Voices & Soul
“… Darkly I gaze into the days ahead,/
And see her might and granite wonders there… Claude McKay “America”
by Black Kos Editor, Justice Putnam
Percy Shelley's sonnet, Ozymandias, was published in England in 1818. Earlier that year, Percy, with Mary Shelley and their children and along with his sister-in-law Claire Clairmont, mother of Byron's child, expatriated to Bagni di Lucca, Italy. In the late summer, they moved to Este, near Venice to be closer to Byron's villa. At a time when the "Exceptionalism" of British colonial reach was unquestioned, in fact, exalted in verse, theatre and the academy, Shelly acknowledged the erosion Time has on all leaders and empires.
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away".
-- Percy Bysshe Shelley
"Ozymandias"
Jamaican-born Claude McKay certainly channeled Shelley, when in 1922, he questioned the "Exceptionalism" of an America that held the "hand that mocked them and the heart that fed." McKay saw also, though few will admit the obvious erosion of Time, that even for America, there will be a future where the "lone and level sands stretch far away."
Although she feeds me bread of bitterness,
And sinks into my throat her tiger's tooth,
Stealing my breath of life, I will confess
I love this cultured hell that tests my youth!
Her vigor flows like tides into my blood,
Giving me strength erect against her hate.
Her bigness sweeps my being like a flood.
Yet as a rebel fronts a king in state,
I stand within her walls with not a shred
Of terror, malice, not a word of jeer.
Darkly I gaze into the days ahead,
And see her might and granite wonders there,
Beneath the touch of Time's unerring hand,
Like priceless treasures sinking in the sand.
Claude McKay
"America"
When I would travel, work and play music in France, I experienced first hand the result of eons of conflict. Byzantine churches stood alongside modern towers built on the ruins of Roman conquest as the Tournesol followed Bright Phoebus across the Cerulean western sky.
I visited the tomb of the unknown soldier there, and I cried when I did. I thought of relatives lost and strangers I will never know. I thought of Kings and I thought of peasants. I thought of gun runners and bakers and young girls in spring dresses, I thought of winter and I thought of Socrates holding a cup of hemlock tea. I thought of children dead in the rubble and I thought of war generals following orders unquestioned and issuing commands unflinchingly. I thought of Senators and I thought of Parliaments. I thought of an overgrown clearing in the forest obscuring a mass grave. And I thought how at the end, whether a soldier or a defeated mother crumpled in the corner, ultimately alone, facing time and the void, and how a distant figure blurred against the horizon, rambles slowly near, come to take us on the journey where we become the unknown, in the great unknown.
Josephine
(words and music
by Justice Putnam)
Josephine
Josephine
I’m pleading
With Josephine
Taking the steps
Down to the sea
Somewhere along
The coast of Normandy
Where the white
Fossil sands
Churned turbulently
Where men rushed
Into battle
And died violently
Whose last
Dying breath
Was to plead with
Josephine
Josephine
I’m pleading
With Josephine
Could be
The grasslands
Of the Sioux
No matter
Which side
They were on
They were all
Thinking of you
Could be in
In the South Pacific
Or the Persian Gulf
An Indonesian jungle
Or an Arctic hut
Could be in a
Manhattan penthouse
Or a cold water den
We’ll all grasp
At that last
Bit of hope
In the end with
Josephine
Josephine
I’m pleading
With Josephine
Josephine
Take me
Home
Normandy & Brittany, France 1998
© 2005 Justice Putnam
Fleur du Sel Musique
and Mechanisches-Strophe Verlagswesen
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News round up by dopper0189, Black Kos Managing Editor
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The Trump administration announced on Monday that American farmers will receive $12 billion in relief aid as they struggle to keep their farms afloat amid rising costs and a decline in markets.
The one-time payment is intended to provide farmers with a much-needed economic boost as the markets endure the effects of President Donald Trump’s global tariffs on foreign trade. The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) said the federal funds to “bridge payments for American farmers impacted by unfair market disruptions” would be received by the end of February.
“We’re taking a relatively small portion of [tariff revenue] and we’re going to be giving and providing it to the farmers in economic assistance,” Trump said of the tariffs during a roundtable with farmers announcing the aid package at the White House. “We love our farmers, and as you know, uh, the farmers like me.”
While farmers welcome the economic relief, Black farmers, none of whom were invited to the White House’s Monday roundtable, are likely to see little of the benefits due to cultural and historical barriers.
“That’s not going to help farmers like myself, who need help now. And many Black farmers aren’t going to get this,” John Boyd, founder and president of the National Black Farmers Association, told theGrio after Monday’s announcement. “This stuff is really more money for large-scale white farmers, point blank, and Black farmers ain’t gonna get a dime…it’s not targeted for us in the first place.”
Boyd, who represents 150,000 Black farmers nationwide, explained that, due to institutional barriers and cultural mistrust Black farmers have of the federal government as a result of decades of racial discrimination, most Black farmers do not report their acreage to the USDA, which is part of the requirement to receive the latest $12 billion relief.
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April Newkirk says "we didn’t have a choice," after brain-dead pregnant daughter Adriana Smith was kept on life support to deliver her baby. The Grio: Mother of Georgia nurse kept alive to deliver unborn baby talks to ‘Nightline’
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Six months after her daughter’s death, April Newkirk is still reliving the moment she learned her daughter, 31-year-old nurse Adriana Smith — then nine weeks pregnant with her second child — had been declared brain-dead. And yet, because her fetus still had a heartbeat, doctors kept Smith’s body on life support for four months.
In a heartbreaking interview with “Nightline,” Newkirk said the family was never given the authority to make decisions for Adriana in her final days.
“You know, you just want to scream, you just want to scream,” she said. “You know, she’s my daughter, my first daughter.”
Smith’s decline began with what her mother described as “really, really, really bad headaches.” Adriana went to the hospital and was sent home with a prescription “a little stronger than Tylenol,” but Newkirk said no CT scan was performed. Everything changed when Adriana became unresponsive.
“She was gasping,” Newkirk recalled.
A CT later revealed “blood clots everywhere… everywhere.”
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Joy Reid has something to say to Stephen A. Smith. During a recent appearance on “Naked with Cari Champion,” the former MSNBC journalist addressed Smith and his “constant attacks on Black women,” including herself.
“He said I got fired for ratings, and I’m like, ‘uh, excuse me, sir, you got $100 million for a show with half my ratings at my worst,” she said. “They’re paying you [Stephen A. Smith] not for your numbers, my friend. They’re paying you because you are willing to say the nasty things about Black people that they want to say.”
Recently, Smith, known for his provocative opinions in the sports world, has been sharing his strong views on a range of topics, including Kamala Harris’ political campaign, Serena Williams’ marriage, Jasmine Crockett’s work, and more. And like many social media users, who have shared their outrage and frustration with the ESPN host’s sudden interest in publicly criticizing Black women, Reid called out his actions on the podcast.
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