Tracking Package

Grainy video clip, Nest cam, low resolution
Slight angle from your front window, fishbowl vision
Poor lighting as befitted the early hour, 4 a.m.
After bringing in the new year, he was walking down the street
A double-take, a package at the door, who'd have thought it?

A brief check, took a look around, no one around to witness
But still, precaution, eyes darting, quick, pull up the hoodie
He shuffled in at an angle, eyes turned away
Made a beeline for the door, only a minor course correction
Then, grab and lift. Bulky, a little heavier than expected
What to call it? Booty or bounty? Practiced operator
He walked away furtively. Happy New Year, sucker.

A thief in the night, a liminal shadow, this interloper
Fittingly, in this covidious time, he was not a mask wearer
He duly seized the opportunity to perform the crime
Leaving only this digital trace, the notification
Discovered the next day. And the sense of violation

Grand larceny, you wonder: what was in the package?
Think. You rack your brain, did you order anything?
Stocking up for the lockdown, or was it a gift?
Amazon? UPS? Who even delivers on New Year's Eve?
Maybe your aunt sent a care package from your parents
She just returned from home and asked if you'd received it
That would be something else, what mortification
Oh well, to my nocturnal visitor, compliments of the season

Tracking Package, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. (spotify version)

• Thief's Theme by Nas
• Opportunity by Bobby McFerrin
  "Opportunity came to my door" is the takeaway from this spontaneous invention. Sadly it was not for me.
• Your Loss My Gain by Omar
• Looking Out The Front Door by Main Source
• Package Thief by Superchunk

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

File under: crime, observation, theft, life, covidious, poetry, toli

Writing log: January 1, 2022

Ghost Transcripts

Brief messages left behind by the dearly departed
Ephemera in times past, letters and scraps of paper
Of late, these new artifacts of the digital era
Faint traces, bylines, icons and avatars
Photos and videos, the color of memory
But also emails, logs, and chat transcripts
Voice mails that we remind ourselves to never delete

No, I want to hear that voice periodically
My brother imploring me to return his call
The chuckle, the slight hesitation
As if pondering the best approach
Before jumping in with the juicy morsel
That would whet your curiosity and impel you to respond
Then, without fail, the obligatory closing joke,
The lesson we learned early, always leave them wanting more

The voice is what I hold on to, its teasing inflection
And so I save the message every sixty days
And so I stay with this phone company
Despite the gaps in their coverage, and usurious rates
That customer satisfaction survey didn't have the option
For me to enter the real reason for my brand loyalty
Contra the telecom operator's retention policy
The textures of a life underwritten
The comfort of the ghost transcripts

Soundtrack for this note

Mostly the Voice by Gang Starr

See also: The Laws of Grief

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

File under: memory, voice, culture, observation, perception, technology, personal, grief, poetry, covidious, toli

Writing log. December 18, 2021

Blue Sand

The headline was striking sixty odd years later
The dust was said to be returning to sender
Swirling dervishes on magic carpets, a blanket of fine particles
Radiation straight from the souk, the message in a bottle

A sixties affair held, not in Provence,
   but rather in the Sahara
Uncharted territory
   in what they then called French Algeria
A convenient location,
   just a few Berber nomads around at best
The fruits of settler colonialism,
   a prime spot for a nuclear test

A case of droit de seigneur, this was the desert after all
Proud of his entrée to the nuclear club was General de Gaulle
Still, it's not something that one could sweep under the rug,
   this thing
Indeed, the test rather embodied a literal carpet bombing

First, the sharp flash of the detonation
Then, later, shock waves and the almighty sound
The scientists marveled at the novel reaction
The blueish fire that preceded the mushroom cloud

Ground zero, the impact crater, the hole in the dunes
The military had assigned a codename: Gerboise Bleue
The desert rodent of Reggane would be baptized in blue
The blue of the tricolor harkened to Saint Martin de Tours

In the aftermath, as expected, came the fallout in all its forms
The uproar was swift,
   later tests would have to be moved underground
Expressions of surprise
   that radiation would drift west and south
Significant traces detected
   in Upper Volta, Ghana and even Senegal

Ballistic rockets launched primed for nuclear payloads
The initial fear was of fission and Strontium 90 isotopes
Decay was all, the main byproduct was rather Caesium
It is an ill wind that blows no good, this reckoning

We are all casualties in the torrid zone of this triangle of fire
That, in a new century, nature had decided to share the wealth
Donations of micro doses spreading irony across the land
A radioactive gift to posterity, a legacy of blue sand



