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COPYRIGHT 1969, THE REBEL. NONE OF THE MATERIALS HEREIN CAN BE USED OR REPRODUCED IN
ANY MANNER WHATSOEVER WITHOUT WRITTEN PERMISSION
ee ere Paul F. Callaway
John R. Reynolds
Business Manager ............ Skip Huff
Co-ordinating Editor ....... Beverly Jones
Art and Design Editor ........ Rad Bailey
es se Franceine Perry
Peery Ee ae Carolyn Griffin
mewiews Edtor ... . 2... oss Judy Coggins
Chief Photographer ........ Walter Quade
Exchange and Subscriptions
Se i iS Patience Collie
Typist and Correspondence
Ss a ee Cathy Norfleet
Publicity Director .......... Keith Parrish
Co-ordinating Staff ...... Rod Ketner
Steve Hubbard
Robert McDowell
Charles Denny
Lynn Ayers
John Sherman
Chuck Kalaf
Bill Suk
John Fulton
NS ey a Ovid Williams Pierce
The Rebel® is a student publication of East
Carolina University. Offices are located on
the campus at 215 Wright Annex. Inquiries
and contributions should be directed to P. O.
Box 2486, East Carolina University Station,
Greenville, North Carolina 27834.
PRINTED BY THE GRAPHIC PRESS, INC., RALEIGH, N. C. 27603
Callaway
Contributors
Paul Green, North CarolinaTs Pulitzer Prize
winning dramatist, author of ~~The Lost Col-
ony� and ~o~In AbrahamTs Bosom,�T provides
one of two featured interviews in this issue.
A narration by Green about one of his
childhood friends provides this issueTs short
story.
Robert Morgan, North Carolina State At-
torney General and Chairman of the Board
of Trustees of East Carolina University
speaks on capital punishment in a featured
interview.
Featured poet for the winter issue of The
Rebel is Gale Morgan, an inmate of Caledonia
Prison in Tillery, North Carolina. Morgan has
been printed in various magazines, including
The Rebel.
Beverly Jones, Coordinating Editor of the
Rebel, contributed many hours work to this
issue.
Poetry contributors for this issue are Lyril
Spence, Claire Pittman, Jean Brown, Annette
MacRae, and John Sherman.
Lastly, The Rebel is fortunate to have had
and sad to lose co-editor Chip Callaway who
was recently elected editor of the student
newspaper. His work can be found through-
out the magazine and will be greatly missed.
Contents
untitled
letters to the editor
legal murder
paul green
poetry
a narration
photoessay
robert morgan
soul on ice
the quiet vengeance of words
they
untitled
dark rider, heartTs desire,
man creates, schism
the sacrifice
the big man
my slow course
just after winter
untitled
from observations
snow
john d. fulton
pfe, bmj, wgs
gale freeman morgan
paul green
pfe, chn, rrk, rbr
robert medowell
annette macrae
patsy wofford
lyril spence
annette macrae
claire pittman
rod ketner
john sherman
linda faye bryant
jennifer salinger
jean brown
chip callaway
Pipes go spinninT round and round
| go jumpinT up and down
We're all crazy
It donT matter who you are
It donT matter whoTs your pa
You and me.
We got a lot of gall
But weTre brothers
You and me
We're brothers
| like to use toothpaste in the morning
Makes my mouth wanT to go roarinT
| like that
| use green stuff
What do you use
Its all the same
But | like mine betterTn yours
Which proves somethinT
WeTre different
But weTre brothers
Pipes go spinninT round and round
| go my way, you go yours
We'll see each other when we're there
Hurray
oBirds of a feather stick together�T
But those pipes and you and |
We're somethinT
We all come from the same damn place
WeTre brothers
John D. Fulton
Dear REBEL,
I was very pleased to see the contributions of Mrs. Pittman and Dr.
Sorenson among the offerings of the latest REBEL. To include faculty
membersT literary accomplishments among those of students, is, I believe,
to move in the right direction toward more faculty-student interaction.
In future issues I look forward to seeing more work of ECU faculty.
Sincerely,
Jane A. Winborne
To the Editors:
I donTt know what the rationale behind your Fall REBEL cover was,
but to me the picture of an infant lying on the American flag is symbolic
of a new and better America where the individual right of conscience will
be assured"an America which will protect and profit from such individuals
as C. D. Stout, rather than force them to adhere to such an antiquated
and inhumane system as the draft.
_The term oselective service� could apply to an ideal system for filling
the army with soldiers, but it hardly applies to the system used at present.
The problem the REBEL presented is not a new one, but your optimistic
treatment of it is unique. Good work!
(Name Withheld)
The views expressed in The Rebel solely reflect the views of the student
writers and the editors of The Rebel. They do not necessarily reflect the
my os : : :
: policies of East Carolina University.
just at,
untitled
from observat
snow
Dear John, Chip, and Staff,
Having been present at the campus vigil for conscience last fall, seeing
the REBELTs photographic essay brought back mixed memories.
I wonder how many of those present were aware of the irony of the
situation"I mean, of course, the presence of the counter-demonstrators
who were no doubt sincere in their intention to ostand up for America.�
Your photography expressed my own sentiments very well, with the
stark clarity that only pictures can sometimes convey. I believe with
all my heart that those Americans who deplore the horrors illustrated in
the REBEL are those who are really closest to the ideals cherished by our
founding fathers.
Thank you for saying this so well,
J. Campbell
Dear Sirs:
The fall issue of The Rebel has provoked me to write this letter.
The entire issue was very good both graphically and editorially. However,
I must tell you that the horrible photo-essay on the war in Vietnam was
uncalled for.
First of all, you used student money to publish a magazine that expressed
an opinion that was not that opinion shared by the majority of students
here at ECU. And, I never thought that you would do it. You stooped to
sensationalism with that horrible picture of the napalm-burned baby with
its mother. You know, the Viet Cong use these same type pictures in their
propaganda war against the US.
Again I admire your work in all of the magazine with the exception
of the photo-essay.
Sincerely yours,
Julie Gailliard
ue.
EDITORIAL...
LEGAL MURDER
North CarolinaTs legal system is paradoxical.
She has one of the most progresssive systems of
prisoner rehabilitation in the United States, yet
she retains one of the most barbaric legal murder
systems ever devised by man. North Carolina
feels that she is justified in the murder of men
with mutilated minds"men incensed by the alco-
hol that the state legally sells"men who are
drugged by the drugs that are legally sold in the
state"men who are temporarily enraged beyond
self control.
In this issue of the Rebel we examine capital
punishment in North Carolina. State Attorney
General Robert Morgan provides us with some
humane political ideas on the subject. Paul Green,
a Pulitzer Prize winner and noted North Carolina
playright and author spoke to us about his life-
long work trying to rid the statute books of North
Carolina of the horrible death law.
Logical man laughs at the death penalty. It has
been practiced since the birth of the Republic and
still it remains on the statute books. The courts
have challenged it time and time again. Countries
not half so wise and experienced as we in juris-
prudence have long ago abolished this insane mode
of punishment and prevention.
Christ came and changed the law of Moses that
required oan eye for an eye and a tooth for a
tooth.� He said, oDo unto others as you would
have them do unto you.� Yet Christians will sit
on a jury and hand down a death penalty, tempo-
rarily disregarding this law of Christ and the law
of God that says, oThou shalt not kill.�
Last year there was no legal murder in the
United States. There were no hangings, gassings,
or electrocutions. Maybe this year there will be.
Perhaps not, though. For our executionless year
can be written into law. In North Carolina it is
a possibility that next year the state will not have
provisions for legalized murder. A bill was intro-
duced by three North Carolina legislators on
Monday, Feb. 17, 1969, that would abolish the
death penalty while strengthening the parole sys-
tem. Hopefully, it will pass.
