Kevin McCarthy's poems, lyrics, plays, essays
Forever on the outside looking in
a hall of fame no-win shoo-in
guilty of the being boring sin
an off balance of yang and yin
chagrin camouflaged by a goofy grin
often anorexic at the gravitas weigh-in
taken one too many on the chin
perennially searching for a life plug-in
in charge of the human waste dustbin
whirled too often by faulty human spin
being quite the deluxe Zelig stand-in
Sour neighborhoods cluttered with soft hard kids
the gates of egress adorned with prickly spikes
no directional signage for life’s stations of the cross
very few chutes, mostly mirages of ladders, minus rungs
perchance to dream, sure, more likely just lay low
Slickly oiled up and anointed as tabula rasas
ensconced in the insidest of sick jokes
breathing in and out in a sundown world 24/7/365
the keys to any kingdom always beyond grasp
it’s a fabled concept spewed by word torturers
In even the most forlorn, yes, resides a dim glimmer of hope
can it ever intermittently eschew dormancy, or even artfully rule?
Try attempting facing the mirror and diving through the distortion
seeking the sprouting, shunning the stunted and gnarled
while praying all searing pain and hurt could be exit wounds
We was raised on a family farm way out of town
croppin’ wasn’t easy but the lifeblood we found
two boys, me and Jed, our sister Rose died at eleven
buried past the barn when he was twelve and I ten
one day here, then gone, Mama said it was the fever
told me not to say a word and everyone believed her
Jed soon turned dark, just ugly treating others
we was the same but so unlike blood brothers
he earned a reputation, it spread and soiled me
kids would quietly edge away, watching fearfully
but Becky Cook took to likin’ me, be it luck or fate
with her I felt alive, a liftin’ of the heaviest of weight
Chorus
Life moves on but absence ain’t just not being seen
Darkness shadows families, we claw at the holes in between
My parents said don’t you dare bring her around
When I’d ask why, they’d say you just calm down
Jed told me to do it, with a look like he knew more
Then he’d smirk and continue on with his chores
one day Becky called wanting to see me by myself
Daddy and Mama in town, Jed to parts unknown
She showed up and I told her I liked her smile
I went to find my favorite book, floatin’ all the while
when I returned, she was gone less a single shoe remaining
I called her name to no answer, silently spittin’ out a prayer
then I heard a scream outside and tore into the yard
Jed was draggin’ Becky away like a corpse to the boneyard
Chorus
Life moves on but absence ain’t just not being seen
Darkness shadows families, we claw at the holes in between
Jed turned, let her go, then ran into the barn
Becky shaking, her dress dirty and blood adorned
Daddy’s truck appeared, he asked “why’s she here?”
“Jed hurt Becky” and Daddy’s eyes displayed fear
“He’s in with the livestock and I want at him”
Daddy had Mama take us inside, him pale and grim
A single shot rang out, Daddy took two hours to return
sayin’ “there’ll be no more problems, nothing of concern”
an hour later, he spoke again with “it’s time for the truth”
he said, “Emory, this is gonna taste like bitterroot
it was evil but family, what Jed did to our sweet Rose
but taking it outside us left me nothing but what I chose”
Chorus
Life moves on but absence ain’t just not being seen
Darkness shadows families, we claw at the holes in between
Introduction:
Not final thoughts, call them edible words
written hard in mind and put away wet
Evil is, yes, the world’s purest desire
and humans will never break from its twining
it’s a backwater oozing enchanting siren songs
laden with devil hybrids and soul strip mining
Long before this nation’s so-called founding
chains were placed heavy across human hearts
call it the original-est of mankind’s sins
the scars on the Blacks in order to tell them apart
Death freighters sailed across the dark seas
Lower in the water, burdened with heavy hate
the ticket-less cargoes bound for King Cotton
timeless auction blocks still the South’s soulmate
Label them holy shrines or places of the damned
hellholes of Wallace, Maddox, Connor and that filth
the reality is there’s a new generation always bidding
the latest now nattily dressed in suits and ties of silk
Oh, come one, come all to the public lynch
it’s a swing and sway of the three-fifths faction
for when it’s a state’s right to maim and then kill
you cannot emancipate solely with a proclamation
Call it an alignment with the status quo gospel
brewed and marinated in feral and fetid DNA
always remember, ‘it’s Mr. James Crow to you boy’
for the genocidal will never stop seeking prey
Yes, human giants climbed many of the mountaintops
alerting and and warning about fires of five alarm
challenging the plaintive ‘we’ve always done it this way’
battling malignant foes laden with a love to harm
But this ill extends far beyond the southern seceders
to constituents professing kinship with the Golden Rule
but when human innocence is profanely slain
the thirst of all is quenched by the vilest of cesspools
Have black lives ever really mattered?
only in the futures market of the enslaved
angels yes, but among us there are no better devils
much history is home sweet home for the depraved
Who was I?
