ellery twining – PortFire

Parade Season

each spring, as the parades
approached, many veterans
would need to update
their uniforms. a small percentage
are Vietnam Veterans
who discarded their awards
in disgust. an accumulation
of time altered their original
conscription, and now wanted to
participate.
and represent.

the veterans of World War II
did not have to confront
the decision their Vietnam brethren had to.
the Greatest Generation watched over decades,
as their uniforms were desecrated
by curious grandchildren.

“i need a belt buckle.”

“a regular web belt for work?”

“No, a Goddamn USMC buckle in all it’s glory!”

my father in law- who owned the Army Navy surplus store
i found myself working in
had bought 120 USMC Dress buckles
at a trade show years earlier.
there were still a few dozen
in our attic stockroom.

“hold on one minute, i’ll be right back.”

i immediately find a
boxed USMC belt buckle,
and head back down the
rickety stairs from the attic,
to the retail floor.

“how much do i owe you, kid?”

“on the house. it’s the least we can do.”

“awww, c’mon kid, i can pay you!”

“hey- didn’t anyone give you something for free today?”

he raised his head to look directly into my eyes.
i thought i could hear his train of thought.

“a free buckle? a free buckle?”

holding the small
cardboard box
he spoke eloquently

“You are making an old Marine proud.”

he then exits the store.

the sound is congruent
everyone in earshot
was aware of what we heard.

i race to the deck outside the store
as customers are dialing 911
on their cell phones.
when i reach his fallen figure, i ask “are you ok?”

he replied~
“yes, i am.”

a moment later, a police officer arrived as
the first responder.
he walked across the deck
that provides access to the store.

“have you been drinking today?
“no, no, no, sir…..”

“Stand Up….”

the officer plants his hands under
the arms of the Marine Veteran
and gradually brings him
to his feet.

“have you been drinking today?” the officer repeats his question, with
an edge of malice.
i was shocked at the lack of a level of subtlety from the officer.
perhaps they dealt with this “emergency” everyday.

and yet, i decided to speak out:

“hey, take it easy on him….”

the officer held the Marine in the same position and then
slowly craned his neck to look directly at me.

“i’ll let you know when i want you to talk.”

i thought to myself
i would oblige,
and remain silent.

a gathering of EMT’s, firefighters, and police
have gathered at the scene.
they all seem to look at me
with a coordinated
disdain.

“you couldn’t differentiate a heart attack
from a drunk old man?”

October 2001

i was confronted
with the dichotomy
of the internet
in the late autumn of 2001.

the attack on America
had specifically affected the content
of our culture, and our national identity.
i attended a concert
by a prestigious English band
at the Riverside Church during the
October of that year.
in Manhattan, security was
prominent.

a week after the show, i found myself in a
bulletin board forum,
the early century precursor
to facebook, and twitter.
a topic caught my attention- the security
at the Riverside Church show, which many
felt was inappropriate.

i wrote to the forum in response
to the topic:

“hey, are you aware that planes flew into the WTC less than
two months ago? could that be the reason for
heightened security?”

member after member of the online group forum
savaged my interpretation of the situation.

“those searches were inappropriate!”

“they negated our personal space!”

“we are not the terrorists!”

“we have no stake in violence, why target us?”

following their compelling statements,
i continued to howl
the content of my rebuttal.
it was an attempt to defend my point of view,
while simultaneously
regarding criticism
as a necessary element.

the awareness was sudden, and complete.
i did not want my personal opinion
validated…

i wanted to be seen as
the smartest person in the room.

i immediately disengaged.

Washington, District of Columbia

the Residence Act of 1790
established the District of Columbia
as the nation’s capital.
Philadelphia became relegated
as a temporary centrifugal point,
while the District
was constructed.

the realization of the national capital
was ratified by the First Congress
of our United States.

I was fortunate enough
to visit the Martin Luther King Memorial
during the summer of 2017;
at the edge of the second year of Trumpism.

Kevin and I planned on meeting
at Farragut Square at noon,
which was the end of his specific
workday in DC.
I arrive uncharacteristically early.
the statue of Farragut catches my attention, its
stoic commitment toward completion is as obvious
as the humid component of late June in DC.

I look him up on my hand held
computer device,
while I waited for Kevin’s presence.

Admiral David Farragut was a
Tennessean who fought
against the Confederacy,
for the Union.
his efforts as a commander
were instrumental in the capture of
New Orleans in 1862,
and was of the mind that
Secession equaled Treason.

the K Street kids buy lunch
at the food trucks that line
the periphery of the park.
Kevin arrives, and greets me with a smile.

