that’s where all

the pain comes

from

———————————————————————————-

in dying arms

and here come all the

reasons i wanted to die

as a child

scattered ashes in a field

in the middle of nowhere

black roses in dying arms

someone put on some

mozart

dirty looks all around

i remember when we

tasted each other on

the top of a mountain

in the rain

you brought out my crazy

like no other soul on this

planet

and here we are

in tears

what could have been

just another dirty rumor

if they aren’t talking

about you, you ain’t

doing your job

remember that shit

loose lips

we danced like everyone

was watching and were

jealous

——————————————————————————–

needle still dangling

enchanted beauty

falls into the void

of this world

the neon bleeds

though the thin

walls

needle still dangling

a rush of something

more than a mere

mortal can handle

the crushing tragedy

of depravity

the endless escape

from anything based

in reality

take my loneliness

and stuff it away

where only the false

idols can find it

hold tight

i will be there

broken as always

loving with

whatever i

have left

the demons only

bite if you pay

in cash

——————————————————————————–

natural to me

i think i wanted to grow

up like kerouac and just

die sooner

i never felt like i had

‘on the road’ in me

of course, i had planned

that cross country coming

of age trip but the friend

i was going with left

without me

that became a running

joke in my adult life

take two steps into

the future and brace

for the bottom to

fall out

i look back on those

years and wonder why

the joints were never

laced

how did i never catch

something from the

homeless or the strange

women in the dive bars

this dystopian madness

that i find comforting

chaos is natural to me

that life isn’t for just anyone

it takes a couple of screws

loose at best

——————————————————————————————-

lost empires

slip on some coltrane and

lose yourself on a yellow

brick road of crack babies

and lost empires

we were supposed to be great

our own kings and queens

the rulers of this little domain

we are peasants

modern day slaves

thankless jobs and a world that

won’t let us have any fun

and they wonder why these

four walls are enough for me

how one soul can get lost in

constant states of wreckage

and pain

i can’t help but think i’m

way past my expiration date

a lost carton of milk at the

back of a dying fridge

J.J. Campbell (1976 – ?) is stuck in the suburbs, wondering where all the lonely housewives have gone? He’s been widely published over the years, most recently at Horror Sleaze Trash, Yellow Mama, The Rye Whiskey Review, The Beatnik Cowboy and Lothlorien Poetry Journal. You can find him most days on his mildly entertaining blog, evil delights. (https://evildelights.blogspot.com)

The Armor Of God

The sculptor of my soul, the shaper of dreams,

The lighthouse guides me through life’s raging streams.

The lifeline of love, a man built to inspire,

His hope fuels my growth, his words light my fire.

A leader of strength, my champion, my guide,

A shoulder of dreams where ambitions reside.

His bald crown, a playground for childhood delight,

His scolding, my spark, my source of bright light.

The hero of heroes, my pride,

A warrior protecting, with love as his guide.

F: A Fighter, shielding through life’s every storm,

A: An Armor of God, steadfast and warm.

T: A Trailblazer, charting the map of success,

H: A Helper, who stands in each moment of stress.

E: An Enthusiast, spreading joy without end,

R: The Realist, who mends where we bend.

Father, The savior.

Like a tree rooted deep, reaching high to the skies,

He holds us together, where our happiness lies.

A protector, a fighter, a beacon of grace,

In his shadow, I grow, in his love, I embrace.

Unmerry

In 1968 I followed my math Ph.D. thesis advisor Karl Stromberg to Kansas State University from the University of Oregon in Eugene to complete my studies.  Professor Stromberg decided to visit Eugene over Christmas break.  His new wife couldn’t drive and he was legally blind.  He asked me to do the driving.

We followed blizzards for 1,740 miles to Oregon.  The first day the snow was so deep that I lost the road and drove into a snow bank.  We were towed into the nearest town by a road grader, but we could only get one room there.  The couple took one bed and I slept with the wife’s two young children, one of whom wet the bed.  As bad as that was, I would have preferred to stay where I was to getting back on the road, but we went on through the perilous weather.  The other excitement on the trip was losing traction on a street in Baker in Eastern Oregon.  We were fortunate that the car slid down a vacant street hitting nothing, rather than running into pedestrians or a building.  No harm done, just horror.

We got to Eugene and then I took a bus to Portland where my father picked me up from a pay telephone booth (they were common then).  When I checked in with the woman that I had been dating while in Oregon, she was distant and cold.  I got the hint.  There hadn’t been any passion in the relationship and I wasn’t very disappointed, despite a desire to see her again.  My sister who had introduced us suggested she was interested in marriage, which didn’t interest me.

