Sometimes a writer feels as if he is an arrow being shot from such a remote dimension that no one can see where he is coming from. Like a sailor shouting warnings to his comrades against a gale that will not allow a single syllable to be understood amid the violence of the storm. Like a mountain climber after a trail collapse whose only option is to continue to climb toward insanity before being able to descend to safely.
On Monday, April 21, 2013 I will participate in the Million March Against Child Abuse with the Fort Lauderdale, Florida group. The hopes are that millions will participate, in different cities and towns from around the nation. I live in Miami and even though we have over 5.5 million residents I will need to drive an hour north to join the group in Fort Lauderdale. I have learned that one voice is a frail thing barely discernible above the calamities of life, but a group of voices has a fair chance of demanding attention.
I have learned that individuals can pull off atrocities, like bombing a marathon and become media darlings, but that the ten children beaten to death in America each day can never become anyone’s darlings. It has become common practice in America to give attention to the detractors and to ignore the heroes and in most cases the victims. Join us on Monday as we loose our arrows from a dark remote location into the light of a seemingly unconcerned world.
“They thought I had guts, they were wrong, I was only afraid of more important things.”
“Take a writer away from his typewriter and all you have left is the sickness which started him typing in the beginning.” Charles Bukowski
Charles Bukowski was an American writer/poet, born in Germany in 1920. He was a heavy drinking womanizer who has been called one of the most prolific and prophetic producer of prose of the last century. He has been described as a misogynist, a fatalist and his work is said to be saturated with defeatism. His work is infused with the literal and figurative profanity of our world. As with many of us who were abused he spent his entire life as an outsider trying desperately not to look or fit in. His work is unabridged unedited truth, truths which many will always refuse to believe.
He was severely physically abused by his father with a razor strop for most of his young life. He has been known to credit his father and that abuse for his becoming a writer, stating that his father taught him two valuable things about life, those two things, pain and truth and the ability to express and embrace both.
I too must acknowledge my abusers role in my success as a writer, as a father and ultimately as a man. Jack Cooper was a monster, but his monstrous behavior molded me into the caring man I would eventually become. One can never truly embrace heaven if he has never experienced hell. One can never truly embrace life if he has never experienced death. One can never recognize the spark of love in an eye if he has never stared into the maddened eye of hatred.
So, as Charles, known as Hank, continued to sling his arrows into the darkened abyss from some dimension unknown to the average man, those of the Million March Against Child Abuse and I will also continue to sling unacceptable truths from our own little corner of reality. We will shout into the darkened world, our truth, our knowledge and the nightmares of ten children who will today slip away into hell, watching as a loving fist repeatedly descend to end their young innocent lives.
“The truth is not popular, and those who utter it are enemies of us all.”
Kennesaw Taylor
I suggest you turn away quickly you’re in danger of understanding something that shakes up your perfect little world. This story is rated DMT damned unpopular truth.
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