Otradom Pelogo

It's simply amusing, even amazing how we sometimes politely persuade ourselves that we understand that which has not been spoken. Whether it's a week or two, and it becomes more apparent in months, how much we think of, care about, and finally admit how much we love them. Our families that nourish us, our neighbors that subtly support us and the city that we didn't' fall in love with until the first time that we left.

Each year we try like our parents did when we were children, to tell them how much they are loved, how much we care, and how much they truly have.
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The Parents Prayer II

There are few things that I could tell the wise,
When there are many wonders that are still a surprise.
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It was an altruistic and academic quest, which
led me to her door

As our host unlocked one room after another, we began to pace the floor
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We're here because of what they did in the past
And more will follow because of what we do
The things we vie to build should also last
Things we also vie to build with virtue
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The day's tumultuous events caused Poreris to drift back to when his niece, Desiree, was a little girl, and remembering her Uncle, Bill; her dad's brother who would come over and visit. One day while she was lying on the bed watching television, he walked into the room and began to talk to her. Just before walking into the room, he pulled a Laura Bush biography of the shelf with the intentions of having her read a few pages for him, simultaneously trying to create an atmosphere and cordial pattern of picking up a book when she has free time, on the weekends when a child thinks, and should think that it's time to forget everything that happened academically, and without a doubt during the summer when most things will discretely fade out through the osmosis of a long, hot, relaxing vacation.

Her grandmother had a small bookshelf at the end of the hall way, about two or three shelves of books; each of a different genre; half that her Uncle Bill put there himself after reading, from Poe, to Melville, to an autobiography of the former Head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; Colin Powel, who once said how ironic it was that his dad never owned a gun, yet his son becomes head of the most powerful military in the world; to Hillary Clinton a modern day female activist, former first lady and senator of New York. At that moment, also trying to show by example, how to take the time and have reading becoming an entertaining event as well as an academic one, and thus he had also brought with him and was in the middle of a fourteen hundred and fifty page novel by Victor Hugo; Les Mieserables, though right about at the halfway point he said that he wished that he had either taken a speed reading course or had bought the abridged version. And Condoleezza Rice, which he was telling a young lady named Shay that he met in Atlanta one day while passing through, whom he had a chance to have supper with one evening, that just halfway through the autobiography of her, Condoleezza Rice, that it had made him dizzy; she, as they say, has been everywhere and done everything, from a professor at Stanford University to Secretary of State; coming from a small conservative Christian family, and becoming a diligent female role model. He would have given her it to read, but he was only halfway through and refused to let it go.
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We extend our courtesy to those we call the wise
Because we saw how much they had given
Courtesies we never vied to memorize
That came with a hug and a how to begin
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Pieces that refer to beings of nature...


A Veritable Friend (The Birds)
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They were equally as beautiful and lovely, I remember asking one of them to marry me, you'll soon see that I will have asked just about each one of them to marry me, only to see them smile and discretely say no; every now and then, finding one bold enough to say 'sure', when they know that my mind is too far away to truly comprehend the acceptance at the moment, or they will ask ‘why', then have it merge into the next question. And her friend, Nanya, asked the rhetorical; 'Do you want to get married', as she saw my mind drifting away from the same question that I had posed to her earlier, with me only vaguely hearing it and truly hearing it rhetorically, for a number of reasons; the main one, is that she had me over infatuated with her personality; and ironically enough, not only by her beauty, for Nanya is a very beautiful young lady, and not only by her youth, for she's young and contains the spiritual prowess of the spider; be it brown recluse or black widow, being pernicious, but yet soft, eloquent and delicate; making the mind defend before giving in to her. For the affair with her friend had seem to be causing unforeseen problems, one that had me confused, but because I had felt that feeling so frequently that she was displaying, I thought I was looking at a mirror image of myself, and though it reflected what I often feel; regrettably the dilemma of the dichotomous thin line of love and turmoil, brought on by being touched by someone; but the longevity of it staring back at me for what I might have done, broke the trance of that reflection and caused me to now ponder on my recent behavior, and though I could find none inordinate, it still perpetuated itself, where I was almost paralyzed from surprise that I could have transferred the monster that I elude on a daily basis to a young lady that I had now began to truly care about.