This is not the first time that this law has been
introduced. For years and years the provision has
been introduced by concerned individuals and each
year the movement has gathered support. But the
fact remains that there are human beings at Cen-
tral Prison awaiting their Friday when they will
be taken from their cells and murdered for the
sake of society.
What could be more cruel than this horrible
rotting process in the cell? Are we not punishing
the family of the prisoner more than we are pun-
ishing him? Are we not committing a henious
crime against God as well as man?
How much is one manTs life worth?
Is it worth a dollar or a thousand dollars?
Is it worth an idea?
Is it worth the life of another man?
We must not allow our traditions to be sacro-
sanct when we consider the life of a human being.
Paul Green is a humanitarian.
His writing and his lifeTs work have illustrated this point time and
time again.
For the past forty years, Green has been intensely involved with
capital punishment in North Carolina. He has been instrumental
in the commuting of numerous death sentences, and in one instance
his efforts saved an innocent manTs life.
Green received the Pulitzer Prize for drama in 1927 for ~o~In
AbrahamTs Bosom� and is the author of ~~The Lost Colony� and
numerous plays, folk tales, poems, and movie scripts.
He is the kind of man who makes you believe in life and man-
kind " all over again.
PAUL GREEN
How close do you think we are to abolition
of capital punishment and through what
channels can this be done?
| think weTll have abolition within a year
or two. Often a very terrible crime can hap-
pen and inflame everybody locally but it looks
as if the United States Supreme Court is go-
ing to take precedence in this action in such
a way that the states will be relieved of any
final action. | think that it can be proved that
it is inhuman and contrary to the Constitu-
tion. But unless a big accident happens with-
in a couple years, | think it will be abolished
throughout the whole United States.
Killing is wrong, itTs just wrong.
The subject is one | could talk about for-
ever. ItTs cruel, inhuman, wasteful, tragic,
blind, final, and | think completely evil, dis-
graceful, debauching, and infectious, " has
an evil, infectious nature.
No one, whether a private citizen or a
group of citizens known as the state, has the
right to play God over the life of any human
being, by putting a deliberate end to him"to
write him off as forever unredeemable. In our
hearts we know where there is life, there is
hope.
LetTs not kill our poor and underprivileged
and ignorant and blind and confused and un-
redeemed ones. LetTs educate them. LetTs
train them. Let us help and guide them.
Laws? Of course. Sternness? Of course.
Justice? Yes, wherever possible. Mercy? Yes,
always Mercy.
Why are you against capital punishment?
In quick summation | am against capital
punishment because:
It outrages the human instincts.
Killing begets killing, and a legal murder
is still murder and perhaps the more deprav-
ed because it is legal.
Its example infects the very society it is
supposed to cleanse.
It is unfairly administered"the poor and
ignorant being those who suffer death, while
the rich and politically strong escape.
The lingering and rotting process on Death
Row is extremely cruel. Thomas Jefferson de-
clared, and it is also written into our basic
Bill of Rights and Constitution, that excessive
punishment is a crime, and so in this par-
ticular case the state does commit a crime"
and in so doing ironically becomes a criminal.
One of the men now awaiting execution on
Death Row has been there for ten long years.
He was first sentenced to die in 1959. What
inhuman cruelty we have already visited upon
him!
It denies the possible reformation of the
human being concerned.
It contradicts and makes a mockery of all
religious contention, and violates the law of
Christ"~~Thou shalt not kill.T�T
It is a negative and irrational approach to
the problem of crime and is contrary to the
whole trend of modern social science.
Its cruelty is visited not only on the crim-
inal but on the innocent members of his fam-
ily"his wife, children, his mother, father,
brothers and sisters"and often his love.
It is economically wasteful in dollars and
cents. In capital crimes the suits and counter-
suits, the appeals and denials and hearing,
the wear and tear and upkeep cost the state
many times over what the sure just verdict
of life imprisonment would cost.
What are the arguments for capital
punishment?
The argument goes that capital punish-
ment is necessary for its exemplary value,
necessary as a warning to others. People are
smothered, hanged, guillotined, strangled,
beheaded, shot, drowned, disemboweled and
destroyed in various so-called legal ways in
different parts of the world to intimidate any-
one who might wish to imitate the crime for
which the punishment is meted out. So the
argument goes. Society contends that it does
not take revenge. It merely wants to forestall
further crimes. As Albert Camus says, ~~it
waves the head, as it were, of the actual mur-
derer in the air to warn others from such a
like judgment and damnation.�T But in putting
criminals to death, society"the state,"does
take revenge, does practice the old outmoded
Mosaic law of an eye for an eye, a tooth for
a tooth. We remain customTs cruel slave even
so.
The truth is that we in North Carolina"
and anywhere else in the world where this
terrible evil is practiced"do not really be-
lieve in the exemplary, the intimidating power
of capital punishment. If we did, we would
have all our executions take place in the most
public ways possible"with a big fanfare of
music, barkers, and broadside publicity, de-
picting the actual occurrence through radio,
motion picture and television, giving closeups
of the actual execution. Closeups, yes, of the
struggling, gasping, criminal, aiming the
camera on his pitiful tattoo-beating hands, his
quivering strapped-down legs, all with loud
clear sound effects of his violently beating
heart, of the horrified gasps and suckings for
breath of his bursting lungs"as his body
lunges and jerks, muscular spasm after mus-
cular spasm, this sometimes lasting for more
than a quarter of an hour, lasting until this
strangling heart finally gushes full of clotted
blood and stops, and he, now a nothing, is
one with nothing.
Instinctively and in our souls we are
ashamed of this terrible atrocity we commit.
But we still commit it"either through human
sadism, waywardness or deadly custom. And
so we hide away these executions behind the
gray walls of our prisons with just enough
spectators to fulfill the legal requirements.
We are not ashamed enough. We should be
so ashamed that we stop it all and at once"
and forever.
We instinctively are ashamed of the men
who pull the switch or fasten the noose, kick
the drop, or fire the shot or let loose the hiss-
ing blade. The hangman or executor never
receives any congressional medal, nor does
any city vote him the citizen of the year. And
his children never go about bragging on their
dad and his good work"even though they
are raised on the cruelty of American tele-
vision. The poor fellow is an embarrassment
even to his associates.
Raleigh, for instance, has never given an
award of merit, any certificate of valor, to the
warden or his assistant who pulls the switch
there in the death house and releases the
deadly pellets that send their smoky, snaky
death upward to crawl into the mouth and
nostrils of the stripped and tied-down human
being to bring on his fearfully, silently
screaming and vomiting destruction.
Does capital punishment help prevent
or deter crime?
There is no proof that the death penalty
ever made a single murderer recoil from his
crime when he had made up his mind, when
he had become obsessed by the urge or the
plan to commit that crime. And certainly
crimes of blind emotion and passion are not
affected by it.
The very reverse is true. The repulsive and
brutal example of capital punishment con-
taminates the public morals and helps in-
crease crime rather than to decrease it, helps
the commission of murder and other capital
offenses and not to their omission.
What should be done with the criminal?
The cure for the criminal"whatever cure
there is"lies in scientific work, care, educa-
tion, justice, opportunity, challenge. And even
then in the best of societies we know there
will still be error and wayward debasement
of body and soul. And these we must deal
with"deal with them logically, firmly and
with understanding. But to try to deal with
them in one big smash by practicing this
worst of evils which the criminal himself has
already practiced is simply to encourage the
evil and not to alleviate or cure it.
