A to Z: A People's History of the United States

P for the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

P is for A People's History

Howard Zinn, an absolute delight in my eyes, who was revered and loved by many, passed away two years ago. Articulate and earnest, he left behind volumes of language, reflections, and messages intended to stimulate critical thought and to promote autonomous ideas and analysis.

As a historian, for the people, an activist, an author, an intellect, and an Air Force bombardier in World War II, he was an advocate for civil rights and a voice for labor unions. In his time he gave much thought to the injustices of the legal system and helped organize anti-war efforts. His accomplishments exposed the true struggles of Native Americans against European defeat and expansion. He explored the accounts of slaves, women, and unionist. All of which he included in his influential and widely-acclaimed book, A People's History of the United States. With this history textbook, he allowed readers to recognize the flaws in historical narrative and he inched open a doorway to thought-provoking departures from the common history books. His messages provoked many to question a superior history of omission.

“Civil disobedience is not our problem. Our problem is civilobedience. Our problem is that people all over the world have obeyed the dictates of leaders…and millions have been killed because of this obedience…Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves… (and) the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem.”
— Howard Zinn

A warm memory of a man that devoted his life to acknowledging the whole of our social structure, to representing true accounts of life and action, and to recognizing submission as our greatest weakness. Thank you, Mr. Zinn, for your message and your greatest feat: fostering individual inquiry and activism.

A to Z: Orange

The letter O for the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

O is for Orange

Last school year (we home-school), Sunday evenings were reserved for family poetry night. Some were in Couplets, some Sensory, some Haiku. Others were Inner-Self and some were Color.

For this post, I've decided that it is Sunday night and the boys have assigned a Color Poem to me.

Orange

a pile of colored blooms
the mandarin eyes peel
a blood-orange moon
pouring out of meal

salmon squirm
their bittersweet term

leaves burning fall
 hungry night's sky
rotting pumpkin face
soup and stew and die

"Poetry teaches the enormous force of a few words, and, in proportion to the inspiration, checks loquacity."

-Emerson

A to Z: Nalini

N is for my daughter for the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

N is for Nalini

The last born, following four boys,

she is the one with an indomitable spirit.

Relentless spirit

Demanding spirit

My daughter


Her arrival was sudden and early,

a stunning show, really.

I waited until the end to know who she was.

Never anticipating that a girl would arrival.

What a delicious surprise.

We joke that she is being raised by wolves.

Each brother shares with her 

his own sense of "mommy". 

With Sahaj, one of her older brothers.

With Govinda, another older brother.

With Judah, again an older brother.

 With her oldest brother, Siddhartha.

Her name is Nalini, our little lotus, but we know her as Haile,

our love and light.

An empress princess.

A to Z: Mother

The letter M for the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

M is for Mother 

"Who are we?

 We find that we live on an insignificant planet of a humdrum star lost in a galaxy tucked away
 in some forgotten corner of a universe in which there are far more galaxies than people." -Dr. Carl Sagan

"Those who dwell among the beauties and mysteries of the Earth
are never alone or weary of life." -Rachel Carson

"The surface of the Earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean. From it we have learned most of what we know. Recently, we have waded a little out of sea, enough to dampen our toes or, at most, wet our ankles.
The water seems inviting. The ocean calls. So" -Dr. Carl Sagan

Sunday Scribblings: Wealth and A to Z: Longing

L for the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

                                 and

This week's Sunday Scribblings prompt is wealth.

L is for Longing

In my arms

when stars were white,

An old man studied magic in a flower.

A day we had

in sweet affluence of bells and song,

I held color in the sky.

Alive in my garden

strung by rare roots,

The world we painted in human flesh.

The dreams were green

fertile danced,

At sunrise, the trees were covered in hoarfrost.

A crack in the lines where another world begins.

This one ends.

Through the hole

where sap and spirit are withheld,

The old man stops.

The summer is short

the end is pale and spoiled,

The old man starves.

Behind the iron gate

mounds of blood pour out,

The old man crawls.

In my hand

where the flower stands,

Silver bells are still ringing. 

"To die for beauty, than live for bread." -Emerson

*photo-Lane of Poplars at Sunset, Van Gogh.

A to Z: Jack Kerouac

K for the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

K is for Jack Kerouac

"I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up
running from one falling star to another till I drop.
This is the night, what it does to you.
I had nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion."

For the beat generation,

on the road.

A to Z: Judah

Catching up with the letter J for the Blogging from A to Z Challenge.

J is for Judah

When he came, the trinity was complete.

He brought along a string of messages. I've kept notes on my conversations with him. 

He is small for his age, in the middle of our family, and he is known to make a clear point when he speaks.

The nick-names that he has given to his baby sister(Haile):

Chubby-fat

Rainbow-Haile

Mary-cherry

He is her favorite; I find them in corners, cuddling and kissing.

A list of his most insightful speech:

Judah on war:

(while finishing a cream-filled popsicle) "Mom, I don't want to go to war. Because when you get back everything is different. You don't know what to do. You have to start all over again. Plus, I don't want to lose my arms."

(The plan in our home, to give each son a copy of Dalton Trumbo's Johnny Got His Gun before an army recruiter approaches. Based on this conversation, Judah has already read the book!

Judah on birth:

"Babies come from Moms. If there was no Mom, there would be no babies in the world. When the ocean slips out, then the baby comes. When I grow up and have a baby, the ocean will be in my tummy too."

Judah on God:

"God is like a soul. God can hold everything you have in his body. Flesh, bone, blood. I don't forget about her. He won't forget about you."

"Is God a He or a She?" I wondered.

"A She," he answered.

"Why?" I asked.

"Because She sits on a flower and wears a dress."

J is for a little boy who lives in his dreams,
where language is yellow and bubbly 

and stories are sage and true.