Facilitate

It wasn't easy, but this was the government lawyer's brief:
The word facilitate. A novel argument about its meaning
Where it applied and, indeed, how and to whom
And whether it was of solely domestic applicability

And if it seemed obvious to the Court that there was a plain meaning
His own job was to fully explain the proper, legal interpretation
For he evinced great concern for the separation of powers and its extent
And a justifiable worry for an unseemly unconstitutional precedent

That the judiciary in the shape of the present court
Was arrogating for itself the realm of executive power was self-evident
Overreaching and inserting itself where it should not
Infringing wholesale on the prerogative of the president

These were strange days of ever more outrageous claims
Stretching past the outer bounds of plausibility and shame
When norms were being shattered daily, and rules broken with impunity
Regulations glossed and discarded willy-nilly, testing the very limits of propriety

The government lawyer advanced his preferred reading
That his clients were in full compliance with the court's ruling
For their actions, after all, made it exceedingly clear
They would "remove any domestic obstacles
That would otherwise impede the alien's ability to return here"

But it turned out that further discretion was for the weak
And so the government attorney stuck to his emphatic brief
He concluded, the most powerful government in the world couldn't do a thing
As a matter of law, and in practice, the word facilitate didn't mean anything

Facilitate, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Can't do nuttin' for ya man by Public Enemy
• Easier said than done by Angie Stone
• Time's a wastin by Erykah Badu
• Ain't that easy by D'Angelo
• Gettin in the way by Jill Scott
• Obey by Dwele
• Not up to me by Frida Farrell
• Obstruction by Gabo Rio
• It don't mean a thing by Omar

Bonus beats: Objection overruled by Gregory Isaacs and My prerogative by Bobby Brown


After: Trump administration says it is not required to help wrongly deported man return to US

...

I seem to be departing from my normal practice of delayed publishing. I suppose the above will not be as topical if it were to be published as initially scheduled in 2036. Let me know if I should continue preempting the vault. I am somewhat tickled that the previous piece, entitled Expulsion Orders, written three years ago, mined somewhat similar terrain

File under: language, law, humour, satire, rogues, politics, USA, huhudious, culture, observation, perception, hatchet job, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log: April 16, 2025

Expulsion Orders

For some, this was the second go-round, a reprise of the upheaval
The scenes at the ports, palpable despair, teeming, almost primeval
When the land borders briefly opened, a brave few chose that route
A long, dangerous journey with opportunist predators to boot

You would think there would be sympathy for these returning wretched
Yet the provisional government called them "recalcitrant and hollow-headed"
You see, earlier on, most had simply voted with their feet
Foregoing chaos, they'd packed their bags and left the country

Now, exiled souls twice removed, this was their homecoming
Leaving in a hurry, running away with just what they could carry
Tough love from the authorities on both ends, no tears for aliens
And extra scrutiny at the border, "non-Ghanaians are not welcome"

Ghana must go is how the trauma is recorded in folk memory
The damage was done and, worse, it was all so unnecessary
But such is the fraught and bitter legacy of the expulsion orders
As goes the proverb, try not to die when you are surrounded by vultures

Anybody could have told the authorities in Lagos that is is impossible to evacuate 700,000 (their own estimated figure) under their own imposed stringent conditions, within the period of one week that they opened the land borders

— Talking Drums May 1985

Talking Drums, May 20, 1985

Expulsion Orders, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify)

• Exodus by Bob Marley & the Wailers
• We trying to stay alive by Wyclef Jean
• Refugee Rolling by Sierra Leone's Refugee All Stars
• The Exodus has Begun by Prince & the New Power Generation
• Get out of Town by Ella Fitzgerald
• Refugees by Gerard Musgrave
• Go Home by Gerry Mulligan & Ben Webster
• Pitche Mi by Youssou Ndour & Super Etoile de Dakar
  stately and mournful from the excellent contemporaneous album, Immigrés

Bonus beats: Shame on me by Alexander O'Neal

See previously Bags and Stamps

File under: Ghana, Nigeria, culture, immigration, displacement, exile, memory, Africa, history, politics, dictator, coup, loss, observation, perception, refugee, Things Fall Apart, Ghana must go, poetry, toli

Writing log: August 17, 2022

Blues Grinder

Nose to the grindstone
The mortar of regret
The days stretch, unending
Shackles untethered,
Healing foregone
A sameness, repetition
The blues grinder in effect

Late at night, exhaustion
Barely able to catch a breath
Restless spirit, searching
The feeling of being alone
Hopeless cause,
Unbearable odds
Still, the truth is our sanctuary

Blues Grinder, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Blues Grinder by Ronny Jordan
• Chains and Things by B.B. King
• Grinder Man Blues by Memphis Slim
• Confirmed Truth by George Freeman
• Hey Lordy Mama by Abbey Lincoln
• In the Wee Wee Hours by Junior Wells
• Blues Grinder (live) by Ronny Jordan
  I once had the pleasure of seeing Ronny Jordan live at the Jazz Cafe in Camden Town. It was exhilirating as expected; he is sadly missed.