Many times it has been said that when the
subject of capital punishment came before
the North Carolina legislature many of the
arguments centered around the question of
the money it would cost North Carolina to
keep these people in prison for the remainder
of their lives. What kind of logic do you apply
to that?
Well, thatTs silly! The Russian system of
penology is so far ahead of ours. The whole
point or view in Russia now is rehabilitation.
Not punishment, not vengeance, but rehabil-
itation of the people. . . . | used to write a lot
of motion pictures and | wrote several for
Will Rogers. Will and | used to chew the rag
a lot. One day we were talking and he said,
oYou know, I've never met a son-of-a-bitch"
never have. ITve come pretty near it, but ITve
never met one.TT Which is to say that every-
body, all human beings tend toward the light.
Of course you can be sick and perverted. You
can be sick and irrational and plain evil be-
cause you're sick.
The idea of rehabilitation, it seems to me,
is in line with science, with the actuality of hu-
man beings. So youTve got something to build
on. If thatTs true, and | think it is true, then
everybody can be made useful. He can earn
his way. You donTt have to keep him up there
in a state-supported place. Let him work to
support himself. So that would be my com-
ment there.
Also, take the case of Booker T., named
after Booker T. Washington. Nell Lewis, who
used to work for the Observer, called me and
said, ~~You know Paul, theyTve got a 15-year-
old boy over here condemned to death.� |
said, ~~Well, you canTt do that; you canTt exe-
cute children.TT She said, ~~HeTs been tried,
and sentenced to die. HeTs a child. What do
you do?�
He broke in a woman's hotel room in Ashe-
ville and tried to rape her. Same old story,
rape, rape, rape. | went over to see Governor
Hewitt. Governors have always been very nice
to talk with you, so | talked to him about it.
He said, ~~Paul, | know how you feel about it
but youTre wasting your time. You ought to
go out there and see him. He weighs 185
pounds. He's a great big Nigger.
10
oYea,� | said, ~~but heTs only 15 years old.�
~| know, but heTs a great big fellow. HeTs a
big man. AinTt going to do a thing for him.
HeTs done such a terrible crime.�T
| went to see him again. They were kind
enough to let me in. The Governor pulled out
a pile of letters and read the first one from
the sheriff of Buncombe county.
It said: ~~l hear that there are certain mis-
guided people who are trying to save Booker
T. from the electric chair. | want to tell you,
this is a bad Nigger. HeTs bad. HeTs got a bad
history. If you let him out, you neednTt look
to Buncombe county for a single vote when
you run for the Senate. Governor, this Booker
T. has been a marauder ever since he was a
kid. | remember one night when | was in the
hotel there, hearing a terrible clatter down
below. | opened the window and looked down
and there was a little Nigger boy robbing the
garbage can. Yes sir, out at three oTclock in
the morning robbing the garbage can.�T
Well, Lord if | didnTt preach a sermon then.
| said, ~Jesus Christ, Governor, think of it.
A little boy, hungry, so hungry he wouldnTt
have been there if he wasnTt hungry or some-
thing. If you let this boy die, shame shame!�T
| really preached a sermon. | was so upset.
| could see that it weakened him. To make
a long story short, he did commute the boy.
He didnTt die.
But that was the kind of thinking. Here
was a little boy robbing the garbage can to
show how mean he was. He used the word
~robbingT rather than saying he was in there
looking for something to eat.
How many persons have been executed
in North Carolina?
The first execution in North Carolina
occurred on March 18, 1910. Previous to
that the counties had handled capital cases.
The first gas chamber execution was on
January 24, 1936. To date there have been
172 electrocutions and 190 gassings, a total
of 362 persons since 1910. Two hundred and
eighty-two were colored males, 2 colored fe-
males, 73 white males, no white females, and
5 Indian males, and almost all were poor and
ignorant. The crimes were 280 for first de-
gree murder, 11 for first degree burglary and
71 for rape.
Currently there are four Negroes and one
white man on Death Row in Raleigh. They
have been there a total of some ten years
rotting and awaiting the agony of execution.
Do you think television and motion pictures
have affected the crime rate?
| think this suction, this death wish that
Freud talked about, the downward pull, the
more death and destruction you deal in the
more of a pull there is. You see it on tele-
vision; the gun motif in American life is so
powerful. ItTs just become a pathos until itTs
imitative suction as such.
When | was lecturing in the Orient in many
different countries " Burma, Thailand, Ma-
laya, and so on"!I would meet up with these
little boys with two guns, adopted from the
American motion picture. ThereTs that pull.
In Japanese drama, thereTs the same path-
ology in the use of the sword. You'll notice
that in their motion pictures or even the Noh
drama itTs the sword and we have the gun.
| know in writing motion pictures that if you
have a gun or a pistol as part of the props
that anytime your story gets weak you can
have your fellow pull the gun and start shoot-
ing and your excitement jumps right up. ItTs
an easy way. So this death house, this electric
chair, the gas chamber all have that suction,
that imitative pull. Of course itTs obvious that
somehow in our rational being we donTt be-
lieve it, but in our furious and fermenting sel-
fish motives and emotions we do, because if
we really believed in the deterrent power
theyTd have the executions absolutely public
so that everybody could see it, if it were a
deterrent. But we hide it away behind the
walls.
How did you form your attitude toward
Negroes?
My course hasn't been normal as far as
the Negro is concerned. My relationship has
11
been one in which | have always been sensi-
tive to humanity and inhumanity. ITve seen
cruelty.
Once | was working in a sawmill with a
fellow named Moody. One day he said, ~~We
ainTt going to work this evening.T | said,
~o~Why not, Mr. Moody?�T He said, ~~lTve got to
go to Sanford and help lynch a Nigger.TT That
was when | was 18 years old. He boarded at
our house and that night when he got back
we were eating dinner and | kept looking at
his hands and wondering what he had done.
After supper we sat on the porch and | fin-
ally said, ~~Mr. Moody, what happened?T
oWhat happened, what?TT he said. ~~What
happened at Sanford?�
oOh,�T he said, ~~l got there too damned
late. They had already lynched him. But I'll
tell you what | did do. | put three bullet holes
through his head.�T
| have a little book | just brought out last
week called a ~~Word Book.TT | take up words
and in here is the word barbecue"~~to kill in
the electric chair.�T [This story might explain. ]
oWell, yesterday was Friday the 13th,�
said Mr. Mac, (Mr. Mac was an old friend of
mine) ~~and it was unlucky for some folks
over there on death row. Three men were
put into the electric chair and barbecued one
after the other. Jimmy Fowler from Dunston
saw the first of the executions, and he along
with the other number of legal witnesses was
looking through the wide glass partition as
they brought in Roscoe Adkins, a big strong
white man who had boasted that he would not
call on Jesus at the last, but would just ride
the ~o~black cat off the deep end to Hell.TT They
strapped him into the chair and put the black
cap over his face and there he sat, naked to
the waist and his big, hairy chest showing.
And Jimmy said that when they shot that
juice into him, that 2,000 volts, RoscoeTs
body lunged against the straps like it was
alive. And then, when they shot it to him the
second time, the hair on his chest caught
fire and sizzled away.
At that, Jimmy said he couldnTt take any
more. He turned sick at his stomach and he
heard himself saying, Let me out of here!
Let me out!
And they did. And he lost all of his break-
fast before he could get down the outside
steps.
Then he said he used to believe in capital
punishment. But no more. ~~ItTs the most
brutal killing a man can imagine, and itTs a
crying shame for the state to do it,� he said.
What do you feel about human life,
the individual?
What | believe is that all that is, is. ItTs
foolish to say forever and ever or inside and
outside. All that is, is. We are in all of this.
