A new disaster for the people [largely neglected… suggests genocide]. The shockwaves are felt. 30,000+, for example, spill into our city, most of which will stay on permanently. Ten minutes away, “Doctors at the Houston Astrodome said Friday they have contained a viral outbreak that caused diarrhea and vomiting in about 700 Katrina evacuees. Forty people remained in quarantine as a precaution.” –The Chicago Tribune
The media spins this disaster around the clock.
I’m walking around with the images in my head. They basically say, “You’re a lucky son of a bitch for not having been there, amidst everything falling apart, all the death, desperation, the brutality.”
They continue to state: this is anarchy! Is it really? Fucking of course not! Anything but!
. . .
Time is passing. Moods up/down. This is the roller coaster of life. The good times, the bad, the tragedies. They throw the mind for a loop. I need time to process. Everyone is screaming specks of blood into my right ear. The bathroom can be one of the only places to go for privacy. Loot that privacy.
By evening, everything has calmed, except for a TV downstairs. I remember back on Bradshaw, Silver Spring, the TV in the background; but it’s all gone now; we’re halfway across the country. That was my grandparent’s house. My grandfather died, my grandmother moved in with my mom. They moved to Waldorf, then to Roanoke…
I never thought I would take decorating so seriously, but here I am, reading about Feng Shui. It’s that ISKCON conditioning that we were always on the move, living out of our suitcases, living in rooms barely unpacked. Well, it is time to unpack. Really settle in. Throw the ugly cardboard boxes away. Make a home for yourself. Remove all the eye sores. Brighten/dim the room to suit your needs. You can exert some control over your atmosphere.
Even if you live only for only five minutes more, a missile splits open your building – was that time making things better for yourself wasted?
So many self-defeating attitudes back there in ISKCON-land. All that talk about the body being as temporary as a night’s stay in a hotel room: if you’re only there for the night, why redecorate the place? Of course a lot of the analogies did not apply, but sounded so profound at the time.
Any moment beyond this one is not promised.
The backbone of it all is to have compassion for others. This is what would legitimize any religion. Which is why I have become a cynic towards it all. Yet somehow I am still open to the paranormal, the idea of UFOs flitting about, even visitations, abductions, and will watch these haunted house documentaries on cable channels. These possibilities seem more exciting. Still, that this is all a lie, nothing is out there, we’re utterly alone, I think is just as possible, fascinating, and a worthy pursuit of understanding.
I love considering it all. I love listening to intelligent people (even if they’re faking it). I love interviews. I love taking these walks with my wife, who tells me something that really adjusts my perspective, helping me to see with greater compassion.
Fuller transcript from Tracy and Eric: Kanye West at the NBC Concert for Hurricane Katrina Relief:
Mike Meyers reads off prompter … switches to black singer, Kanye West:
“I hate the way they portray us in the media.
“If you see a black family it says they are looting if you see a white family it says they are looking for food.
“And you know that it’s been 5 days because most of the people are black and even for me to complain … I would be a hypocrite because I would turn away from the TV because it’s too hard to watch. I’ve even been shopping before giving a donation and so right now I’m calling my business manager what is the biggest amount I can give.
“And just to imagine if I was down there, those are my people down there. So anybody out there who wants to help with the set up, the way that America is set up to help … The poor, the black people, the less well off as slow as possible. I mean, Red Cross is doing everything they can.
“We already realize a lot of the people that could help are at war now fighting another way and they’ve given them permission to go down and shoot us.”
(Mike Meyers tries to get back on prompter, reads from script and then camera cuts back to Kanye. He pauses before
Kanye West: “George Bush doesn’t care about black people.” Link
BGKPOETRY.COM 