A few remakes to round off the blues grinder. Keep your head down, your time will come.

File under: culture, observation, perception, displacement, poetry, toli

Writing log. August 16, 2022

A Very Beautiful Thing!

Some day people will realize
That Tariffs for the United States of America
Are a very beautiful thing!

What's going to happen to the markets,
I can't tell you, but our country is much stronger.
Sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something

Hang tough, it won't be easy,
But the end result will be historic

They are coming to the table.
They want to talk
But there's no talk unless they pay us a lot of money on a yearly basis.

Our past "leaders" are to blame
For allowing this, and so much else, to happen to our Country.
MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!


A sonnet after Donald Trump

Puff, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. Self regard is everything. (spotify version)

• He's Misstra Know-It-All by Stevie Wonder
• Talking Loud and Saying Nothing by James Brown
• Legend in his own Mind by Gil Scott-Heron

File under: hatchet job, language, humour, satire, rogues, absurd, economics, politics, USA, huhudious, culture, observation, perception, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log: April 6, 2025

The Logic of Dreams

You finish composing the email,
Making sure to cc the right people,
And click Send

Promptly enveloped, encased in a package
The soft fabric, crinkly with its sheen, surrounds you
Wrapped up, bundled into a mailbox
Bumpy, you hit the rugged sides, blue metal

Then other envelopes and packages come in
What is this? You are getting pushed down
Crushed against the sides of the mailbox
Congestion, you think, even at this hour

Yes, you seem to be stuck in the first mailbox
The first of many. When will you get out?
You know the envelope has markings on the outside
But will it be inspected? Postal inspectors for email?
It's getting dark. More mail comes in. More packages

Finally, movement, your message is on its way
Floating, the envelope moves through the mail system
The thought occurs: should have marked it as urgent, high priority
Comfortable but stuck in the envelope, this must be a dream. Damn
Next router, another mailbox. More congestion, more packages
You have to wake up, you won't make it

Delivery has failed to these recipients or groups
The email address you entered couldn't be found
You can't wake up. Message undeliverable

Packets, packages, parables
Finally you laugh, the comfort of the envelope
Lucid, the logic of dreams

Logic of Dreams, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. (spotify version)

• A Dream by Donny Hathaway
• Weird Fishes/Arpeggi by Radiohead
• Paradise Circus by Massive Attack
• Lucid Dreams by Blu
• Just Can't Understand by Paul Hardcastle & the Jazzmasters
• Weird Lullaby by Wynton Kelly

Bonus beats: I can't wake up by KRS-One


File under: dreams, life, observation, perception, poetry, toli

Writing log. August 6, 2022

Running Away

The lyrics in the songs always mentioned running away. Flight, escape, danger in its many variations. Embedded in the outlook, punctuating the very choruses was a sense of precarity. And yet these were not dirges, these were not laments. They'd long made their peace with the world as they'd found it, nay, they were comfortable even if clear-eyed about this existence.

And they watched.

Running away, heading for the hills and the rocky terrain. Running away, heading for higher ground, for those parts that only those close to these lands would know. The caverns where they could hide, holding their breath, stifling all sounds, covering the mouths of the infants.

And they waited.

Holes in the ground, the entrances disguised, dark caverns where the ancestors were said to have sought shelter from previous predators. At most a dozen could fit in the largest ones so you had to be prepared to seek out other spots, ever calculating as you ran up over the rocks how many had already made it, and if you would be able to use this particular refuge.

Oftentimes it was a gamble.

To enter the hiding places, you crouched, crawled and wriggled. The earth would envelop you, surround you with its embrace. You could expect to taste the slightly acidic crumbs as you pushed your way in, to smell the faint trace of clay. The earth would resist the touch, implacable and stern, until it would yield all of a sudden, plunging you forward into the void of the cavern.

You hoped, you wished for a soft landing.