These dreams that there is God that created
this and that is just nonsense. ItTs part of the
folk culture of people because they want final
causes. When Einstein speaks of all that is as
being a great sphere, you speak of something
being outside the sphere. No, there is no out-
side.
| used to chop cotton and look at the sky
when | got bored and tired and think that
you could go on forever and ever and ever.
But no, thereTs no beginning to all of this. It
just is. ItTs always changing and will always
change. Stars will blow up; other stars will be
formed. People will die, people will change.
Where you and | are sitting, someday the ice
will be 200 feet thick. Shakespeare will be
gone and forgotten. Men will tell the story.
Other creatures with four eyes in the back
of their heads and one in front with five legs
whom women think are beautiful may exist
somewhere. It's all unutterably created.
As the Hindu philosophy states, all that
can be done will be done. All that men can
do, they will do. That means both foolish
and wise.
So here it is. ITm sure that consciousness
is, that weTre all conscious and itTs not just
a dream. So when you look at it, feel the
glory and wonder of it, you say that soon you
die and be in the ground. ThatTs right. YouTre
part of all the eternal, part of the rain, the
12
sun, the flowers, the bees. You belong and
thatTs it. Then you say, ~~Well, for what pur-
pose?TT No purpose, it just is. ~Well, what
about me?TT Well, thatTs different. YouTre all
purpose. ~~What is my purpose?TT My purpose
is to be the best | can. When the story is all
told, which it will never be because itTs always
telling, ~~he was a good man, she was good,
she was kind. In this great darkness and mix-
ture of light and darkness, he was kind.�
Every night Walter Cronkite will say, ~~They
killed 129 of the enemy; the Communists.
What they did was kill boys, boys like you.
But they lump them as enemy, Reds as they
call them. So to answer your question, the
greatest thing is a manTs life. When youTve
taken his life, youTve taken his all.
Wars are the greatest shame. We poor,
pitiful, blind human beings erect monuments.
We donTt want these boys to die in vain. Of
course, theyTve all died in vain. TheyTve died
for the cause.
The young manTs life is the cause, it is the
cause, no better cause. ITm so sure of that.
What do you think the future holds for
the present generation?
| believe that the next age is the beautifi-
cation of the world. Young healthy people,
nice houses, flowers, the abolition of poverty,
the whipping of cancer, and all those wonder-
ful things that ought to be done. We can be-
cause we have the means now. We have these
mechanical slaves. They donTt get tired, they
donTt eat when youTre not working them, and
itTs all fixed. The program is wonderful. A
united world and a great system, a ~~parlia-
ment of manT�T that Tennyson talked about.
PFC, BMJ, WGS
PCE 1 ry
By Gale F. Morgan
And Hornets Wail, By Children Stung
I sit and watch"
Of all possible times and places"
In a prison-yard;
Seeing,
Oh, too clearly now,
How prisons are for sissies:
Not
For little old ladies
Who lean toward pretty pussy-cats,
Hairy, lumpy lovers
And toughness"
Who like their cats are durable;
Who like their cats are tough,
Too, and free"
Who believe in capital punishment
(but only in a clean room),
Who visit prison-houses to see
The Chapel,
The School,
The Kitchen,
The Laundry
and the
Dying Room:
Who look askance at scowling convict-faces,
And who, all aquiver then,
(Twittering among themselves in little, bird-like
voices)
Speak
of deeds foul and fearful,
: Of the responsibilities of freedom,
The rights of the innocent.
What do they know, a-flutter there?
When men from high-arched death-row windows
see
(Should they care to look)
Across the street outside
Where lives a little old lady there
Who has thirty-nine howling, fighting,
Fornicating cats,
And not one bird.
13
OF
COLLARDS,
CONCEPTIONS,
AND
BEANS...
REJOYCEING
14
Once,
Let us say,
Around a time divided by two"
Tho thinly then"
Two early called it a day
(for lack of a better term)
who
Having fed that term of day
On time, cold collards and beans
Knew hunger
And opened up another can of love.
Are you still why?ing, Job?
Alas babbleon
Man is born of boredom
Not of malice.
Come
Someone said
In the word was the beginning
And I
TimeTs last miracle gone stale
Uniquely to become
Unasked became
And having come"
Consuming all of early
And a little late"
Can Truth estate: I know beans,
Having opened a can or three
Some laughs . . . a life or two
After the fashion.
Gentlemen be sated
Unto the age a child is born.
Re-joyce, or,
Hav udrunkthefearthatmade
Mine hat on famous?
Are you still listening, Whitman?
I hear America belching
But neTer you mind, poor Walt,
We'll set our burps to music
And there'll be dancing
To the murder in our streets,
A la mowed ...
Oh, mein Freud, mine void!
Must Reason dig you later?
Pure streams unconsciously embryoid
Swing sullied back to mater
oLove.� lies the kinging void.
To bed to board to suckle consume
Such is the painTs unvoicing
Like T. S. man ITm wasted too
Tho with a bang rejoyceing .. .
Between Master Bayshun and Ma Turity
Lied the womb (wasted basket to a doodlerTs day
Psychatrix for a wounded want)
To pray?
Neigh!
To pill or not to pill
ThatTs the question
(The pope paupered the question?)
(The flock flunked the Flesh?)
(The quiddity queered the quo?)
Whoa!
Now the bastardTs gone too far
(Which one had the phony?)
Deep.
Sleep, Dream Boy,
We have hopeners
Geared to the glut on taste
Andsoonagainnowcomeshogkillingtime.
Meanwhile,
A head in the jungle
Died the nearest thing to Christ.
Wait on! Schweitzer awry!
Tiger! Tiger! burning blight
On our lily souls so right
O, common Al, donTt let it all hang out,
Else we right see...
Once,
(Lettuce pay)
Around a P
A poured Tea"
Tho thickly then"
Mr. Hay, sez Pea, sez heh!
Supermockery is not my line
But some lays is faire, cuz,
Else OlT heafenfarb
Hadnamaidsex
Cheapern
Beans.
15
New Insight
Jesus.
What a waste.
Once
I saw the stars
And could I have but reached them,
Would have torn them from the sky
And hurled them hard into the face of God,
For I was a child
And children have a way of hurting.
Older now,
And looking back,
T do not think
It would have helped matters any.
Blueberry pie might have turned the trick,
But never stars.
Heaven knows
To be star-struck is to Be,
But warm, blueberry pie
Running down the face
For All to see
Surpasses pain,
And might have placed things
In their proper perspective.
And this could be a time
For love and pity.
16
Parvenu (1964)
If I were versed in phrase and ambage strong,
I'd never sing a fuzzy-wuzzy song:
I'd lay Truth on the line where it belongs,
In status-quo above just-so jargon.
Nor give it attribute of aimless worm,
To weave plae patterns through a clod of terms;
ITd paint it proud lest prouder terms affirm
That Truth, forsooth, fell victim to its germs.
Phrom Phreudian phrase my phancy phairly phlies,
I am the bull the china shops despise:
And though ITm crude, and though TTll win no
prize,
Yet, grant me this: I do have poet-eyes.
But I must needs refrain from fratricide,
Nor point a poison pen at poet-pride:
For since I know for sure thatTs suicide,
I guess I'll go along just for the ride...
Hey diddle-diddle
A cat on a griddle
In a fog of immutable myths,
Hacks at the air
With clause debonair
And amazingly mutable scythes.
Deferment
One of these days
These foolish games we play:
This hide-and-see!x with words
And gods absurd
Will pass away.
We'll sing no lays
Of little lost boyhood
To lost and little boys
Who kill with toys
And rancored naes.
We'll come of age
To walk this earth like men,
And pity those who say,
oOne of these days,�
One of these days.
