April 15, 2021; Checks and Balances

Can a man die of oxygen deprivation if there’s a strong, heavy knee placed on his neck for 9 (oh, just give and take, the killings haven’t even slowed down yet, homeys) minutes? Or must we dig for alternative causes like all the ills that black folks have been heir to and victim-blamed for throughout these last great American centuries—drugs, poor self-care, poverty, despair, lack of faith in the SYSTEM and the MAN, systemic denigration [note the intended pun! The word means ‘to blacken’!] and devaluation—till we come up with something resembling business as usual.

Eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow you may be in Utah

I wandered, literally, up and down the bruited and brutal ‘Oregon Trail’ which so many nineteenth-century Americans eager (or greedy) for a ‘better life,’ for the ‘American Dream’ set out on, in unbelievably rickety wagons, with children, wives, cattle, guns, food, elders (most in small quantities, except sometimes children) for the Pacific West and Northwest.

AWWW, it’s a Happy Birthday

Dear Friends and Readers, Near and Far, please join me for the Happy Birthday of Love’s Garden You’re invited for the VIRTUAL book launch and happy birthday of Love’s Garden, An epic family saga of war, love, friendship, and sacrifice in twentieth-century India during its fight against British rule… TANTARAAAHH!! October 27, 2020 Find Love’s Garden at Amazon: and mark your calendars for these free, virtual, various and, I’d claim, virtuous events: Reading at the KGB Bar, New York City, Nov 15, 2020, 7-9 PM Book Launch at Brazos Bookstore, Houston, TX, Oct 27, 2020, 7–8 PM Reviewers hail it…

Race and America; Political Blackness 2

I Can’t Breathe

Autobiography of Political Blackness

This series will be about my connection as a South Asian-American to Political Blackness, a term now in use to describe solidarity across races.