You had to be methodical even in the heat of the moment, deliberate even as the senses were heightened by the danger. First, to dislodge the covering by pulling at the right spot, the intricate branch structure that only careful hands could pry open, and then to preserve its camouflage so that it would appear undisturbed to the raiders in pursuit. The architecture of escape, the provisional sanctuary.

And they prayed.

No matter how many times they had practiced, no matter how many warnings, no matter how many songs they had sung, no matter how much advance notice they'd garnered, they knew that there would be something lost, that there would be someone lost. It was the nature of life in those times. Something, someone would be snatched from you. Pieces of yourself dispersed, shredded away, leaving only the memories.

And they wept.

Farmers and pastoralists, they never had a standing army. Millet and maize in small fields, custodians of the northern territories, eking out enough to support the clan, to trade some guinea fowl and kola nuts, to enjoy the gifts of the earth, to husband it. This patch of land on the lower Sahel was unforgiving but it was theirs.

And they stayed.

But, at length, there had to be some edge they could wield to surprise the raiders. Running away might ensure survival for many, but more was needed. They taught the youth about all the plants and their uses. Those they ate, those they treated with as part of aromatic bitters, those with properties that were prized, their nighttime potency recounted, astringency debated, and medicinal effectiveness evaluated. And once they proved adept and facile with the identification of the flora, they would learn about what in extremis could be used in the poisoned arrows that were always reluctantly fashioned. Weary, wary, reluctant but necessary.

And so they studied.

The elements of survival were well known. Swift recall, preparation, decisiveness under threat, knowledge of topology, and luck. For the gods were capricious. Even the fleetest of foot, the strongest, and the most agile could be brought low and fall prey to the human hyena that roamed the lands. And Babatu's men were implacable and determined trackers. Tears would be for nought when in their grip. Best to fight when caught, to resist with all one's heart. But, above all, to flee when attacked, to live to see another day, to rebuild and restore when these interlopers would leave, for they would surely leave as these lands only yielded bodies to them.

And they ran away.

Taboo. A famous dirge recounted how one of the twins was unable to stay silent, a hard demand of a toddler, let alone in the darkness of the cavern. Their position having been given away, tough decisions had to be made. Father and the one would give themselves up hours later, when it became clear that this set of raiders would wait them out, they were a patient lot. Mother and the other twin would retreat further into the second chamber, deep in the dank bowels of the earth and stay for three days. It was hard to breathe, it was hard to stay silent and still, and there was only one gourd of water and the few nuts hidden in the fold of her cloth. They clanged to each other, charged with the burden of loss, of memory, of survival. Pieces of themselves lost for good. But they lived to tell the tale, to recover possession of the land.

And they survived.

Strangers have come into our land
Raiders have come for our bodies
Take heed, my brother, and run, run away
Caution, my sister, and run, run away
For we will all, someday, be turned into sand
And all that will remain is our story

Running Away, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. (spotify version)

• Running Away by Roy Ayers
• Running Away by Bob Marley
• Kunta Kinte Dub by The Revolutionaries
• Man in the Hills by Burning Spear
• Hiding by Breakestra
• Slavery Days by Burning Spear
• Kunta Kinte by Horace Andy
• Man in the Hills (live) by Burning Spear
• Hiding (Quantic mix) by Breakestra
• Kunta Kinte by Mad Professor

Further reading:

• Raids and Refuge - The Bulsa in Babatu's Slave Wars by Franz Kröger
• Slavery, Memory and Orality by Emmanuel Saboro
• Wounds of our Past by Emmanuel Saboro

A later discovery: Beyond Elmina: The Slave Trade in Northern Ghana by Joachim Jack Agamba mined similar terrain to great effect.

This note is part of the Things Fall Apart series. Do let me know what banner might be appropriate.

File under: slavery, Bulsa, Ghana, Africa, culture, memory, music, history, observation, perception, fear, dislocation, escape, griots, Things Fall Apart, poetry, toli

Writing log. July 24, 2022

Literature Only

Literature only
Life vest under your seat

Literature only
Parental advisory

Literature only, put aside your childish ways
Literature only, this is grown folks' business

Literature only reads our manifesto
We try harder, even with no bells and whistles
From spare and unadorned prose through the densely elliptical
The experience is sometimes said to be life changing and mystical

Literature only, storytelling is our mission
Your franchises and universes are mere diversions
Commerce marks the tomb of the unknown author
But the fact remains, the tales are immortal

Literature only, the issue is survival
When it hits your soul, the sensation is unrivaled