17
A NARRATION
PAUL GREEN
When I was a little kid, my best friend was a
Negro boy. We grew up together on a farm. I
started out with Negroes. As I came along I saw
more and more of this capital punishment applied
to Negroes. ItTs been mainly Negro people that
have suffered the terrible punishment, I guess
my natural sympathy and knowledge lie with the
Negroes.
This little boy that grew up on the farm, I met
when I was four years old and I have a little story
about him.
This little fellow always carried a Barlowe knife.
I still carry one in memory of this fellow. We just
played. He taught me how to chew tobacco. He
was the smartest little fellow I ever saw. As we
grew up he taught me how to put dogwood berries
up my nose and hold one side and pop them
out in a snort. And he taught me all kinds of
things, how to yoke little pigs. We used to catch
little pigs, put a yoke around them, run these pigs
and watch them turn somersaults.
One day he said, oYou canTt swim, can you?� I
said, oNo, I canTt swim.� He said, oI'll teach you
how to swim. We'll catch us a fish and get that
swimmer. (He called it a swimmer, that little
inflated sack inside a fish.) You get one of them
and you swallow it and you can swim like a fish.�
And so we caught us a little fish, cut him open,
and there was this little tiny sack. So I stuck it
18
in my mouth, and ran to the branch right there
and took a swallow of water and swallowed the
darn thing. He said, oGet off your clothes and
hop in there. Now you can swim.�
So I did and I went to the bottom just like a
rock. And ITd have drowned, I reckon, if he hadnTt
pulled me out of there. And he laughed up and
down, whooped and hollered. He said, oI. was just
fooling you cause thatTs the way a man fooled me.�
He was so smart and I loved him. I used to tell
my mother and father, oITm going to live with
Rassie.� Rassie was his name. He was little Eras-
tus and they called him Rassie. He lived in a
tenant house on my fatherTs farm.
So finally they said, oAll right, go down there
and live with Rassie.� I went over to RassieTs.
When suppertime came Old Zelda, the big mother,
put us around the table and poured out some
molasses and got out some bread. I was a little
tiny fellow then. Boy, the flies were humming
and the smell was bad. Gosh, ITd been getting
more and more lonesome and all of a sudden I
knew I was going to cry. Zelda said, oI know
whatTs the matter with him; he wants his Mam-
my.�
Rassie came around and hugged me and said,
oDonTt cry.� But I was just so lonesome.
The father, Will, took me home. And then they
all laughed at me.
oi
t,
cif !
a
}
One day Rassie and I were working and he cut
his finger with his Barlowe knife. I was a teeny
little fellow. His blood ran out red and I said,
oWhy look at your blood!� He said, oIt donTt
hurt,� and wrapped a leaf around it. I said, oYes,
but itTs red.�
He looked at me astonished and said, oSure
itTs red.� Then he caught on, looked at me and
said, oCause youTre white and ITm black you
thought my blood would be black.�
If it had been black blood I guess I would have
been surprised too. Somehow it just didnTt seem
right that he should have red blood like me.
I learned a lesson that day. The blood of all
human beings is red . . . the same. I never forgot
it. That little fellow already knew it. He already
knew of the brotherhood of man.
But then he caught typhoid fever, Rassie did.
My sister went down and waited on him and they
wouldnTt let me go. Every day I would say, oHow
is Rassie?� She would say, oAh, heTs all right.
You stay away from there, the doctor said.�
So one day I went down there anyhow. When
I got near the house I saw the doctorTs horse tied
there. When I got up to the house I heard this
moaning. I peeked in and Will and Zelda, the
two parents were down in the floor bowing their
heads up and down saying oOh Lord! Oh Lord!�
Over in the bed I could see some turning figures
with wild, delirious eyes. There were the two other
sons, Preacher and Hansen, they called them. They
had typhoid fever too and they were delirious.
The doctor was there.
I kept looking for Rassie. My sister was in there
and she came in from the lean-to with a pan of
water and a little rag. She went over in the corner
and I looked over in the corner and saw Rassie
lying on the floor. I called and he was asleep. I
thought he was asleep. She said, oGo on home, I
tell you.� (It was my older half-sister. SheTs sort
of a nurse.) I said, oITve come to see how Rassie
Tag
oHe ainTt no-how,� she said, oHe ainTt no-how.�
That scared me. The doctor looked down and
said, oLet him come in. Let him die. Let Tem all
die.� He was really tired. In those days typhoid
fever was like a scourge among the people. So I
crept into the room and there was Rassie lying
with his head on a little pillow and an old skirt
over him. He was dead, dead as a door nail. I
ZL
Ta Aor,
z oy ALE 2
rer ee
5 oy,
+a 4
~ia
Wb Mf, FEE
MMU Coo
0
saw this purging stuff on his lips and I yelled,
oRassie!�
My sister knelt down beside me and said, oYea,
RassieTs dead. He died this morning.� Boy, did I
have a fit. She ripped the garment off of him and
there he lay, his little stomach all puffed up. She
was washing him. She tore the rag in two, handed
me a piece, and I knelt down and we both washed
him.
Rassie had hurt his toe running after pigs. My
sister got up and left me to wash him privately
and I'll never forget how I looked at that toe
where he had hurt it. ItTs funny, I didnTt think
about it until later but I didnTt wash his toe cause
I didnTt want to hurt him.
Then she came in with a white nightgown in her
arm. She unrolled it and it was my little night
gown. She said, oI reckon you donTt mind. I
brought it down here to put on him.� I said, oNo,
I donTt mind.� Then we put it on him and she
reached up on the mantel and said, oHereTs a Bar-
lowe knife. (See, he and I used this Barlowe knife
for cutting yokes and things that we had). He
rared up this morning and before he died he said
he wanted you to have his knife. She said, oI
reckon thatTs a good swap; he gets the night shirt
. . and you get the knife.�
Now this sounds like a lie but itTs the truth.
Where are we going to bury Rassie?
Old Will, the father, came down and said. oMr.
Billy (my fatherTs name was Billy) , you just bury
him where you please. I ainTt got no heart to do
nothing.�
Sometimes they would find a great big cedar
tree and start burying people. My father looked
up in the field. We had a cedar tree up there and
my father said, oHow about burying him up
there?� Will said, oAnywhere you please.�
So my daddy and I went home and we made
his coffin out of pine planks. I got some cotton to
put his head on. We toted his little coffin down
to his place, put Rassie in it, and took him up
there and buried him.
I said to my father, oAinTt you going to say
something over Rassie, sing a song, or something?�
My father was sort of embarrassed and recited
oThe Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Rest
in peace, Rassie.� Then I put a little board up
to his head and we left him.
WM MUU ag
I walk through the woods, and I walk through the hills,
And I ask you to tell me if you can"
You know what a tree is, you know what a rock is,
But what is the soul of man?
You know what the moon and stars may be
And the width of the salt sea span,
But where is the tongue that can answer me this"
What is the soul of man?
I turn to the east and I turn to the west,
And they tell how the world began"
You know what a day is, you know what a year is,
But what is the soul of man?
I searched the broad earth, I begged the fair sky,
I questioned the rivers that ran,
But never a whisper to tell that they knew
Aught of the soul of man.
I bowed down at evening, I bowed low at morning,
I prayed for some proof of GodTs plan"
When lo, the glad answer"the Word with its Light!"