After: Irony as Saharan dust returns radiation from French nuclear tests in the 1960s (March 1, 2021)

Blue Sand, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. (spotify version)

• You Dropped A Bomb On Me by Gap Band
• Ill Wind by Ben Webster
• Midnite Blue by Count Basie
  Taken from The Complete Atomic Basie, the album cover is telling
• Dust by Van Hunt
• Inherit the Wind by Wilton Felder
• Dust in the Wind by Eric Benet
• Ill Wind by Lee Morgan
• Oh Lord Don't Let Them Drop That Atomic Bomb On Me by Charles Mingus
• Ill Wind by Milt Jackson
• Ill Wind (You're Blowin' Me No Good) by Ella Fitzgerald

...

The Wife's history of Atomic Junction dug up lots of interesting material. Here's a 1960 speech by by Tawia Adamafio denouncing French Nuclear Tests in the Sahara. See also a few more clippings from Ghanaian newspapers of the time.

File under: nuclear, France, violence, colonialism, war, environment, Algeria, irony, culture, observation, science, weapons, Africa, politics, power, perception, public health, poetry, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log: December 16, 2021

Action Items

Oh! I think I'm going to have to end this presentation now
I... I just got a message... It's on the news?... Oh wow
There's... there's an active shooter at my daughter's high school

What's that? Yes, yes, I have a number of action items
Look, I'll.. I'll schedule another teleconference
I have to go now. Rob can handle things. Um, Rob over to you

Mics unmuted. Gasps. Harrumphs.
   Worldwide expressions of sympathy
This is America.
This is the country's regular brand of insanity

Still, action items?
Who asked that? Poor form. Absurdity.
What is wrong with you, man?
Where is your humanity?

...

Michigan High School Shooting: 3 Students Killed and Several Critically Injured

A 15-year-old sophomore was taken into custody with a semiautomatic handgun that was bought by his father four days before the fatal shooting.

...

Action Items, a playlist

A soundtrack for this lament (spotify version)

• What's Going On by Marvin Gaye
• Right and a Wrong Way by Keith Sweat
• Prayer by D'Angelo
• The Moment I Feared by Slick Rick

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

File undebr: USA, blood, violence, absurd, culture, observation, modernity, perception, language, bureaucracy, corporation, work, life, poetry, outrage, guns, The Rough Beast, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log. Concept: November 30, 2021; December 12, 2021

The Color of Memory

First, the red cloth in the marketplace
Shimmering prints. Dakar was a revelation
First time abroad. First time on a plane.
The sounds, the laughs, friends and family
They have different jollof these Sénégalais
And, mon dieu, how about that poisson braisé
Black and white world cup matches on the TV
Then, a treat, we watched the final on a color screen
The orange of the Dutch team and their fans.
They lost. Orange was the color of memory

Again, a few years on, back home
Black and white TV. Monochrome.
Charles and Diana. A royal wedding.
We drove across Accra to my cousin's
A dash to their impromptu watch party
Just in time. We caught the carriage ride in color
Bright imprint, young mind. Colonial press
Strangely pallid, the prince and princess
Crown jewels from the Gold Coast. British monarchy
Our former rulers. Red velvet was the color of memory

Later. Exile. Someplace called Golders Green
Our own Babylon, mother and son, not quite refugees
Creature comforts, we bought our first color TV
This 9 year old's research pointed to a Panasonic
This was during the 1982 world cup, football fanatics
Fresh. The first thing we watched: Brazil vrs Italy
So unexpected, enter Paolo Rossi
A blue bandit overcame heroics from Socrates
Transcendent beauty outdone by clinical speed
Gutted. Frankly, everything has been downhill since
Contra the poacher, yellow was the color of memory

Colors, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. I give you sixty odd flavors of a rainbow spectrum, listen without prejudice (spotify version)

File under: memory, culture, observation, perception, color, sensory, youth, exile, immigration, poetry, Small Things, toli

Writing log: December 11, 2021

Until Such Time

Mystical spirits loom
Natural healing will soon come
Bringing justice promised us

Maroons, these searchers roam
The men of the hills journey
With rhythms of defiance

Crossing effervescent streams
Marking sanctified borderlands
Truths disclosed in light of day

Guidance duly salves the soul
It's the force of freedom
Protection until such time

Until Such Time, a playlist

A soundtrack for the maroons courtesy of that griot Burning Spear (spotify version)