I didn’t know at 7, 14, 21, 28, 35…
When I was young, I never knew I needed to know myself
That was never an assignment
I just lived each day
ingesting whatever came my way
what else was there?
carpe diem being something about a fish
was it my quiet neediness that overwhelmed my reflection?
Or an ordinary case of blindness traveling on the oblivious thruway?
I was everyone, yet no one. A self-induced facade
Empty inside
An adapter to surroundings
Well-liked but for what? Reflecting others?
I, wasn’t.
— inspired by a poetry writing class prompt about an earlier sense of self
The following is a look at Bart D. Ehrman’s book “God’s Problem How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question — Why We Suffer?”
University of North Carolina Professor of Religious Studies Bart D. Ehrman, among many other things, is a former fundamentalist and currently a fallen Christian. Agnostic would be a more accurate term.
Despite an early-on devotion to fundamentalist Christianity, he began experiencing doubts about his faith during graduate school. As he writes here:
“…If there is an all powerful and loving God in this world, why is their so much excruciating pain and unspeakable suffering?…”
“…for many…life is a cesspool of misery and suffering…”
“…the darkness is too deep, the suffering too intense, the divine absence too powerful…”
“…Ultimately, it was the reason I lost my faith…”
“…I realized I could no longer reconcile the claims of faith with the facts of life…”
Ehrman then explores the often contradictory and multiple reasons/justifications detailed throughout the Bible for such horrible afflictions in life. Among those:
Ehrman also points out conundrums in such misery: God’s flood killing countless animals as well as the actions of Adam and Eve not injuring others.
He states that if God can see into the future and is all powerful and loving, then his actions/inactions are not worthy of worship, but fear.
Simply put, he cannot understand or explain the prospering of the wicked while innocents suffer, believers among them. Why aren’t genocides prevented? Birth defects eliminated? Cancers stricken? Natural calamities deterred?
For Ehrmann, there is no fully satisfactory answer.
Not necessarily as a side note, he also writes about the element of Christian and Jewish apocalypticism and provides a pair of instances where Jesus offers that the end time would come very soon:
“Truly I tell you, some of those standing here will not taste death before they see the Kingdom of God having come to power” (Mark 9:1)
“Truly I tell you, this generation will not pass away before all these things take place” (Mark 13:30)
Yet we’re still here. More grist for the proverbial mill besides the suffering conundrum.
Mark W. Bartusch offers in-depth insight in his 2011 God’s Problem How the Bible Fails to Answer Our Most Important Question — Why We Suffer?” review. Do take a read.
With all due credit to Christopher Hedges and his beacon of honesty.
I was sent off to war
to settle a petty score
’cause the pols said
we want those bastards dead
They were once our friends
but that all now depends
on doing our private bidding
or else — no f-ing kidding
Shipped over to the sand
then marching overland
trying not to misstep
a basic danger we must accept
Some look forward to the kill
taking human life as a thrill
but it’s different you see
when you’re sitting in D.C.
Splattered with guts and blood
whether of an enemy or close bud
changes you deep inside
a pain some can’t abide
The desert she bleaches you
hallowed through and through
I just wanted to do some good
like most everyone would
After three lengthy tours
I’m not the same anymore
I did my best with pride
but it’s in a shell I now reside
Jen’s settled for what she’s got
the kids scared what war has wrought
tears and terror map out me
I’m tryin’ like hell so none can see
Now I don’t dare explore
what’s left of my brittle core
the mirror says it’s me there
shut down in my lonesome lair
So blare the trumpet solitary
and invoke the patriot fairy
my most ominous of fears
is that “Taps” I’ll never hear
I was being all that I was
charging forward just because
now my soul is never more
in case the Pentagon is keeping score
Yes, I’m still somewhat alive
maybe cursed to have survived
but I gave my life too
for it’s not the me I once knew
My parts and my pieces, never a fit
a jigsaw puzzle borne of bewilderment
from pillar to post, through kindness to jibes
focused on locating survivors of my lost tribe
Nimbly surviving on generous winks and nods
emitted from a charming and personable facade
always traversing terrain as a velvet infidel
silent on sharing, firm on don’t ask nor tell
Despair in my cup plus a diet of regret
but a fading vision still beating in my heart’s locket
seeking rainbow’s end, not continual storm
my destination always shifting place and form
But guided by virgins learned and sinners graceful
scouting for footprints of angels who will tell
on the outskirts of freedom, my simple epiphany
‘I am one, I am all, they are one, they are me’