Literature only, it's a matter of perspective
All consuming and focused on the narrative
Dialog, repartee, conflict, motivation
Interplay, romance, thrills, observation

Literature only and occasionally poetic
Our brand of storytelling is the original cinematic
Perception is all, this life of ours is a mystery
Truths, secrets and lies, the rest is history

Literature only, we never stand for ceremony
We make no prescription and traffic in irony
Exploring the boundaries of the human condition
The interface between modernity and tradition

Literature only, it's beyond dispute
Caution, my friend, accept no substitutes
Bask in the glow and let the narrative unfold
The urgency of folk memory, the story simply had to be told

Literature only, plan to be a believer
A cast of thousands, all of them word scribblers
Apt to spontaneously declaim, these occasional rhymers
Mind you, the griots among them are also keen listeners

Literature only, enter the lyricists
Deep thinkers, philosophers and moralists
Villains, hacks, and, of course, the polemicists
Witness the hatchet jobs from the propagandists

Literature only, this is a serious matter
Specialists in all styles, we've got you covered
Hardboiled tropes, greed, revenge, and dense plotters
Love, hate, lust, youth and comedies of manners

Literature only, scribes and scriveners
Bask in what springs from the minds of these dreamers

Literature only, style and aesthetics
Savor the pointillist skewering from the satirists

Literature only, indelible heroes, ever dramatic
Our protagonists are always charming and charismatic
World builders, the terrain of the unknown, mining the imagination
Outrage too, a surfeit of reality that exceeds description

Literature only, we're not the usual suspects
Afflicted with the journalistic impulse, we simply have no regrets
Essayists and wordsmiths expounding on nothing and kindred subjects
Small things, the world is our oyster and practice makes perfect

Literature only, allusions and exhilaration
Literature only, excess and repetition
Literature only, even as the form varies
Literature only, filling your libraries
Literature only, as yet undefeated
Literature only, fasten seat belt while seated

Literature, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• This is my story, This is my song by Thelonious Monk
• Fairy Tales by Anita Baker
• Stories by Carleen Anderson
• I Could Write a Book by Miles Davis
• Tell me a tale by Michael Kiwanuka
• Poetry by RH Factor (ft. Q-Tip and Erykah Badu)
• I Could Write a Book by Dinah Washington
• 8 Million Stories by A Tribe Called Quest
• I Could Write a Book by Ella Fitzgerald
• Just Another Story by Jamiroquai
• Literature Beyond My Mind by Blue Moon Swing
• Imagination by Count Basie
• Poetry Man by Phoebe Snow

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

File under: humour, literature, culture, observation, writing, craft, perception, whimsy, poetry, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log. July 24, 2022

The Dynamics of Worry

Blame the losses incurred during the South Sea bubble
Owing to which, the great man's credibility suffered such a tumble
While mankind adopted his search for fundamental laws of heavenly bodies
(Their tangible motion was unarguable, elliptical totems of physicality)
History fully discounted his later findings on the dynamics of worry

Thus I reproduce here the lost chapter of Newton's Principia
Whose discourse moved beyond those musings on objects' inertia
The simple formulae that laid down the outline of the classical analysis
The formal statements that derived from the moral calculus of the treatise

The first law states that anxiety expands in proportion to the depth of feelings
But that the capacity for worrying will eventually approach a ceiling
The paradox of approaching this asymptote of anxiousness
Weighs heavily on the mind, leaving one in a state of uneasiness

The famous equation can be shown to result in quasi-equilibrium
The disorder presents as a fraught subject in the generalized version
Especially confounding, as the parameters of worry have a time component
Still, careful experiments confirmed the findings with decisive evidence

The second observation is that public concern accentuates the degree of anxiety
This finding on the stresses we incur in life has the well known corollary
At its worst, the most apprehensive symptom is unbounded depression
Net attention can thus be said to vary inversely to the bearer's perception

The quantity theory of pessimism accounts for the enduring appeal of bad news
The marginal existence of our ancestors transmitted said affinity as a virtue
Replaying the past, and its influence, enhances the effects of solitude
The reaction, opposite in direction, ends up equal in magnitude

The third lemma concerns the propensity for debilitating panic
The damage of unfocused worry is piecemeal but renders one frantic
The general dynamics that govern the fundamental paradigm
The study of how the mind might develop or alter over time

The crucial point: interaction being the key to matters of identity
The essential insight, namely that human beings live in communities
The currency of social capital, thoughts expressed in conversation
The friction of human intercourse raises simultaneous frustration