• Man in the Hills
• Black Soul
• The Lion (live)
• People Get Ready
• Door Peep
  Chant down Babylon

File under: culture, observation, griots, maroon, sensory, poetry, toli

Writing log: December 7, 2021

Coinage Capitalism

Hottakes galore, call it coinage capitalism
Reification of the zeitgeist, the books proliferated
Bearing weighty tomes laden with keen, academic discourse
Along came the bright observers and the futurists

Cassandras calling, heady charges were duly leveled
Observe well the rhetoric of these social synthesizers
But scratch the gleaming surface of their mooted frameworks
And behold a fundamental misdiagnosis of the economics of networks

Such edifices they erected
   as they bemoaned the newfangled platforms
Perverse incentives touted by the lawyers among them,
   stern demands for reform
Bullet points on their charge sheets,
   not your garden variety contrarianism
A veritable rush to be the first to pinpoint the original sin

They extolled the perils of the day,
   but it was a new age of puffery
Their research probed the fatted calf
   or, at least, its dark underbelly
These pundits, badged with brows of concern and alacrity
Were minting think pieces full of shrink-wrapped profundity

Talking to themselves,
   the commentariat selling policy prescriptions
Data is the new oil, and other slogans that belied their fictions
But to take them at their word would be a crying shame
For, at the end of it all, they were merely playing a shell game

Tell us something new, there's no such thing as a free lunch
Captain Obvious, if you aren't paying, you are the product
Dark patterns applied as you skipped over the fine print
Taken hostage, the convenience of the Faustian pact in one click

Blinders on, the profit imperative,
   next they'll be fleecing you
Slouching wide awake, you customer,
   as they extract surplus value
Still, was there really anything novel
   in this dark empire of fear?
Methinks their sole invention
   was a new way of saying buyer beware

Cheap Talk, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Cheap Talk by Loose Ends
• Talkin' Loud and Saying Nothing by James Brown
• Talkin' all that Jazz by Stetsasonic
• Talkin' out the Side of your Neck by Cameo
• Sound and Fury by John Brown's Body
• Talkin' Loud and Saying Nothing by James Brown and the J.B.s

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

File under: hatchet job, culture, observation, perception, technology, Buyer's Remorse, shell game, Observers are worried, poetry, language, rhetoric, toli

Writing log. Concept: January 29 2019. November 21 2021

An Hour Away

Cape Point. Near the southern tip of the continent
From the cliff, we watched the famed seascape
The blue waves that were said to rival Zanzibar
Then, the Cape of Good Hope.
Tourists. Escapism.

Later, an hour away lay the township
Punishing. We took in the juxtaposition
Apartheid painted from its drab palette
Khayelitsha.
Slum life. Journalism.

(South Africa, Christmas 1993)

Put all this behind you, the scripts were being readied
The recent unpleasantness was all ancient history
Welcome to the New South Africa, they'd started to say
After all, you know, the elections are only months away

A Temporary Inconvenience, a playlist

Some sounds from South Africa. (spotify version)


File under: memory, culture, observation, perception, travel, poetry, South Africa, apartheid, race, poverty, colonialism, juxtaposition, Africa, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log: December 30, 1993, December 1, 2021

Workforce Rebalancing

We recorded workforce rebalancing charges in the combined income statement
Structural actions to simplify and optimize the increase in employee exits
The allocation of corporate expenses was not meaningful

...

Structural actions
Simplify and optimize
Employee exits




After The Company's 8-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission

See previously: Restructuring Activities and The Annual Report

File under: language, work, life, culture, observation, perception, capitalism, office, job, culture, irony, waste, poetry, humour, The Rough Beast, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log: November 7, 2021

Less Unfortunate Casualties

In Puerto Rico — among Irma's less unfortunate casualties — the lights were out. In many places, so was running water.

— Caribbean Devastated as Irma Heads Toward Florida (New York Times, September 7, 2017)

I guess the relativity of casualties is what is hard to handle
The "less unfortunate casualties" construction amounts to a great muddle
In context, I can sort of see where the writer was headed
But the more I think about it, the more confused I get

One is certainly fortunate to be injured rather than dead after an attack
Yet one is clearly unfortunate to have been attacked in the first place
On the one hand, a casualty is, by definition, unfortunate
On the other hand, we are full of concern for those less fortunate

How to distinguish between the typical usage of unfortunate
And the duty of care we always admonish for the unfortunate?
Thoughts and prayers should always go to the less fortunate.
But what of the reverse? What is due to the less unfortunate?