Love is the soul of man.
by Paul Green
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WhatTs it like to be caged for life
to die when the pellets fall
a naked bulb
stares down from space
What's it like to sleep one last night
to be well rested for the dawn
You wonTt sleep well
In your cold stone cell
thereTve been better nights
and better times
in better places
not quite so cold and damp
The timeTs acoming
Use what youTve got
Left
the bars are nice
thin sculptured steel
made in Bethlehem Pennsylvania
You've one last meal
ItTll make a feast
But your mouth will be too dry
itTs a long corridor
time
John Fulton
ies
ae
"
SEY ye WE A
5
"
SS ere ers es
ROBERT MORGAN
Robert Morgan, chairman of the East Caro-
lina University Board of Trustees and newly
elected State Attorney General is a dynamic
young leader.
Here Morgan espouses perhaps the most
liberal executive opinion on capital punish-
ment of any recent North Carolina official.
27
The theme of the magazine this time is
capital punishment and most of our ques-
tions will be centered around this subject.
What will be the effect of the Fourth District
Court of AppealTs decision on the North Caro-
lina death law?
That is on appeal to the Supreme Court at
the present time, but | suspect that as long
as this decision stands, it will have the effect
of abolishing capital punishment in North
Carolina unless the Legislature clarifies it.
Is it true that the State of North Carolina
must spend an enormous amount of money
keeping a man in prison for life?
Well, yes, it is very expensive to keep any-
one in prison and certainly, to keep a man
in prison for life.
This is one of the difficulties in doing away
with capital punishment. | think that the gen-
eral public would say that it would be fine to
abolish capital punishment if you could as-
sure them that once a man has been con-
victed of a capital crime, he would be con-
fined for the rest of his life. If you stop and
think about it, you will see just how imprac-
tical that could be. If you have a man in
prison with no hope of parole or being re-
leased, then this man is certainly going to be
incorrigible and he would be subject to kill
in prison or anything else.
The general feeling of the penal officials
is that if you have to abolish capital punish-
ment and in doing so you have to say that he
is not entitled to parole, then donTt abolish
it. For example, Mr. Randolph, one of the
most progressive directors of the state prison
"""
ee
system we have ever had, is very much in
favor of the abolition of capital punishment.
But, he says that we must not abolish it if we
must remove all hopes of parole.
DonTt you think that the individual him-
self"if he had a choice of being imprisoned
without parole or being killed"would rather
live in a state of confinement than die?
At present, there is no such thing as a
man being in prison without chance of parole.
Our law says that when a man has served
one fourth of his sentence, he is eligible for
parole. And this is one of the common com-
plaints of those who are in favor of capital
punishment. They say, ~~Well, a man is con-
victed for life and then after ten years he
can be back in the community and even com-
mit the same crime again.�
A man goes on to prison, and if it is his
first offense (as it is in the case of so many
murderers) and if he conducts himself pro-
perly, there is a very good chance that he
will be paroled. And this is the bone of con-
tention. The question is ~~If you are going to
do away with capital punishment, why not fix
it so that the man will never be eligible for
parole?TT Now | am opposed to that, and |
think that anyone who understands the sys-
tem would be opposed to it.
Is there any case on record in North Caro-
lina of a man who has been paroled of a
capital crime and then commits a second
offense?
Yes, | canTt name you the specific case,
but there are cases on record in which this
has happened.
When I looked at the statistics, | found
that there were 282 Negroes executed and
only 73 whites. Proportionately, Negroes are
no more prone to crime than are whites. So,
it looks as though a personTs skin or social
prominence " or skilled counsel " could be
the thing that has kept many whites from
execution.
Well, of course there may be some truth
to your contention, although | wouldnTt say
it were absolutely true. For instance, there
28
has been a white man executed, from John-
ston County, just within my lifetime, from a
very prominent family"a very wealthy fam-
ily. There are tales today that he may not
have been gassed and maybe he is alive
somewhere else.
ItTs true the crime rate has been higher
percentage-wise with the black people. But
| think that in times past it could have result-
ed from lack of adequate counsel, although
as far as | know, in this state it has always
been true that a man charged with a capital
crime was provided with counsel. Now | think
that this question has been removed because
now the courts will not only look into the fact
of whether or not he had counsel but whether
that counsel is competent and experienced.
Often in North Carolina a man has gotten
a reprieve just a few days before his execu-
tion date. In the case of Mason Wellman,
this reprieve made it possible to prove his
innocence. In California there was a case in
which an innocent man was executed because
his lawyer was unable to reach the Governor
on the day of execution. | feel that to abolish
capital punishment altogether would be pre-
ferable to letting one single innocent man die.
What do you think about the risk of killing
innocent men?
Well, ITm not going to argue with you on
that. In fact, you might as well know in the
beginning, basically, | am opposed to capital
punishment. | would never sit on a jury to
try a man for his life. At one time in my life,
| was employed as private prosecutor to
prosecute a man for his life who had com-
mitted a horrible crime. We asked the jury
to take his life, and they voted to do so. But,
he appealed it, and | would have to say that
during the time he was sentenced to death
until the time that the Supreme Court revers-
ed it, that it gave me a great deal of concern.
When they came back for the second trial |
refused to participate in it. | just was not go-
ing to ask that jury . . . any jury, to take the
manTs life.
Would you explain the justification used by
the Fourth District Court of Appeals in nulli-
fying the death law in North Carolina?
Under the present law, if a man may be
charged with a capital crime of premeditated
murder, arson, rape, or first degree burglary,
and if he is convicted by a jury the penalty is
the death penalty, unless the jury recom-
mends life imprisonment. Now that part is
not under question at all. But, there is an-
other statute which was enacted for humani-
tarian purposes which says that if a man will
plead guilty to a capital crime and if the
state is willing to accept this plea, then he
can escape the death penalty and get life
imprisonment.
Now what the circuit court said was that
this puts a premium on a manTs pleading .
guilty to a crime he might not be guilty of in
order to avoid the risk of the death penalty.
This will be the point that will be taken to the
Supreme Court in Washington. Now the fault
that | find with this ruling is that the man in
the case involved did not plead guilty to first
degree murder. He pleaded guilty to second
29
degree murder. Therefore, that is why | say
that this is not up to this court to decide. It
is like trying you for driving drunk and the
courts suddenly decide that the speeding
statute is unconstitutional.
Do you think that the state ~~stacks the
cards� against the prisoner when they ask
all prospective jurors if they believe in cap-
ital punishment before they are allowed to
sit on the jury in a capital case? If they answer
that they are opposed, then they cannot
serve.
| do not think that the mere act of asking
the question makes it unconstitutional. But,
just to excuse him from the jury ~solely be-
cause of that does deprive him of his con-
stitutional rights. It does not make any differ-
ence what the jurorTs personal belief is. The
question is, notwithstanding your personal
beliefs, can you listen to the evidence and
render a verdict based on the evidence and
in keeping with the law as the judge instructs
you? So, | feel that a jurorTs personal belief
has no bearing on the case at all.
| believe that some people are asking for
a test case in light of the ~~cruel or unusual
punishment� clause in the United States Con-
stitution. Do you see an indication of this be-
ing sustained by the court?
| doubt that it would. | know that times
have changed and that the outlook of the
people has changed, but at the same time,
as much as it has been used throughout our
history | doubt that the courts would say that
it is cruel or unusual. Necessarily, that is not
my personal opinion, but it is what | feel that
the courts would decide.
In oThe Idiot,� by Dostoevsky, the author
says that to kill for murder is a punishment
incomparably worse than the crime itself.
Would you comment here?
What he is really saying is the same thing
that Christ said when he changed MosesT
law of ~~an eye for an eye and a tooth for a
tooth.T It really just comes back to the ques-
tion, ~~Do you believe in capital punishment?�
And as | have said before, | have serious,
serious doubts about the advisability of it.
One serious gripe with capital punishment
is the inhumane cruelty of leaving a man on
death row while waiting for execution or ap-
peals. Marion Frank Crawford, a Negro who
has been sentenced to die for rape has been
on death row since 1959. This just seems to
be unjustifiably inhumane.