Ever since we left Eden, we've borne the weight of the certainty of death
The precarity of life, a constant, and the gravitational pull it exerts
The comfort of a touch can steady the soul and bring a body to rest
The countervailing force of passing time acts as a blanket of neglect

With nagging doubt lingering at the back of the mind
Seized with insecurity at the most inopportune time
Enter imposter syndrome and its many liabilities
Evaporating any confidence in one's abilities

All this is independent of the righteousness of one's cause
Even with the best preparation the observer effect is quite remarkable
Knowledge was our stolen gift, lifted from the gods
Who would render us naked to ignorance for our troubles

A state of uniform emotion cannot be countenanced without internal displacement
Off kilter and unbalanced, the pressure that amounts leads to much resentment
And in the reverse of the process, to settle the mind's confusion
And descend from the peaks of worry, and finally be able revel in relaxation

To the toll of mounting discomfort that external forces exert
To counter the dark impulses, how best then to allay concerns
The load one is bearing leads directly to a surfeit of unease
The constant velocity of what amounts to a social disease

The research shows that the most propitious cure is conversation
Prolonged engagement serves to relieve stress and isolation
The underlying mechanism for the diffusion of distress
The gaze of an audience helps scale the heights of nervousness

None shall escape the cardinal embrace of worry
The fundamental principle at work is its irreversibility
Because once a soul succumbs to its seductive gaze
Unease becomes part and parcel of the bearer's days

Folk remedies have been proposed by noted cultural alchemists
But when two irresistible forces meet traveling at equal velocity
The final outcome will depend on their relative acceleration
Thus the saying, observers are worried, borne of close studies of such collisions

Over time, coping mechanisms can be found for some measure of mitigation
Yet these last are only palliative, permanent relief remains a fiction
Indeed, the dynamics of worry fully hinge on these matters of cultural sensitivity
The frame of reference is everything, an early statement of the theory of relativity

Worry, a playist

A soundtrack for this note. (spotify version)

• Three Little Birds by Bob Marley
• Don't You Worry 'Bout a Thing by Stevie Wonder
• (Don't Worry) If there's hell below, we're all gonna go by Curtis Mayfield
• Not to Worry by Abbey Lincoln
• Dem no worry we by Super Cat
• Don't you worry by Alice Russell
• Don't Worry be Happy by Bobby McFerrin
• Why Worry by Aaron Neville
• Worry, Worry by Buddy Guy
• Why Worry by Dire Straits
• Dem a Worry by Mighty Diamonds
• (Somebody) Ease my Troublin' Mind by Sam Cooke
• Worry Walks Beside Me by Michael Kiwanuka
• Worries by Robert Glasper Experiment (ft. Dwele)
• No Worries by Robert Glasper Trio

..

See previously in humanity's curriculum:

• The Laws of Grief
• The Economics of Whimsy
• The Physics of Shame
• Fortress of Ignorance
• The Ingredients of Catharsis

File under: worry, culture, observation, perception, life, humour, whimsy, humour, satire, poetry, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log: June 28, 2022

Nothing to See Here

It is of the nature of a conundrum, this puzzling passivity
That human beings, in the main, submit so readily to authority
Acquiescing to mass extinction events almost with alacrity
Fearful, as it were, of being accused of disturbing tranquility

A tall order, perhaps, to stick one's neck out in a fit of outrage
Exit, voice or loyalty. The perils, and limits, of moral courage
The dissonance between one's values and what one is prepared to live with
In the dark of night, realizing that our inaction makes us complicit

Inured to pain, with no trace of accountability
The routine tallies, dismaying figures as normalcy
Altogether brutish outcomes, a cheapness, a deadening
Nothing to see here, don't even count on a reckoning

Nothing to See Here, a playlist

A playlist for this intolerable time (spotify version)

• Sitting and Watching by Dennis Brown
• How Soon We Forget by Colonel Abrams
• I Can't Go for That by Hall & Oates
• I Just Don't Understand by Ann-Margaret
• Don't Know Why by Norah Jones

This note is part of a series: In a covidious time

File under: failure, coronavirus, pandemic, culture, observation, perception, despair, dislocation, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, covidious, poetry, toli

Writing log. July 20, 2022

Maroon Creed

Long before those edifices of past sorrow were erected
They moved with the poetry of resistance
Disdaining the fraught burden of a label
Freedom and defiance, they owed allegiance to liberty