Those who ended up without lights were casualties, that we must admit.
There are gradations of fortune, it seems, a full spectrum of hardship
Harken to the circles of hell laid out in Dante's Inferno
And so we come, in this instance, to misfortune in Puerto Rico

Like mosquitos and other disasters, the hurricane didn't discriminate
The truth is, those who didn't have running water were certainly unfortunate
It seems a stretch to make a distinction between those without electricity
And those of the former group. Whither the less unfortunate casualties?

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

File under: language, humour, absurd, culture, observation, perception, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log: November 30, 2021

Rear View Mirror

Bear with me as I expound,
   my meaning will surely get clearer
I realize you want to put this plague
   firmly in the rear view mirror
It's only human to want to draw a line
   under the recent terror
Buyer beware, you may fall prey
   to the worst kind of category error

The blemish is that, per Doctor Fauci,
   it is the virus that sets the timeline
And, with a few new variants
   that escape the mooted, mitigating vaccines,
We're back to first principles:
   that global peril requires global solutions
Mother Nature doesn't discriminate,
   and the least of us deserve consideration

For all it takes is an immunocompromised so-and-so
   in some remote place
That, with a long infection,
   allows the virus to evolve and then displace
A few genetic markers in competition,
   for it's really survival of the fittest
And then a new variant is spawned
   with mutations that put humanity to the test
Unless you close your borders, or impose a quarantine,
   you have no protection
The new normalcy exposes
   the very real challenges of globalization

And so the tension that humanity faces
   is how to deal with the disease
Back to business, acceptable loss,
   and facing the ensuing unease
Will it be like malaria,
   once the challenge at home has been met
To close our eyes on the wretched,
   will we forget about the rest?

In the past, those in the first world
   were self assured and very vocal
Righteous, nay, they would always have you know
   that everything is local
A large part of humanity were consigned
   to face mosquito borne diseases on their own
For whatever reason, climate, bad luck,
   and the lack of development in the torrid zone

For some of us who know that no man is an island
Exiled souls living in the diaspora
Mindful about the fate of our relations
Our liminal networks have been disrupted

Those shielded from these troubles
   quickly gained a propensity for selective amnesia
Forgetting the enduring struggles
   that supported humanity's defenses
This pandemic has given a global education
   in observed competence
A corollary of the mosquito principle
   is vigilance against nostalgia

Rear view Mirror, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note (spotify version)

• Objects In The Mirror Are Closer Than They Appear by Meshell NdegeOcello
• It Ain't Over 'til it's over by Lenny Kravitz
• It Ain't Over by Terry Ellis
• It Ain't Over Til The Fat Lady Sings by En Vogue
• Rearview by Raphael Saadiq
• Objects In The Mirror by Prince

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

File under: culture, observation, perception, USA, failure, disaster, coronavirus, pandemic, poetry, covidious, Observers are worried, toli,

Writing log: May 22 2021, November 20 2021

67

Well, well, well, guess who turned 67 just the other day?
A neighbor distributed a flyer right at our doorway
Inviting us to a gathering to celebrate
   near the benches just before dark
Plum center, a photo of the birthday boy,
   the old man who lives in the park

Sadly, I couldn't rally to make it to the happy event
Even though I would consider myself one of his friends
Life intruded, parenthood and the pandemic's dismal reality
Meant that I missed out on the trappings of that ceremony

What do you give the man who has nothing but wants nothing?
I racked my brain:
   what could possibly be an adequate contribution?
Moreover, would he really want to be celebrated
   or, rather, left alone?
After all, when the party's over,
   the park would still be his humble home

At his age, one would traditionally be prime for retirement
Clearly though, besides his clothes and blanket,
   he has no safety net
Despite the gestures we've made
   to maintain a modicum of community
For all we know, he may not even be collecting social security

It can't be easy this life of his, being homeless
Street life, the whole world watching all your business
The soul of the neighborhood was the flyer's consensus
67, this old man. Think first, of the least of us

The Old Man Who Lives in the Park (Redux), a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. (spotify version)

• Homeless by Paul Simon
• Sitting in the Park by Alton Ellis
• Longing and Waiting by Bilal
• Rock Creek Park by The Blackbyrds
• Waiting by Rachelle Ferrell
• Sitting in the Park by Billy Stewart
• Srotoi Ye Mli by King Bruce & the Black Beats