After that there was a low key Christmas with my mid-fifties year old parents.  Of that and the trip back, I remember little.  There was no drama, pain, or joy.

Epilogue – I got my Ph.D at the end of that school year back in Eugene.  I never heard from the girlfriend again.  I got married the next year while teaching at Morehouse College in Atlanta and remain married to the same person who among other things is my live in editor.  Professor Stromberg’s wife left him and he got a mail order wife I am told.  He has died; I don’t know anything about either of those wives – there had been some before those two.

Why the Afro-Caribbean Diaspora Celebrate Carnival

By Jacques Fleury

As a young boy growing up partly on the francophone island of St. Domingue or Haiti as we know it today, few things gave me more pleasure than seeing random festivities making a raucous in my neighborhood.  I would later learn that they are colloquially referred to as “raras.”  Rara is defined as a festive Haitian musical category, religious ritual, dance, and sometimes a system of political dissent that originated in Haiti.

I remember running to my mother and saying in French : “Maman, il y a un tas de gens qui jouent de la musique et font des bruits joyeux dans les rues ! Et d’autres personnes les rejoignent en chemin ! On dirait qu’ils s’amusent ! Pouvons-nous les rejoindre aussi ? ’’ Which translates in English to: “Mom, there are a bunch of people playing music and making happy noises in the streets! And other people are joining them along the way! Looks like they’re having fun! Can we join them too? “

I never asked “why?” I just felt the joy in the deep part of my youthful soul, replete with then a plethora of auxiliary wonderment. It was the few times that the border between adults and children blended and we all became simply humans just being. It never occurred to me that there was a reason why the historical legacies of these prima facie “happy” islanders were rooted in pain, which they would then deliberately mitigate by suffusing their hearts with joy rather than congregate to commiserate in an amalgamation of anger over egregious hurts from their historical past.

This is the island I remember as a child. Running naked with my cousins in the rain, playing hide & seek during blackouts and flying kites under the perpetual summer sun and of course CARNIVALS: an equally festive but much bigger version of “raras.” A colossal event that encompasses floats of popular bands replete with polemic reciprocal banter all in good fun, lavish costumes and a time when they forget about dictators, and the politics of malicious foreign policies and governmental undermining of bigger more powerful countries that seemingly condemns them to a state of perpetual hardship and political unrest.

It wasn’t until I came to America on a student visa that I learned about America’s relationship with Haiti, which was and still is not so good. As I watched the American news media portray the Haitian people as sorrowful, pitiful peasants who “need” to be “rescued”, an ideology that conceivably corroborates “the white savior complex.” Even after over one hundred years of genetic research from top universities like Harvard have traced the VERY first human civilization back to the deserts of  sub-Saharan Africa from which all other civilizations evolved 50,000 years ago! According to generative artificial intelligence, this is defined as:  a mentality where a white person supposes they need to rescue or “save” people of color, often by belittling or meddling in their lives, while concurrently denying agency and authority to those they claim to help; fundamentally portraying themselves as the generous force needed to uplift demoted communities, which is often seen as a detrimental typecast and a form of racial despotism. 

Key points about the “white savior complex”:

• Patronizing attitude:

A white person with this complex may view people of color as incapable of solving their own problems and needing white intervention. 

• Performative actions:

Their actions might be more about self-image and gaining praise than genuinely helping the communities they target. 

• Ignoring systemic issues:

This complex often fails to address the root causes of inequalities, focusing instead on individual acts of charity that may not create lasting change. 

Examples of white savior complex behavior:

• A white person starting a charity in a developing country without consulting local leaders about their actual needs. 
• A white individual taking credit for the achievements of people of color they are “helping”. 
• A fictional narrative where a white character is the only one who can solve a problem faced by a community of color. 

Why is the “white savior complex” problematic?

• Perpetuates stereotypes:

It reinforces the notion that people of color are helpless and need white people to save them. 

• Disregards agency:

It denies people of color the ability to advocate for themselves and solve their own issues. 

• Centering whiteness:

It puts the focus on the white person’s actions and motivations, rather than the needs of the marginalized community. 

