Chicken Scratch... June 2001 Blood. Blood may be thick,
but sometimes it takes a quick splash of water to purify the Soul,
and give air back the breathability that life needs
to keep all its players standing. Water is simple. You take it for face value, then drink it down. Easy. You take it, Drink it, Relax. Blood, on the other hand, is thick! It’s Complicated. It clots. Creates blocks! The sort of blocked emotions that can fray even the most resilient set of nerves! It’s Trouble! And the Very trouble with blood is that,
being built from it, we can’t escape its Relations. We’re bound by it in ways that make it difficult to see beyond its viscous haze. So what’s the answer? You want to know? Draw some water. Drench yourself! Early on. Moon landings have a way of breaking in on even the most thoughtless states of consciousness. Something of less importance may not do so well... especially when there are flowers blooming outside, and baby chicks to hold in the palm of your hand. But I remember the Moon landing, and I remember John Kennedy’s funeral, and I remember Viet Nam. I had no clue about what any of them meant to me, or to millions of other people at the time. I was a kid. I had games to play, plastic soldiers to arrange, cities to build in the sand. There was work too. Chores for me. And the Textile mill for everybody else. Now, I didn’t know what everybody did at the textile mill. But I knew it had a lot to do with lint. That, and the fact that my papaw didn’t have a left arm. I remember when the Viet Nam war was on the six o’clock news every single night. Momma and daddy broke the rule about no TV during dinner just to watch it. It didn’t matter, though. Not to me. Not at the time. Well, except that my cousin looked a lot like one of my toy soldiers when he came by to see us after he got drafted. You know it’s funny. Because later, when things did matter – when assassinations and war and death and dying all came home to me in ways I’d never dreamed they could, I wished for Moon Rocks, and some time to understand them. Brain Surgery. This here’s not Brain Surgery! But for certain, success weighs itself in near the same measure. Successful dissection, after all, still brings pleasure - Whether the knife is built for breaking skin, or the clean white lines of paper! One stroke! One thought! Cleanly cut and clearly read! This is brilliance – Brilliant! and all the more precious because of the clarity of its cut! Because of the hearts its cut can steal, and because of the feelings it reveals. Cracked corn. Yellow nougets, made mortal by the crush of a miller’s tool, spill out of a sack’s safe keeping. Kernels, once bound for baking, mix with the grit of the ground. This is Scratch – Too rough for meal-making in its present state. Bits of gilded grain reduced to Chicken Feed! Rest assured, though. This less glamorous purpose is also a guarantee that tomorrow’s eggs will break to a Golden Dawn. Little Husk. Little Husk, so dear, and now so dry! So sure, and yet so fragile – Insecure! I have only to close my eyes, and I can still see you – Taking chances. Certain of yourself! Sure that each new antic you undertook was well within your reach. Timed to perfection by bright eyes, and a light step. So sure you were, and so surprised when the potential face of danger pulled you in and out of comfort while we watched. So sure, so ready for success – Then a jump and a turn. Miscalculation and a quick safe landing. Recovery. Astonishment! “How dare the deal go awry!” You say it, see it, beg for understanding! Then look for love, and a quick embrace for reassurance before you find new encouragement, and face the test again.