See previously: The Old Man Who Lives in the Park

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

File under: poverty, street, life, observation, culture, race, homelessness, social, conversation, USA, aging, pandemic, poetry, covidious, toli

Writing log: September 11, 2021

Body and Soul

Human bodies can take a lot of physical stress,
Whether it is heat, cold, pain, or starvation.
Our surviving ancestors - those that handled it best,
Were accustomed to life at the extremes and deprivation

The gods would present challenges beyond mere deprival
For the health of the body is but one element of survival
The one paradoxical stressor
   that leaves the soul completely unmanned is solitude
A shadow's burden weighs on the psyche,
   isolation is the ultimate test of fortitude

Solitude has its uses, however,
   for such is the Gordian knot of human life
Many acts of creation require momentary detachment,
   if not a splinter of ice
A little dissonance and social distancing
   to garner an oblique perspective
To see things in proper true light,
   artistic impulse is the prime objective

...

Fellowship, a comfort suite is to be found in community and connection
Skin to skin, the merest touch can revitalize one's condition
Out-of-body, the journey to a far region of the mind has its own costs
Sensation, soul insurance assuages the spirit's rhythm of loss

Body and Soul, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note. Twenty odd takes on Body and Soul, one of my favorite standards. Coleman Hawkins's solo is the definitive statement while Billie Holiday has lead the approach to vocal treatments. This is the kind of music that makes you promptly pay your soul insurance premiums.

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

File under: culture, observation, social, perception, comfort, solitude, health, poetry, covidious, toli

Writing log: November 10, 2021

Fortress of Ignorance

The proudly incurious throughout history
Stand in opposition to the experts of the age
The manifold flavors of their ignorance
Counterpoints to the textures of knowledge

Forget the hedgehogs and the foxes, they'll say,
Can't you see? We are forging our own reality
Never mind the hubris, the paradox of the day:
Their tribe often seem to be in ascendancy

That the lack of shame opens the way for the ignorant
   is the core insight
Where scoundrels prosper freely,
   the useful idiot has firm ground on their side
Observe well, the emperor's new clothes
   contra the evidence of your own eyes
Later narratives will rebrand those moments as frothy hysteria
   instead of common lies

And therein lies the dilemma,
   there is a tax to confronting the ignorant
A burden even beyond the avoidance of conflict
   that simian politeness demands
Humanity is not so far removed from ignorance,
   nay it's our default state
What more to be perceived as a killjoy stickler,
   most would rather shrink from debate

Badged with unshakeable convictions
   and certainties based on gut feel
It's a wonder to behold their impregnable armor,
   call it shameless steel
Mankind's sole weapons, volleys of ridicule
   and the attrition of experience
And deep focus to expose their folly:
   their Achilles heel is incompetence

Knowledge may have its purposes, but guessing is always more fun than knowing.

— Archaeology by W.H. Auden

Soundtrack for this note

• Robber by The Weather Station
  Ignorance is a wonderful album

See also: A Taxonomy of Useful Idiots

File under: ignorance, culture, useful idiots, stupidity, knowledge, culture, observation, perception, rogues, strategy, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, poetry, toli,

Writing log: November 7, 2021

Speak, Memory

To walk around with your conquerors ever present, and in your face
Forever mindful that their whims are fickle and were previously unrestrained
The mask of civility, if not servility, renders you knowingly abject
For when survival is all, the imperative is to protect your neck

But life is not static, and these things have an eventual reckoning
The arc of justice, even if delayed, affects the event horizon
But in the interim we see the mobs with their brand of injustice and pogroms
Purity tests and shibboleths, the taunts chanted, the blows bestowed with no qualms

Settler colonialism leaves its mark, the imprint might even be genetic
The bloodstains that resound from walking through crimson soaked streets
Shame will out, humans love storytelling too much to forgo living testimonies
Truth and reconciliation rendered even as inconvenient flesh. Speak, memory.

"The past is past. I've accepted it. I don't want to remember. It's just asking for trouble."

— survivor of the Snake River massacres in Indonesia interviewed in The Look of Silence, Joshua Oppenheimer's documentary about the ghosts of the Indonesian slaughter of a million so-called communists.