When it comes to Haiti and other predominantly “black” nations, the scenarios above are what I’ve come to know as an adult through the American media and personal interactions with fellow Americans across all racial and cultural backgrounds. What America fails to tell the world is that despite Haiti’s people being enslaved and brutalized for over a hundred years by the French, Haiti managed to single handedly secure its freedom by becoming the FIRST BLACK REPUBLIC in history in 1804 after the pivotal Battle of Vertieres. From the authority of generative AI:

The Battle of Vertières was the final major battle of the Haitian Revolution and the establishment of Haiti as the world’s first independent Black republic: 

• When and where

The battle took place on November 18, 1803, near Cap-Haitien in northern Haiti 

• Who fought

The Haitian army led by General Jean-Jacques Dessalines fought against Napoleon’s French expeditionary forces led by General Rochambeau 

• What happened

The Haitian army stormed the French-held Fort Vertières and eventually defeated the French troops 

• Significance

The battle was a critical blow to Napoleon, forcing him to focus on building an empire in Europe. It was also the first time an army of enslaved people led a successful revolution for their freedom. 

• Monument

A monument was constructed on the site of the battle in 1953

And it was money from the then richest island in the Americas that France used to supplement the American Revolution against the British, in the late 1700s, Haitians came to fight off the Brits in Savannah, Georgia for which they are memorialized in a colossal monument erected in 2000 (better late than never, eh?). Not to mention that it was a Haitian American trader by the name of Jean Baptiste Point du Sable who is regarded as the primary permanent non-Native colonizer of what we now know as Chicago, Illinois, and is documented as the city’s founder.

Despite all these accomplishments, Haiti is still being portrayed in the media as pitiful underachievers who need to be “rescued” by the self-proclaimed superior powers that be.

So why does the African diaspora celebrate by throwing lavish “fetes” or “parties” in the form of Carnivals? As an adult, I had to research and educate myself about “my story”, no thanks to my American “His-story” classes of yore. The carnivals represent a joyous middle finger to their oppressors, much like when during the tempestuous epochs of the civil rights movement, black people used to sing negro spirituals as they were being arrested to reclaim their individual power, joy and dignity.  The idea of “the carnival” was conceived to celebrate the liberation of the Afro-Caribbean Diaspora from slavery…something I didn’t know when I was child in Haiti.

It is a reclamation of the Afro-Caribbean power as a people, to tell their OWN story. I once read that until the lions possess their own historians, the history of the hunt will always extol the hunter. Hence the carnivals represent the formation of the hunted “lions’ historians” and they are “glorifying” themselves by telling their OWN stories through song, dance, fabulous customs and costumes!

Dedicated to my brother, Dr. Guy Claude Fleury for his inspiration and advocacy for Afro-Caribbean culture.

Jacques Fleury is a Boston Globe featured Haitian-American Poet, Educator, Author of four books and literary arts student at Harvard University online. His latest publication “You Are Enough: The Journey to Accepting Your Authentic Self”   & other titles are available at all Boston Public Libraries, the University of Massachusetts Healey Library, University of  Wyoming, Askews and Holts Library Services in the United Kingdom, The Harvard Book Store, The Grolier Poetry Bookshop, amazon etc…  He has been published in prestigious  publications such as Muddy River Poetry Review, the Cornell University Press anthology Class Lives: Stories from Our Economic Divide, Boston Area Small Press and Poetry Scene among others…Visit him at:  http://www.authorsden.com/jacquesfleury.

Pay it Forward

One Christmas Eve, many years ago, I sat on the pavement, outside my pharmacy, having gotten my meds and now waiting for the door-to-door transit bus, which ferried disabled folks about town. I didn’t think much about it at the time, but in my old Carhart jacket and tattered jeans, I must have presented something of a spectacle to others who were going in and out of the building. As I sat there idly observing other people, I noticed that many of them averted their eyes in passing. I figuratively shrugged.

At one point, a middle aged woman approached bearing a  twenty dollar bill and implored me to take it. I tried to refuse it, telling her that I was not a begger, but merely waiting for my bus — I was sitting on the pavement because my legs weren’t strong enough to support me for long periods of time. But, she insisted, telling me simply, “Merry Christmas.” Not wanting to hurt her feelings, I reluctantly accepted her gesture of kindness.

Ten minutes later, still awaiting my ride, I spied a pretty young woman with two little children. She approached a well-dressed man emerging from the pharmacy and briefly spoke to him. I saw him shake his head no and continue on his way. She stood there, forlorn, and I struggled to my feet and approached her.

“Can I help you, miss,” I asked her.

Taking in my disheveled appearance, she shook her head and said, “No, I don’t want to trouble you.”