Nanya lives in Dubai's Deira district, where this is now taking place; a city in the UAE (United Arabic Emirates) , once ruled by His Highness Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum and now run by his heir, his son; His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid Al Maktoum, who has just over a few decades, turned Dubai into one of the world's leading economic ports where a financial and business district snakes along the city's waterway called the Creek, that many refer to as the Manhattan Skyline, which also brings in the bulk of the city's imports. And the small lobby of the Ambassador is now becoming full; an eloquent and comfortable hotel, where you will see many people from many walks of life visit, from your average business guru, to a family vacationing in Dubai, where mom is dressed in the traditional black abbaya, along with the shayla covering her head; the gishwa; a thin black veil covering her face, rather than the burqa, which is made of a stiffer material, though I have, since I've been there, and I guess it's becoming part of a trendier fashion, if I'm correct, seen them now made out of a shaded synthetic plastic material. Dad's head is covered with a gutra, which the men wear around their head, tied with an igal, the black woolen head-rope and wearing the kandoura, the ankle length traditional male white skirt. The little ones will be mirror images of their parents, of course, just smaller, enjoying the fun of having gotten out for a while, and thus the lobby and dining area of this strategically placed hotel, which serves locals and tourist alike, has now become domicile; home, if only for a little while.
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Brenda's Song
I had either lost my debit card or it had been frozen by the bank, thus almost literally being stranded in the Middle East, not being able to get to my funds, which would have easily turned a progressing nightmare, once again into an overdue vacation, but the former, disaster, was vying incredibly hard to be victorious, and the only person that I knew on the outside who could help me figure out what was going on, was Brenda, my youngest sister, who would have to call banks, foreign currency exchanges and struggle with the time zones to constantly try to track and coordinate the differences; though because of the time differences, at one, two and three o‘clock in the morning so that the exchanges would be open after transactions had been sent and completed.
She is no advent at taking care of business, for if I had her mental dexterity, I would have twice as much completed, in just about everything that I pursue; seeing her work around the clock, literally, and quite often; and by the age of forty, already having put in twenty years in the same business. Starting from the bottom and climbing the vertical ladder, breaking through, whether it being glass ceiling or removing the proverbial top from the metaphoric glass jar that many of us struggle with on a day to day basis, while teaching and working with children; a most fastidious affair.
In the below piece on the pope, suddenly, in retrospection, did I remembered writing that there was a strange relationship between women and myself; a message that they were trying to communicate to me, and later below, in a prayer that I had written, so not to forget such an astounding message, that at that moment I could not do anything with, I put in a prayer, stating that it was the Year of the Woman. And only until recently could I truly put the pieces together that I had struggled to try and understand after seeing how arduously, myself, my sister Brenda and this small group of women worked through a trying austerity to keep calm a worsening affair or should I say a worsening foreign affair, until recently.
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Lela's Song
(I got the idea of the ‘Song' while talking to Lela, you'll see as I explain in the following paragraphs, while talking to her one evening and feeling comfortable enough, like she simultaneously did, tried to explain and show her some of the things that I do. I played some of the recordings that I had made some time ago of some of the poetry that I had written to hear how it sounded, for editing purposes, which she only considered interesting. I then sat her down, and after a little while of talking to her, I decided that I wanted to keep her story, ‘song', and picked up the computer and began to write it as she sat there watching me compose as much as I could remember her telling me, up until that very moment. At the end of about half a page, I scrolled back up to the top and titled it ‘Lela's Song'. I could, though I was myself truly surprised, see that she authentically enjoyed an uncontrollable moment of pleasure, as she sat up and turned her head to the side for only a short moment, the virtuous embarrassment of having someone do something nice for her, before returning back with the mask.)