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

File under: memory, reconciliation, history, blood, legacy, culture, politics, observation, perception, Israel, Palestine, Indonesia, violence, outrage, justice, conqueror, colonialism, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log: May 15, 2021

The Physics of Shame

The half life of shame, experiments confirm,
   has been decreasing at an alarming rate
The exponential decay, in modern times,
   subject to the vagaries of fate
Blame changing mores, expedience,
   and a predisposition for fun
Descartes would never get to write
   "I'm ashamed, therefore I am"

Researchers who have studied the erosion of shame
   are mostly confounded by the facts
A few gremlins are said to possess the unerring ability
   to repel it on contact
In some quarters, the term of art, shame liquefaction,
   has even been advanced
The gene which confers a selective advantage
   is often found in politicians

The angels that shepherded humanity
   out of the garden of Eden still maintain
That they left a curious gift in their luggage,
   wrapped in decorative paper
Ostensibly impermeable this solid substance,
   it bore the label shame
A puzzle too, for when mankind touched it,
   it instantly changed their behavior

Alas, like most unrequited gifts
   it was doomed to be treated as a novelty product
Further, the owner's manual was missing,
   and the warning labels unexamined and unread
Like the Rubik's cube forlorn that second week of January
   at the back of the toy closet
Swiftly discarded, right next to the silly putty,
   observe well the ensuing misconduct

The substance, in practice, turned out to be quite malleable
   in human hands
Material scientists point to a barrier function
   affecting soul insurance
After the initial practicality was addressed by clothing,
   and a modicum of modesty observed
There was no further selection pressure,
   the survival imperative was all that mattered

Thus, in our early dealings in the torrid zone,
   some realized that it could evaporate
If not treated with care,
   the run on our communal supplies would accelerate
But it was seen as a victimless crime,
   there was no one really that one could blame
The corollary in the modern era:
   America's real herd immunity is to shame

Shame, a Playlist

A soundtrack for this research note. (spotify version)

• Shame on Me by Alexander O'Neal
• It's a Shame by The Spinners
• Shame by Lewis Taylor
• Shame by Lenny Williams
• It's a Damn Shame by Johnny "Guitar" Watson
• It's a Shame (My Sister) by Monie Love
• Shame by Lewis Taylor

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

...

See previously: Shell Games (Part I. Shame Cultures)

File under: culture, shame, observation, perception, shell game, USA, humour, hatchet job, Observers are worried, poetry, toli

Writing log. Concept: May 14, 2020. September 18, 2021

Barter Trade

A cop doing detail at a distribution site
Gave her the tip about the extra vaccine doses
Solid, he was a regular at the main liquor store
The one near the old airport, a repeat customer
"He's a real fiend for good booze", she recounted,
Gleeful as she was about the stylish twist in fortune
Call it serendipity, if you'd like, this coup
That in those early months of constrained supply
When most went unprotected no matter how hard they tried
How she managed to trade a boutique bottle of whiskey
For her first jab of the Pfizer vaccine

They've been living their best lives during the pandemic
For, early on, liquor stores were branded as essential
The governor was adamant, the state was open for business
Thus, the flow of alcoholic beverages continued unabated
Heck, they were even expanding, even though it took a bit
At length, the state board issued the required permit
The new store would be opening soon in the posh part of town
An upgrade, no more gentrifying combat zones with their brand of chic

Not a mask in sight throughout all these months
It seemed as if the pandemic was irrelevant
Still, this was a departure, this vaccine development
A marked change from the early days of the lockdown
When we'd heard loud and clear over the fence
Right at the start of The Grand Reopening of Texas
The laughter and the assertion: "There is no virus"

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

File under: life, coronavirus, pandemic, humour, culture, observation, perception, Texas, poetry, covidious, toli

Writing log: October 24, 2021

The Annual Report

The leading contender was just launched (category: literary fiction)
A touch unorthodox perhaps, it's hard to keep up with the latest fashions
Today's fresh arrival in my mailbox was The Company's annual report
Would it be magical realism this year or the stream of consciousness of yore?

The most interesting section in The Company's 10-K statement
Outlined "the rationale for management's use of non-GAAP information
In the Compensation Discussion and Analysis and Proxy Statement"
A wonder of the world: dense bureaucratese and obfuscation

"The Company believes" that this fiction "provides increased transparency
And clarity into both the operational results of the business
And the performance of The Company's pension plans improves visibility
To management decisions and their impacts on operational performance"

The wholesale escapism, the whimsical mix of romance and fantasy
That The Company's writers have laid out, so striking and awkward
"Enables better comparison to peer companies; and allows The Company
To provide a long-term strategic view of the business going forward."