I thought: she  thinks I’m a panhandler too. I smiled as kindly and as unthreateningly at her as I could and merely handed her the twenty. She was stunned. Then she narrowed her eyes at me a little suspiciously for a moment, but finding in my face only kindness, she accepted the bill and hugged my in gratitude. In my mind I imagined the predators who might have tried to coerce her.

“Merry Christmas,” I murmured, but she was already half way across the parking lot with her children, en route to McDonalds.

New Money Talking

a parvenu offer discharging

other beveled rhythm clatter

created the natal glassware

negative distention shared

slowly with caravan garnish

a vernacular surfeit ravenous

when placebo clutter scented

all vinyl camels sentenced 

to motivation from bonfire

moons harvest night visions

baring simple reverberation 

mixed donation count slowing

the explanation always current

alkali confessionals assimilate

slowly crumbling nonchalance 

nouns confused beyond focus

boxed the intended explanation

their asymmetrical rout buttons

left the blot workers hot hands

gripping for work when shading

though a new belief metropolis

tried as nominal monorail dreams

asphalt moving where plumage

displaces pinnacle precursors

sweatband mavens manipulate

sandbar dissertation swamping

catapult mustard blown ashore

cranks threatened clatter thirst

where shore’s old money fails

recumbent vengeance battered

blossom soundtrack bromide

while chopstick hipsters loaded 

before fetal setters waddled

partnership plumage protruding

acoustic manacle swamping

subterranean passengers worm

behind a retro simulacrum pit

repository staterooms gamble

old management vendettas

trace a subliminal condition

called nom more than noum 

and crowing transparencies

go postal for envelope return 

or warrant rampage visions

the intricate endeavor served

over fresh apocalypse lotion 

gives notions pixellated rancor 

King Leering

1.

reptilian camphor

never a slither too soon 

     adorned &

adrift in scrotal motoring

     epilogue in fourth pursuit

     culpable as a faded legion

     grown foreign to its tongue

no matter the sliced enticement

     a filter guord

     sharing tooth bleeds

     a bellied circus

cordially monochromatic

     and always available

                  in shortened outbursts

2.

writhing mayhem

occlusion spoils the winning 

     whose circuits

shorten the soiled spread

         caught 

         in a tandem remake

         unclogged 

                          its calling core 

a new suit (gray) covers the slay fang

     implant

     the chronic rotary ogle

     replayed

                   a grip-firmed gin

         attuned to automatic

             outbursts parlayed cast

                  nuance to dating figurines

3.

turning left-

handed on the condo circuit

                  a rebel 

                  without a paw

     no star north

     on the Hollywood walk

to warm 

             the break

                            of a lizard chill

just flip on the zeitgeist filter

     ecalate downward

          an eye on ascending

               the scent of his ointment

Sometimes it Takes a Weatherman

roadhouse winds seem leftward 

prefixes to convenient pursuit 

of roadblock carnage bellow out-

play setbacks that failed to stray 

from a victor’s convenient minibus

motoring a firestorm transit rumor

alongside visor launches designated 

to pillory schemata recipients 

formation grows vexation turf

wavering against the sciatica blister 

employers left to forage custard or silt

stock dilemmas in the fetid marsh

no predators attended the bramble 

an armpit thrust lowered bandanas

red animation compounded assent 

backbone boost informally intoned

no caliper adversaries compounded

another tangible venom change

left a salvage phone dispatch filter 

ventilated natal fortification glory

the phrenolology firestorm forecast 

their linear organ liter landmark trails

fair comparison to a roman jockstrap

lunchtime exorcism belch emerging 

nice caricature to bump upon a bias

the lemur media already receives 

empty support from intrepid reflectors 

where roadhouse monuments dazzle 

filler but diminished drizzle glazed

the vagabond camouflage too relic

dooms its own discursive slipping

duffers hail a coastal mausoleum

tabloids blow messenger predilections

past the looming preconception 

syncophantic retrofit pulsations glimmer

ghost implosions when darkened

bolero dining to a sepulchral medley

Long Motel Stayed

larvae pudding 

low tipper cleats turn out 

the other thrust

whisper texture

fades on feel from heating

motive a venom waylaid

as linear guffaw exports

a raw blockade enclave

daydreams

boast hourglass staterooms

immediate 

pallor stains the worn brain 

dispensing

sedentary replication

to delay any pocketbook guest

sidecar candelabera boast

a vaunted misanthrope rotisserie

stroking visible pork shading

dazed veins

turning patio temper vacant