Lela, Nanya's friend, had seen me come in one late afternoon and walked up to me and went through the motions of preparing to sit down for a long and intriguing conversation, and watched me pass up something that she knew I wanted, ironically the polished product which she was pretending to present to me, when she knew that I was totally preoccupied with a few things on my mind, but something that I had been asking for, subliminally and subconsciously; not only and intimate relationship, here, intimate meaning to have an in-depth conversation, talking beyond the superficial salutations, and being extended where we would, I guess you would say, although it was fate that had brought us together, become friends, but I guess it manifested itself more than even I thought. Only when I had decided that it wasn't there any longer did it appear, and she felt safe enough to play with it, while I sat and had a cup of coffee with way too much on my mind.
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Princess Sultana Al Sa'ud
Speaks With
Immanuel Kant
Emmanuel
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Charlene's Song
Tethered to Life by Virtue

To go back to the beginning seems similar to piecing together
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'My Mom and Dad (Hilda Mae and Clinton Thomas Sr.) are extra motivators when taking on arduous ventures, (and it goes for their cohorts, those their age in general, as much) . Being born in the post-Great Depression era, in the 30's, in Louisiana, like for the rest of America, was trying enough, coupled with being black parents in the segregated south in the 40's 50's and 60's, made life at that time even more challenging. At the age of five, my mother being one of the oldest of ten children along with my grandparents who packed everything into boxes and put them on back of the truck, headed to Texas from St Martinsville, Louisiana. My dad from Shatan or I think he said the name changed later to Ville Platt.

My Mom and Dad worked hard, taught us how to pray each day, respect and love one another, supported and encouraged me and my siblings, they also taught us to enjoy working (which each one of us had worked somewhere before graduating from high school.) , would be the second motivator. Although I started working at the age of eleven or twelve, there was very little at the end of the week to save, and little reason to save with the amount I would get working part-time.
By the time I was twelve, I had worked before, like most eager children at that age had wished to do but couldn't. My Dad, besides being a truck driver was somewhat of a handy-man, and thus I can remember doing odd jobs with him, from working with people renovating their homes, to helping unload bails of paper for the Standard Paper Co. that he worked for as a truck driver.
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My mom is sixty-four; will be sixty-five April the twenty-seventh. I just got off of the phone with her, ironically; a few people to be more precise; my mom and sister; trying to increase the tolerance level, making the bonds stronger, and as one would say, keeping the lines of communications open. This morning I went by to have a cup of coffee; since I moved here, I don't go by very much, so whenever I have the chance, I call and invite myself over for a hot cup of coffee or just a short and cordial conversation.

Usually I call home with nothing in particular to say; how is everything going, who's all there, what's for dinner, or did I get any mail; five minutes or so and say good-bye. One day it was okra, sometimes pork chops, fried chicken, sometimes gumbo; and she usually offers; but an hour walk over to her house or just as long transferring on buses, makes the acceptance rare.
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Each year I would tried to do something for them, whether it was buying them a book, letting them work on the computer, buying them toys that I thought would help develop a sport that they would like to indulge in one day; I figured if I were in Austin, and because we are a close family, that I would like to, even should help them with as much as possible. Especially when looking back in retrospection; seven and ten years from now, I thought then, when they would graduate from high school and begin to go out on their own, and look back, I would like to be able to have helped them and be able to have made some type of a difference; academic or moral investment in their lives; something I was thinking about when I started to keep a journal on them several years ago. When they would reach eighteen and nineteen, no matter what happened or what road they would take, had I done the little that I could to try and help them. As I said; Desiree was seven, three years younger than Joshua, and up until recently, she probably still does try to imitate Joshua, which is good, for Joshua is nice intelligent and respectful. And Barbara Jean; their mom kept as you would say, 'A close eye on them'. Therefore they can be good peer role models for each other.

The last time I was by my sister's place; which was about ten years ago; one day I woke up early; which when driving a twenty-four hour period, day after day and month after month, which I was at that time while driving OTR (Over The Road) , can either be early or late, and heard what I thought was Barbara Jean, my older sister getting dressed, but minutes later heard my mom say 'Joshua are you ready yet'; and about half an hour later heard him say to his little sister, ‘bye Desiree, which she doesn't have to be to school until eight o'clock because it's only a block away. She, my mom, usually gets up and watches Barbara Jean walk out to the car, as a safety courtesy; her husband goes to work just a little bit earlier, and thus, they, my mom, sister, her daughter and son are there alone; a house where women and children live, safety and courtesy becomes somewhat of a necessity and not a burden.
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We can't transcend life; it must be lived,
Although it's the quest most arduous
I could tell you all that I know, but all
About life, that would be ostentatious
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A salute and a smile with a simple look
Along with a hello, subtle and by the book
A sweet eloquence to regale my dole
With a soft voice to emblazon my soul
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