I'm not normally a fan of the fantasy genre but was quite shaken to the core
By this panoply of words hidden in plain sight that confounded and obscured
What with precious jewels of misdirection whose sole intent was to distort
I commend to the Pulitzer Prize committee The Company's annual report

Fantasy, a Playlist

A fictitious soundtrack for this note. (spotify version)

• Fantasy by Earth, Wind & Fire
• My Fantasy by Guy
• Fantasy by Mariah Carey and O.D.B)
• Fantasy by George Michael
• Bone Lies by Freddie MacGregor

Some things take away your breath and reading the company's annual report was revelatory.

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

File under: language, misdirection, shell game, humour, hatchet job, culture, observation, IBM, deception, finance, capitalism, Observers are worried, toli

Writing log. Concept March 28, 2020. August 19, 2021

The Lobby

It's one thing to avert the eye and go for benign neglect
It's another when the chairman of the board is affected
I recall that when Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait
A furious response was simply not up for debate

With Kuwaiti elites, whether oligarchs or royal family, over a barrel
These major stockholders, the world over, were in mortal peril
Forget matters of sovereignty, it didn't need to be said
That it wouldn't be good for business, let alone US interests

Even today, western media, who would not normally exercise restraint about strangers
Suddenly become coy and sensitive about their coverage, and hew to their better angels
As India became a new epicenter, they initially started showing makeshift crematoriums
And the telegenic, albeit burning, funeral pyres; the utter collapse and dysfunction

But the tone quickly changed, even as things were getting worse
The reality is that Indians hold the power of the purse
It really comes down, in these things, to who pays the piper
Who has the loudest voice when it comes to the diaspora

For when, say, Google's CEO's close and extended family is affected,
You'd best believe there'll be outrage, and an almighty scramble
Suddenly those who would never otherwise spare a thought
Are seen to be urging solidarity for this catastrophe

And so I've been thinking about the power of the lobby
I wonder who, in extremis, would ever be coming for me
I have long studied the successful ones even if I disapprove of their sleaze
The Israeli, the Saudi and those others; smooth operators, well versed at advocacy

For when my countrymen were stranded in Libya, Lebanon, or what have you
Or even those unfortunate souls who were being trained by Nicolae Ceaușescu
When calamity struck, the lesson they quickly learned was rather sobering
Namely that not a scintilla of help was on the way, no one was coming

In the past, to hold a Ghana passport was to be a down-on-your-luck kind of person
Radioactive really, the kind of thing that attracts the worst sort of attention
The immigration agent would break out a broad smile as you made your arrival
Your ovaries or gonads, foreseeing their inspection, would start to shrivel

We always wished for a different passport, Liechtenstein, or, say, Luxembourg
Let's be frank here, of a Luxembourgian held for hostage, I have never heard
But it stands to reason, there is something quite apt, even if it's inequitable
To read a headline: "White contractors airlifted to safety before local Black people"

There is a great sorting hat at work, perhaps the gods have always played favorites
But it is rather tiresome for those of us who have to content ourselves with miseries
"The fellow with the fufu usually moves over to the man with the soup,
Never the other way around", goes that saying, and well known Nigerian truth

And so as I write my own stories, I realize that I too need a posse
That I need to build bridges, and help those on the lower rungs than me
In this liminal life in the glue layer, making connections is what matters
The head nod of appreciation, building up the lobby for my fellow travelers

The Loud Minority, a playlist

A soundtrack for this note, meditating on a lobby (spotify version)

• The Loud Minority by Donald Byrd
• The Loud Minority by United Future Organization
• The Loud Minority by Frank Foster
• The Loud Minority by Kero One

...

Timing is everything
Observers are worried

File under: power, politics, immigration, identity, strategy, lobby, communities, advocacy, Great Game, humour, Ghana, Africa, culture, social, observation, perception, Observers are worried, Buyer's Remorse, poetry, toli

Writing log: May 14, 2021

Onomatopoeia, a Playlist

I give you a playlist full of vocal incantations. With poetic license, I've named it onomatopoeia rather than vocable which arguably better captures the sound effects I have in mind, the la las, the ding dongs and the sho-be-doos. We hum, we sing and we chant; the words are immaterial, it is the sound that enthralls. Listen without prejudice

Onomatopoeia, a playlist (spotify)

• Doobie Doobie Do by Omar
  The very definition of infectious, a celebration. I find myself nodding my head and singing along, Doobie Doobie Do. Effortless soul
• Shoop by Salt-N-Pepa
  Shuffling and sexy rhythms
• Ooo La La La by Teena Marie
  Slowly and langorously, the golden voice delivers a hook with staying power
• Zungguzungguzungguzeng by Yellowman
  The endless inventiveness of the Dancehall master, no one could toast quite like him, he rode any riddim relentlessly
• Din Daa Daa by George Kranz
  The vicious drums and the sum total of the lyrics:

  Din Daa Daa / Don Doon Doon.