Naturalists by inclination, observers of the earth's promise
They found strength in conversation and community
The playfulness of the language, the meandering turns of phrases
Luminous idiolect that harkened to ancestral lands

By necessity navigating the contours of cultural interplay
Recognition in the names, a heritage weighted with history
They carried in their tongues the tales and the traditions
Fragments of identity, the métissage of their found society
The maroon creed, independence of thought, purity of faith
Sacred links, bonds forged in renewed nighttime ceremonies

To stand straight even amidst insecurity
To laugh when confronted with precarity
To flow around obstacles, resilient as a river
And always hewing to escape, shackles discarded
Sounding the alarm with conch shell at the ready
Intent, moving with purpose, their destination is history

Bearing traces of scars still lingering that speak to society's ills
Not beholden to the legacy of those days in the hills
Yet embodying by one's very existence the remembrance
Of the enduring shame of what man would do to fellow men
To strangers and neighbors alike, out of the wages of blood and sin
Charting a path then, spears burning, ever mindful of this proud legacy
Cast in this vein as living emblems of cultural memory

Maroon Creed, a playlist

A soundtrack for the Nèg Marron. Caution, take heed, behold a spear burning over yonder. (spotify version)

• Man in the hills by Burning Spear
• Spear Burning by Burning Spear
• Black Soul by Burning Spear
• Door Peep by Burning Spear
• Spear Burning (live) by Burning Spear
• Song of the Maroons by Courtney Pine
• Foi de Marron by Léon-Gontran Damas
  Listening to the premier poet of Négritude narrating his famous ode to the maroon creed is invigorating. It is easy to see the spark that he lit in Senghor, Cesaire and other contemporaries.

In memoriam Aba Cecile McHardy


See previously: Until Such Time, Traveling Light and Forgiveness and Love

File under: culture, observation, griots, maroon, perception, history, legacy, freedom, slavery, race, identity, poetry, Caribbean, Africa, Social Living, toli

Writing log: July 3, 2022

The Sense of Violation

A wrong has been done, there's no doubting it
It's hard to contain the sense of violation
The damage is done, there's no comfort to be found
Regret is all, it's proving hard to move on

Your cause is just, it goes without saying
Basic fairness should have made things go your way
Honor, decency, you've now run the gamut of emotions
To hear "wrong place, wrong time" is no consolation

It's only human to be subject to the vagaries of fate
We realize our place in the world and duly accommodate
But it's hard to bear the altogether capricious
Let alone the impact of the actively malicious

The hurt, the outrage in its wake is volcanic and all consuming
It's hard to control the righteous anger that you're feeling
It's probably wiser to keep a straight face and your own counsel
But, in this mood, the slightest thing could spark a conflagration

And we all know very well where this could be heading
How unproductive it will be, think of the recriminations
Indeed you can't understate the peril of this volatile situation
But, after this injury, there's no hope for reconciliation

Sense of Violation, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. (spotify version)

• Right and a Wrong Way by Keith Sweat
• The Hurt by The Jacksons
• Anger by Marvin Gaye
• You Done Me Wrong by Al Johnson
• Outrage by Booker T & The M.G's
• Sacred by Amel Larrieux

File under: outrage, emotion, life, culture, observation, perception, strategy, anger, poetry, toli

Writing log. July 16, 2022

Love, a playlist

Love. The eternal subject. What is this thing called love, I wondered? Once upon a time I scoured my music library for the folk wisdom about love, filling my old ipod mini with 1,000 or so songs about love and its many textures.

Herewith then: Love, a playlist (spotify version)

I tried to stick to love qua love and focused on the word itself and its ramifications, thus there are only 5 songs about 'lovers' and 4 songs about 'loved' e.g. Bob Marley's Could You Be Loved? and The Impressions' I Loved and I Lost

Similarly, there were 12 songs about loving (You've Lost That Loving Feeling obviously needed to be on this playlist and clearly Minnie Riperton's Lovin' you was essential). A boyish Michael Jackson asking Who's loving you could not be denied.

With some effort, I ended up with 1,032 takes on love (caveat: A Love Supreme came in 4 parts). The playlist amounts to almost 3 days of continuous listening and flows quite beautifully if I might say so.

