rendezvous
In Thanksgiving for the Memories
Before the night-terrors began, dreams were in play – dreams of racial and gender equality, even equal pay.
Healthy dreams of affordable care for mind, body and soul; Dreams of an Equal Rights Amendment, a livable minimum wage, single payer and Medicaid extended.
Dreams prioritizing support for our troops, when Veterans, sustaining their defense against traumatic mental and physical damage, unemployment and homelessness descended.
I remember it well: our cornerstone of rockets’ red glare bursting into the fresh air of Freedoms ensconced forever in the firm grip of a French Lady promising Liberté to masses yearning to breathe free – until we slammed the Golden Rule door.
I remember it well. We met at the 1621 treaty signing between the Wampanoag tribe and the Pilgrims of the Plymouth colony. I was on time.
No, you are remembering too late.
I remember it well. We dined with New World discoverer, Columbus and friends.
We dined alone, in Rio de Janeiro until that Italian explorer, Amerigo Vespucci sailed ashore like some travelling troubadour.
A tenor sang
No, a baritone
Ah, yes, I remember it well. The New World Order called, America, created under God’s moon.
There was no moon nor America that night, and it was South America
That’s right. That’s right.
It warms my heart, to know that you, remember still, the way you do.
Ah, yes, I remember it well: How often I’ve thought of that first summer night
It, was a brisk March evening.
I remember it well: surviving a long ocean voyage and hostile winter in Thanksgiving to God!
Perhaps Christians with more guts, owe thanksgiving too, to Wampanoag who befriended us;
Showing strangers in a strange land how to fish, plant corn and gather berries and nuts.
I remember that night when we had our last rendezvous, and somehow I foolishly wondered if you might be thinking as I do. I rode all night, just me alone to warn, the Red Coats are coming in just a few.
No not alone, not you. Before the dawn of Valley Forge, while Congress slept behind closed doors, women too rode out to warn Minute Men of the coming Red horde.
Ah, yes, I remember it well. We men, better than most…
Not so exceptional to boast.
Those Russian songs
From Muslim sailors at a mosque on Cuba’s coast?
Ah, yes. I remember it well. You wore a gown of gold.
Not quite Red, White and Blue?
Am I getting old?
Oh, no, not you. How strong you were, how young and gay. A prince of peace, in every way.
Ah, yes, I remember it well.
It wasn’t King Ferdinand nor Queen Isabell, who launched a thousand ships in 1492, but rather Muslims in 1178 who, sailed the ocean blue – introducing Islam to Latin American hue.
In the early fall of 1621, Thanksgiving was a happy accident: Pilgrim Edward Winslow wrote, “we exercised our arms!” Think more Open Carry than gymnasium event.
There was so much Iraqi-like celebratory firing in the air, neighboring Wampanoag, thinking the foreigners were under attack, rushed to defend them, loaded for bear.
In thanksgiving, the Pilgrims invited the Americans to stay for dinner, and both English immigrants and native born agreed, Lincoln’s idea a winner.
Inspired invaders and their Good Samaritan neighbors, proclaiming we reap what we sow, more gun play was the order of the day, for unsuspecting doe.
Natives provided Venison; foreigners first harvest farmers’ market, and voilà it’s done.
There was land and water fowl aplenty, seafood, pumpkin and, of course, cornbread for ill-mannered sopping, with no hint of the foul play of treaty flip-flopping.
Yet, in time, inter-cultural bridges were squashed, by the craven craving the land of the free braves and labors of the unwashed.
When only fear and hate abide between truth and lies, the tie that binds the middle to East and West is compromised.
Our promise lost to the dark side when love is denied and open arms giving refuge succumbs to prejudicial pride.
I remember it well: Dallas, Watergate, Trickledown, Pre-emptive Iraq invasion, and Patriot Act betraying American Exceptionalism.
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