“i think the MLK memorial is over there, past that row of trees.” states Kevin as
we approach the entrance of the memorial.

I am initially surprised by
the inherent deception.
across a wide plaza sit two massive
rocks, towering over the people
that are walking between them.
In the distance stands
a third stone, the missing middle section
of the granite mountain.

what appeared at first to be inconsequential,
was immediately and instantly revealed as a lesson
in the realization of totality:
the center rock of the split mountain
contained the sculpture
of his image.
conclusions are inherently happenstance,
and yet I understood that Martin had
created a path through the mountain
that did not exist before him.

his majesty exists beyond containment.

a large group of Black Americans
are gathered at the front of the memorial,
for a lasting impression.
they appear to be a multi-generational family,
some smiling; the majority reflecting.

I look to my right to see
who is taking the photograph.
a White woman in shorts and ponytail
squints to get the focus correct.
and I am in awe.
Is this The Dream?

to my left, about twenty feet away
sits a White American family of four.
their teenage son is wearing
a Make America Great Again red ballcap.

I turn my head back toward the group taking photographs in front of the Monument.

21 august 2018 : this is the third act

what are we fighting for?

A Prophecy

the old systems are being destroyed
right in front of our eyes-
refrain from shielding your sight…

we exist within the hidden nature
of a heedless epoch.
a severance of our accepted
deference toward divinity.

our examination of
behavioral traits
stretches decades.
was it all part of the plan?
we participated, subscribed, and invested wholly
in the disruption of the anticipated outcome.

perhaps, the convincing argument
articulates a recollection,
not an institutional
creationism that
may protect the possible
consideration of the
work.

the evidence is everywhere.
a collation of failed firewalls,
as reckless malware
creates a composite portfolio
of corruption.

is the mirror image an exercise of divisive involvement?

we are being asked to
define formality.
a curious reclamation
of a previous reality.

context of my last post

reminiscence

“I have to cancel our scheduled practice for the next Thursday night, as one of the regulars at the Palace
died suddenly on a camping trip with his college roommates. GaryU2 was a long serving city
representative in Norwich, Connecticut’s local government. He changed the lives of so many people
through his compassionate politics, that it was hilarious to reconcile his love of heavy metal, as well as
his fastidious commitment to U2. Anne and I went to the wake; and you could sense how hard this
sudden shock had wounded his kids. I knew the three of them empirically from the Palace; but this was
new territory. They were in a place I had been many times before.

“Long day, huh?” I said quietly to his oldest son, a teenager.
“Oh, yeah…” he replied. But there was a sense of relief, that maybe I had lessened his burden by recognizing it.
“Your dad was a great man, always remember that.”
“Thanks for coming.”

an excerpt from “THIS IS NOT SLANDER”

reminiscence

i recently perused the CD
you gave me
of photographs of the U2 show
at foxboro.

and now you cannot speak for yourself
the tidal wave that took your life and forced us to ask
is there really a God?
who could believe this circumstance?
the depth of a recognizance
we were tasked to come to terms with

begat an avalanche of an inescapable reality.
as witnesses, we were then
asked to confront the fact that

death is always at the door.
living is within every door,
and you taught me that.

IN THE VILLAGE

i walk toward
work in downtown mystic,
amidst our recent heat wave.
the pavement dissolves into
a blur of recognizance.

the sidewalk is dry.
however, my footsteps raise
no dust.

a car pulls into
the parking spot
in front of the local
health food store.
a window slowly unrolls,
defining the progress
of electronic sensors.

“could you tell me how to get to Mystic Seaport?”
“Eric Bogosian!”
“Yes…..”
“Cool. Ok, take the first left after the Drawbridge, at the flagpole.”

“and next?”

“take the left turn at the next stop sign at Route 27. The Seaport lot will be up on your right about two blocks.”
“thanks, kid…”
his wife smiled at me, and turned toward the windshield.

2018

i have witnessed
a compromised nation
intentionally conceal
the inherent cohesion
of equality

experiencing
a regulation of normality
requires resolve
as a survival
tactic

this is the division

opposition
prevents a codification of the
present tense.
a reliable sense of repetition.
an immunization
forcing expiration,
within common sense.

a threat of extinction
a lack of firewood
a pretense of generations
whose valor
shall render
their quest for dominion
a trivial iteration.