I tried not to repeat myself in this exercise so there are 866 distinct titles. The constraint of disk space on the fondleslab meant that I couldn't add the hundreds of cover versions of standards like Love for Sale that I have amassed (and only 7 versions of You Don't Know What Love Is made it sadly)

The selections focus mostly on soul, jazz and pop. Hip-hop hardly features (love doesn't sell in hip-hop on the whole, LL Cool J's I Need Love notwithstanding), and reggae features disproportionately (lovers rock being an important facet of that genre, just ask Dennis Brown)

Having amassed this body of love as it were, this corpus of love, that many splendored thing (3 versions), I couldn't help myself and did some rudimentary analysis. Consider these liner notes research on the anatomy of love. Let me tell you about love...

Frequency

The usual suspects who made a career on love shine here: Sade, Anita Baker, Luther Vandross and The Temptations. And Motown looms large, the composers Smokey Robinson and Ashford & Simpson dominate. Also, I was initially suprised that Al Jarreau and Regina Belle had such encylopedic takes on love.

The singularity that is Barry White is mainly dealt with in a separate playlist. I only included 7 of the 54 songs I have of his that directly addressed love. A monomaniac focus on the topic was a virtue of the walrus of love.

As far as the frequency distribution goes, who opines on love? Who shapes the narrative?

• Luther Vandross - 18 songs
• Prince - 17 songs (or 14 if we omit his duets with Sheila E, Madonna and Nona Gaye)
• Al Jarreau - 13 songs
• Temptations / Chaka Khan / Dennis Brown - 12 songs
• Smokey Robinson / Regina Belle - 11 songs
• Ashford & Simpson / Stevie Wonder / Elton John - 9 songs
• Anita Baker / Sade / Gregory Isaacs / Dwele - 8 songs
• Al Green / Barry White / Alexander O'Neal / Brian McKnight / Keith Sweat / George Benson - 7 songs
• Brenda Russell / The Isley Brothers - 6 songs apiece

Typology

Then to the meat of things. There were 66 songs "of love"

What do these songs of love tell us (skipping for now the 20 explicit by less precise "kinds of" love? e.g. The Sunday kind of love that Etta James sings of

The basics: Look of love, Power of love, Way of love, Mystery of love, Glory of love, Gravity of love, Ritual of love, Game of love

Metaphorical: Freeway of love, Caravan of love, Army of love, Sea of love, Land of love, Bed of love, Prisoner of love

Practical: Mind of love, Test of love, Best of love

Whimsical: Ingredients of love, Seeds of love, Color of love

Emotional: Tears of love, Victim of love, Pains of love

Association

"Love and" - what goes with love? Consider fully 24 companions of love. Al Green obviously has the anthems (Love and happiness, Love and affection). The Persuaders famously sang of the Thin line between love and hate complicating the picture. Love sometimes goes with war (Tamar Braxton) and at other times with peace (per Quincy Jones)

There are also the outliers, including my countryman Ebo Taylor who asks the listener to lend him their ears as he weaves a troubling tale about Love and death

Characterization

We may be social beasts but love is a matter of perspective and indeed love is personal:

Sweet love, Good love, Slow love, Tender love, Baby love, Real love, Endless love, Lost love, Everlasting love, Tasty love, Emotional love, Self love, Blessed love, Precious love, Lifetime love

There's a naivete in love:

Simple love, Special love, Perfect love, Pure love, 100% Pure love, Superfine love, Fine Fine love, True love, Easy love, Sentimental love

Or think of the stages of love: New love, Old love, Young love, Teenage love, Puppy love, Old fashioned love, First love

Pathologies of love: Secret love, Blind love, Hidden love, Unrequited love, One way love, Unreleased love, Stupid love, Strange love, Crazy love, I'd hate to love you

Arcane takes: Cosmic love, Stone Love, Hysteric Love, Carnival Love, Electric Love, Killer Love, Tough love, Bitter love, Superficial love, Famous love, Lucky love, Shotgun love, Telephone love

Time-bound love: Saturday Love, Weekend Love, Love in the night, or as Roberta Flack notes, Tonight I celebrate my love

Religious love: Jesus is love, God is love (a couple of versions). Opinions are divided on whether the Higher love that Steve Winwood sings off falls in this category.

Parental love: The love between me and my kids per Smokey Robinson. The Supremes' Baby love is euphemistic despite the name on the front

It's about mores and values, some takes are quite spicy: Free love, Sexual Love, Love Triangle, Part time love, Love Affair

But love is complicated: Love can't turn around per Farley Jackmaster Funk and its celebrated Isaac Hayes sample, indeed we can get into semiotics: Love is not made in words (Deborah Cox) and Love is not a word (Peter Cinotti)

Love can also be prescriptive: Love shoulda brought you home per Toni Braxton or say, It's gonna take all our love as Regina Belle asserts

And then the defaults: One love, Any love, Typical love, More love, Only love and a couple of versions of Love changes (Mother's Finest and the lovely cover by Kashif and Meli'sa Morgan)

At a loss, 12 artists just go with the single word: Love, and who can blame them.