  Onomatopoeic perfection
• Tutti Frutti by Little Richard
  Rock and roll was changed by the immortal chorus:

  A wop bop ba lu ba a wop bam boom.

• Woo Hah!! Got You All in Check by Busta Rhymes
  Even a subdued Busta Rhymes is action packed. Vocal gesticulation at its finest
• Yabadabadoo by Chubb Rock
  Simply Authoritative.

  The fat lady sang, I crushed her / Word up the Chubbster / Yabadabadoo

• Rub a Dub by Mikey Dread
  Nursery rhymes reinvented with a reggae vibe
• Oops Outside Your Head by Gap Band
  Charlie Wilson and the boys, Oklahoma's finest funkateers delivered bonafide party jams, perfect for barbecues and family reunions. Note the disingenous title: I don't believe you want to get up and dance
• Na Na Hey Hey by Donna Summer
  Dance with the disco queen, unarguable fun
• Da Da Da by Trio
  There's repetition and there's radical simplicity in structure in this piece of German pop. Da Da Da
• Poom Poom by Prince
  The chorus must be at least twenty poom pooms, vocal percussion in this vault track. From the man who sang about joy in repetion we get hundreds of poom pooms by song's end
• Bam Bam by Sister Nancy
  This is a hit. Sister Nancy may have never got paid for this lethal track inspired as she was by Yellowman and other toasters at the time, dancehall at its finest.
• Beng Beng Beng by Femi Kuti
  Dionysian and ferocious, no wonder it was banned in Nigeria, a song guranteed to cause commotion on dancefloors
• Boom by The Roots
  Adrenaline from a lethal lyricist

• Eeni Meeni Myni Mo by Omar
  We start the b-side with another nursery rhyme to punctuate some soul. Omar always delivers
• Rub a Dub All the Time by Dennis Brown
  The crown prince of reggae had so many hits, rub-a-dub style.
• La La La He He He by Prince
  Challenged to write a song to this title, our man came up with this slice of funk.
• Sho-Be-Do-Sho by Beres Hammond
  A consumate showman, Beres has to be experienced live
• Da Da Da by Prince
  The kind of song you can do when you get control of your masters, emancipation was the album
• Shoo-Be-Doo-Be-Doo-Da-Dey by Stevie Wonder
  A preview of the exuberance that was about to let loose in his virtuoso run in the seventies
• La-La Means I love you by The Delfonics
  The ultimate ballad
• Don Dada by Super Cat
  For a few years, Super Cat was inescable.
• Ding-Dong The Witch is Dead by Ella Fitzgerald
  No one has ever objected to Ella Fitzgerald, she could sing anything.
• Fu-Gee-La by Fugees
  Harkening back to Teena Marie on the hook, this was the album that would take them to the stratosphere
• Na Na Hey Hey by Bananarama
  Their brand of 80s pop might have been lightweight but you still had to dance to it
• They Want EFX by Das EFX
  The heart of this playlist is probably the effusive piece of vocal gymnastics. The intricacies of their rhyming in unparalleled.
• Din Da Da by The Roots
  Questlove and Black Thought took on the challenge of revisiting George Kranz'a masterpiece on the Tipping Point
• Ting-a-ling by Shabba Ranks
  The master of the dancehall
• Shing a Ling by Desmond Dekker
  Reggae greatness
• Ha! by Dianne Reeves
  Scat and vocalese virtuosity
• Sho Be Do Be by The Clarendonians
  The early reggae bands harkened to the doo bop bands
• Woo by Erykah Badu
  Apparently this album came after a bout of writer's block. Woo is all you need to get back to work
• Ding-Dong the witch is dead by Glenn Miller
  I'm always minded that this was the song that was sang in the streets when Margaret Thatcher died.
• Bam Bam by Byron Lee and the Dragonaires and Toots and the Maytals
  What a Bam Bam, Toots is sorely missed
• Doo wa Ditty by Zapp
  Zapp and Roger always deliver dancefloor bangers

I leave you singing Doobie Doobie Do

File under: music, language, whimsy, culture, fun, Comfort Suite, toli

Writing log: July 7, 2022