Well, | think that this would be unbearable
too, but you have to understand the point of
view of those who do this. In their eyes, he
has been convicted by a jury of a terrible
crime and until his conviction is overturned
or upset, in the eyes of the law, he has been
convicted. There is generally a time lapse of
years between the time all of the appeals
have been exhausted to when he is executed.
| feel that it would be a horrible wait.
Do you feel that an abolition law will come
before the Legislature this year?
lam sure it will. | feel that | ought to make
it clear, now, that | am speaking from a posi-
tion | have never spoken from before. Re-
gardless of my personal views, my job is to
uphold the laws of the state of North Carolina
and to present the arguments that tend to
support the laws of the state regardless of
what my personal views may be. | have never
been in that position before, since | have
always been in the Legislature where | could
say what | wanted to and when | wanted to.
But, | cannot do that anymore.
With all of the marvelous work being done
in the state prisons with rehabilitation of
prisoners, do you not think that these meth-
ods could do just as much good for the
murderer as they have done for a person
who is returned to society after having served
a term for, say, assault with intent to kill?
The question here is, and it is a difficult
One, when are you going to say that a man
has been rehabilitated? So many of the re-
leased prisoners will, after they are released,
violate the laws again. If the parole board
takes the responsibility of releasing a mur-
derer and he commits a capital crime again,
the public will say ~We told you so.T They
30
have a most difficult job.
Do you think that capital punishment has
seen its day in that it will be ended in fact if
not by law?
| suspect that is true. | think that you can
safely say that capital punishment is, as a
practical matter, on the way out.
What is happening in the North Carolina
Prison System now regarding the rehabilita-
tion of prisoners with terms of life imprison-
ment?
| canTt tell you about the particular ques-
tion on those who are awaiting the death
penalty, but | can say that North Carolina
is aS progressive in its prison system and
its work with rehabilitation of prisoners as
any state or country that | know of.
Some time ago, | was appointed to defend
a young Canadian for murder, in my county.
He came from a rather well-known family in
Ontario. They sent a top reporter down, who
spent two weeks doing background work in
North Carolina. | took him through the Youth
Center in Lillington, where he saw grown men
and young boys in one classroom doing junior
college work. He was just simply amazed. He
said that this was where North Carolina was
light years ahead of Ontario in our prison
system. Now, we havenTt done all that we
ought to do, but we are doing a great deal,
and! say that we have made great bounds
forward.
Our prison system in North Carolina is do-
ing a tremendous job in rehabilitation now.
| Know when you talk about rehabilitation in
prisons that you are subject to incur the
wrath of people who say that we are coddling
prisoners. Let me make it clear, there are a
lot of tough ones that you canTt really do
much toward rehabilitating. But at the same
time, when you remember that over ninety
percent of them will eventually come back
and live in the midst of our society, purely
from a selfish point of view, it behooves us to
do what we can for them so that they can be-
come useful citizens when they come back
and live in our midst.
PFC, CHN, RRK, RBR
REVIEWS
(Soul on Ice by Eldridge Cleaver, New York: Mc-
Graw-Hill Book Company, 1968, 210 pp. $3.97)
The voice is the voice of the jungle raised in
carnal blackness. The language of the streets
breaks through like clots of garbage or the drop-
pings of rats in tenement hallways. Obscenity?
No, obscenity is a word for the inflicters of the
pain, not the victims. In other manuscripts such
language might mar the eloquence of the prose,
but in the context of suffering it goes a long way
to describe the anger and the pain.
Autobiography is often a tedious medium, filled
with self-satisfying introspection. Not so with
Cleaver. His prose is clear and concise; his pace is
terrifying. He opushes himself forward like a
train.� There are no pretensions. Eldridge Cleaver
31
is a convicted rapist serving a fourteen-year sen-
tence; he is writing from prison. He makes no
attempt to hide his situation or justify it; his sole
purpose is to expose the forces that tormented him,
to catalogue them in writing so that he can face
his devils and exorcise them.
Soul on Ice emerges as the chronicle of the
struggle, not only CleaverTs struggle but also the
struggle of the black race, to overcome the forces
of oppression that limit the Black manTs role in
the American dream to the menial and the mean-
ingless.
The forces that drove Cleaver to crime, the
frustration and the fears, are by-products of a sys-
tem of racial domination which places the white
above the black in a Master-slave relationship
where the white man becomes the oOmnipotent
Administrator� and the black man becomes oSu-
permasculine Menial,� renowned for his prowess in
the athletic arena but relegated to a position of
servitude to the obrain power� of his racial supe-
rior. Cleaver develops this view of AmericaTs racial
caste system to its most far-reaching consequences,
exposing the sexual nature of racial conflict
brought about by the white manTs fear of impo-
tence when faced with the black manTs over-
whelming physical superiority. The white manTs
elevation and overprotection of the white female
is just one evidence of his fear that the black man
will replace him in the bedroom.
The continued efforts of the white community
to emasculate the Black man or subject him to
ridicule via oAmos-and-Andy� type distortions
of ghetto life are the objects of CleaverTs rage. In
the jungle of the ghetto he struck back at his
frustrations:
oT became a rapist. To refine my technique
and modus operandi, I started out by prac-
ticing on the black girls in the ghetto"in
the black ghetto where dark and vicious deeds
appear not as aberrations or deviations from
the norm, but as part of the sufficiency of the
Evil of a day"and when I considered myself
smooth enough, I crossed the tracks and
sought out white prey. I did this consciously,
deliberately, willfully, methodically"though
looking back I see that I was in a frantic,
wild, and completely abandoned frame of
mind.�
He committed rape. He was caught, tried,
judged guilty, and imprisoned. But the story did
not stop here as it does for so many Black men.
The story began in prison proceeding through the
record of CleaverTs subsequent rehabilitation.
Cleaver was returned to society and took an active
role in the Black Panther Party until his parole
was revoked. Today, he is a fugitive. Some say a
fugitive from justice; others say a fugitive from
political prosecution.
At any rate, his words remain; the record of his
struggle on behalf of the Black man remains.
Soul on Ice is a warning and a promise:
We shall have our manhood. We shall have
it or the earth will be leveled by our attempts
to gain it.
Robert McDowell
The Quiet Vengeance of Words " poems
(the quiet vengeance of words. by Antoni Gro-
nowicz, 32 pp. The Polish Institute of Arts and
Sciences in America, Inc.)
Written in the modern, apparently unprin-
cipled style which affects neither capital letters
nor punctuation, this collection of poems reprint-
ed from the Winter 1968 issue of The Polish Re-
view is the sort of slim volume one is tempted to
throw down after a first, quick glance. One of the
hidden benefits of being a reviewer, however, is
that he has to take a second look, and thus some-
times happily discovers unexpected pleasures in
reading.
At second glance, the poems which seem to
zigzag aimlessly across the page sometimes create
stark linear images on the page. But the imagery
within the poems is more pleasing. In his poem
oevening,� for example, Mr. Gronowicz describes
the onset of evening as a deer leaping:
oout of mysterious shades
i come
scattering
sunlight...�
The sunset he personifies as being the sun god
who becomes bored with the ecstasy of day and
owastes the last
armful of his
colored plumes
and mound
by
mound
lazily
climbs
down 3. i"
These are provocative images, and fresh. Unfor-
tunately, his linear imagery is neither:
onight is a black skull
split by importunate stars
scanty and vain...�
One does not think of the night sky as having
the characteristics of a skull, nor of stars as being
oimportunate.� Nor can one picture this:
obeauty
holds us
to
her breast
before
a
rainbowed
miracle...