• Big City double things up with Love Love
• The incomparable Donny Hathaway is three times exuberant with Love, Love, Love
• Lulu claims with the Rule of Four that Love Loves To Love Love
• As Tall as Lions go over the top with Love, Love, Love (Love, Love)

Perspectives

More analysis, who is the subject of love?

40 songs about "your love"
39 songs "love you"
5 songs "love your"

27 songs "my love"
26 songs "love me"

9 songs "our love"

And on declarative matters:

12 songs "for love", causes of love perhaps

4 songs "love or" alternatives to live (Prince's Love or Money being the funkiest)

33 songs "the love"
24 songs "this love"

Declarations

Then there are the descriptions. There are fully 93 songs explaining what "love is" including a few eye openers:

• Love is a house
• Love is a battlefield
• Love is my religion
• Love is contagious
• Love is like a plague
• Love is medicine
• Love is my drug

Following that social disease theme, it's no wonder that Robert Plant is Addicted to love

True, there are contradictions: Love is the answer for Kenny Burrell but for Linval Thompson, Love is the question

Sade, almost inevitably, chimes in with hard-won experience, namely that Love is stronger than pride while Roy Ayers claims that Love will bring us back together.

Similarly, Loose Ends declare I don't need to love, but for LL Cool J, it's the opposite: I need love; your mileage may vary

Location

There are 9 songs about finding love, its difficulty and its locations (e.g. Love on a two way street by The Moments), The places you find love by Tevin Campbell and Beres Hammond crooning about Love from a distance

Where Roberta Flack is somewhat coy Feel Like Makin' Love; Johnny Gill explicitly suggests making Love in an Elevator. No wonder some say they don't make love songs like they used to?

Obligatory disclaimer, any playlist I make has to flow and move me, hence I included a few songs that you might say are love adjacent per my criteria. Sue me

• Right and a Wrong Way by Keith Sweat - this falls under prescription. The lyric goes "There's a right and a wrong way to love somebody"
• The Lovers and Sentimental from Alexander O'Neal (Jam and Lewis's best interpreter oozes love without trying)
• Between the sheets by the Isley Brothers mostly for the part that goes "Enough of this singing, let's make love"
• Je t'aime, moi non plus Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin after realizing that this was an overly anglophone take on the matter
• Part time lover by Stevie Wonder simply for Luther Vandross's adlibs on the chorus
• Loving you by Tony Toni Tone which, as I've noted previously, puts the contraception in baby making music
• As well as a couple from Prince: Joy in Repetition for the telling phrase (Love me) that prompted the song's title and Adore which is the ultimate love song ("love is too weak to define what you mean to me")

I'll end with sentimental favorites: The Beatles optimistically chiming in with All You Need Is Love while Brenda Russell sings of A Little Bit Of Love and, for good measure, Teddy Pendergrass is struck by Love T.K.O.

There's a spreadsheet, if you want to wrangle the data for yourself.

But mostly there's the playlist, do give it a listen.

I'm no expert but hey, I wrangled with the textures of love. Be prepared, they said, so I gave you Love, a thousand so ways. I tried to do my part, let me know what you think.

Love, a playlist (spotify version)

Disclaimer: About 80 songs didn't make it in the journey from YouTube to Spotify

The Adinkra symbol, odo nyera fie kwan, or "Love always finds its way home".

See previously: 66 Ways to Franco

File under: music, obsession, love, whimsy, culture, observation, perception, humour, language, analysis, statistics, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log. May 6, 2024

New Love

The breathlessness of new love
The quality of those early days
When, tentatively, you discover each other
The first time for everything
Butterflies, the newness of it all
The moment after the first touch
Embracing the rapture of infatuation
The first look, the first acquiescence
Reciprocating and mirroring, seeing anew
The light of a lover refracted in your eye
This is us. Together. This is our time.

New Love, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• New Love by Cherrelle
• Looking for a New Love by Jody Watley
• Love Struck by Jesse Johnson
• He Loves Me (Lyzel in E Flat) by Jill Scott
• Butterflies by Michael Jackson
• Newness by Musiq
• The Newness by Eric Roberson

File under: emotion, life, culture, observation, perception, love, poetry, toli

Writing log: July 3, 2022