The range of subject matter in the poems is
reasonably varied, but the poet favors the com-
ings and goings of day, and topics of national inter-
est. He builds a concept of war which expresses
in a few tense words the most tragic aspect of
manTs battle against man:
ocorpses
corpses
corpses
devils and saints piled dense .. .
Properly, devils and saints should be separated,
but war upsets manTs neat categorizing.
While one would find it difficult to become
enthused about Mr. GronowiczTs poetry, it certain-
ly provides some quiet pleasure through his mo-
ments of perception.
�
"Annette MacRae
Tae es Oe we, ee ee weergeuel
(They, by Marya Mannes. Doubleday, 1968.
$4.95)
I donTt know which came first, the movie or
the book, but it doesnTt matter. ItTs the theme
that counts, and it is a theme which is becoming
more and more popular"what the future holds is
anybodyTs guess. They, by Marya Mannes, is
slightly reminiscent of OrwellTs 1984, a relatively
recent book which prompted cynics to begin
learning Newspeak in order to have a head start
by the time The Year arrived. But it is even more
reminiscent of a movie I saw during the summer
called Wild in the Streets, in which fourteen-year-
olds obtain the right to vote and twenty-three-
year-old radical Max Frost is elected President of
the United States. Since the motto of Frost and
his otroops� is oDonTt trust anybody over 30,� the
only logical course of events is to herd all of the
old fogeys into buses, dress them out in flowing
gowns a la Maharishi Yogi, sack Tem out on LSD,
and let them live happily ever after on communal
farms.
I was reminded of the movie (which I thought
was rather asinine) while I was reading They, and
I thought that the ooldies� in both instances were
given a raw deal, but at least in the movie they
were given ample opportunity for travel, what
with LSDTs being pumped into their drinking sup-
ply. In They, five people who have passed the cut-
33
off point of fruitful existence, the age of 60
(Mannes is a bit more lenient with regard to age
than Max Frost), are together in an isolated
beach house. We see no action taking place in this
short novel, but by the reminiscences of the people
several points become evident.
Upon reaching the age of 60, persons are isolated
from the rest of the world"the useful faction"
and are given the necessities of life (food, shelter,
clothing, and computerized medical care). They
are allowed to continue in the do-nothing environ-
ment until the age of 65, at which time they are
given a pill and die a peaceful death. Euthanasia is
the name of the game, and youth takes the stakes.
All this playing the Fates is done by the young,
who are running the country, and for whom the
old bit about the sagacity of the aged has become
the new bit about the senility of the sages.
They is pathetic at times"when the oldsters
talk about the productive lives they led in the
world of the sixties, for example"even pathetic to
~the point of being sentimental. They is a stimulat-
ing book and it reaffirms the aphorism that old
age is a time of loneliness. It fails, however, to
make one skeptical to its contents ever becoming
reality. But, who knows what the future holds?
We used to see heart transplants only on the grade
oB� Saturday morning early show.
"Patsy Wofford
POETRY
wandering through rows
of daffodils
speaking in a light way
saying so much and nobody
guesses it
where the wind blowing still
makes you feel it
and the wind blowing still
makes you make it
then on into a notpath-known
where vines and bush all
overgrown
sound asleep
while the wanderer weaves
patterns
beneath his feet
and Our notpath-known accepts
defeat
"for now"
34
Spence
I am fury ridden.
Words roll and boil and pitch
Within me.
Nameless obsessions trouble my soul"
Unshaped thoughts,
Uncolored images.
I dare; I drive, I taunt and curse,
But the anger angers me
Till I am spent.
IT burn.
Not ocean breeze
Nor GreenlandTs ice
Can cool my heartTs desire.
T want.
Nor all the art
Of human mind
Can take away the fire.
The sculptor cut and shaped and molded,
Happily working his bid for fame.
Whistling, singing the plastic tune,
He pushed and pulled and measuring firmly,
Shaped on features, turns of limb,
Fashioning the form of man"
Who breathed in Life
And promptly walked away.
SCHISM
36
DARK RIDER
HEART'S DESIRE
MAN CREATES
There is an age in which
Flesh grieves,
And wonders what ails
The spirit.
There is a full eternity while
Past dies,
Then future, like the phoenix,
Rises
Annette Mac Rae
the sacrifice
the big man
To this ever loathing world,
Nay do I belong,
Nor do I wish to belong.
To stand back, to know;
Seeing in this patch of blue,
What is, but shouldnTt be:
Seeing all wrongs, save those of my own:
Knowing the course of every man
Except the direction I face;
Knowing not the way I go, only that I go;
I move on in my aimed way slowly,
On one foot following the other,
Each day I move, closer I fair .
To what someday will be me.
John L. Sherman
37
Holy of holies,
O Exalted,
O Most Glorious,
We bow before thy Majesty.
Have mercy on us,
We sacrificed our best,
We passed the bloody test,
Our love for you is written
In blood;
We always kill the good.
Claire Pittman
Let all who love stand and tell the man and tell
him why. A
Box of rotten, juice dripping, stinking lives
All thrown in a heap and allowed to wiggle and
squirm until
They think they are satisfied, knowing all the
time that they
Are lying to themselves, to their fellows, and to the
Big man gazing down through the barrel top
Rod Ketner
my slow course
Just After Winter
Methodized miracles happen.
Lovers are seeds
that sown, shed coverings and sprout.
Rain swells rivers, muds banks.
Caramel slush sucks at shoes.
Intuitive trippers wing home.
Clouds pillow the sky to rain, shade or show.
Pulsars from this particular planet
baffle the thinkers .. .
Enlighten the fools.
Linda Faye Bryant
ItTs over now,
That which is done
Given
To no one
But taken from me.
That part is over.
I toss them back and forth
In the palm of my heart
One weighs heavier
Then
The other
One tosses me
Back and forth
T decide
Over again.
Jennifer Salinger
39
-But starlight and moonbeams canTt be caught
From Observations
How little we value our lives, Not knowing
The precious possession they are, Till going.
I long for things on a distant shore,
And not obtaining desire all the more.
I want to sift starlight through my hand
The way I play with grains of sand.
>
And I have not the deed, only the thought.
Jean Brown
SNOW
Snow is a leveler of forms,
A rounder of sharp angles,
A smoother of jagged edges
Like a carpenterTs plane in the great hand of a
working God.
Snow is a straightener of wrinkles,
A balancer of curves,
Like the square rough hand of an old mother
who makes up a bed, laughing,
and strokes the bedspread smooth.
Snow is a hider of red dust,
A coverer of yesterdayTs phlegm,
A bandage for bleeding sores,
A humped old peddler who sells the garbage a
white hat
to wear in the morning.
II
The wet snow is like a woman: a maker
of waiting,
A demander of patience"
The cool snow will lie down
and sleep long
And say, I donTt care; why should you?
The snow of the morning tosses its head
And takes a never-mind of the new
plaid suit,
CouldnTt care less for the gray limp
work-shirt
full of last yearTs holes and this
weekTs dirt.
The snow of the evening is a fighter,
A giant wrestler who throws us down
And keeps us there and says:
Damn you, damn you, while ITve
got you down, why donTt you think
a minute? Why donTt you stop a
minute?
Ill
The snow of a Sunday is an evener of
grudges:
Black man and white man together
spin useless wheels in frozen cars;
Snow slithers into the boots of the
heathen and the faithful;
Snow melts on the masterTs floor as
well as the slaveTs;
Snow is as bluely cold to the president
of the Garden Club
as it is to the saggy-breasted old
nigger who sweeps the floor at half-
past six.
Snow will sit and wait:
It is the reminder that God can hamper our great
speed.
Chip Callaway
40
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