{"id":24379,"date":"2020-10-15T11:25:31","date_gmt":"2020-10-15T18:25:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/?p=24379"},"modified":"2021-10-15T03:54:19","modified_gmt":"2021-10-15T10:54:19","slug":"magical-brown-bags-that-never-emptied","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/?p=24379","title":{"rendered":"Magical Brown Bags that Never Emptied"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n
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\"\"<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Magical Brown Bags that Never Emptied<\/strong><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Let me sing to you about magical, brown, road lunch bags that never seemed to empty.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Of James Brown silencing the riots in the streets
Of an attorney general who actually reconsidered his initial strident positions<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Of AM radio
And Black radio stations nationwide\u00a0
Always found at the very top and bottom of the car radio dial<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Of Nina Simone singing songs I wouldn\u2019t understand until right now<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Of a time when Kentucky fried chicken was one of the only restaurants that would serve everybody on the road
And they were only found in the South
(although the Colonel definitely stole the recipe)\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Of a time when there were only two McDonald locations in our area<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

And families went to Drive in movie theaters\u00a0
Sometimes hiding the little ones in the back under blankets.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

We found ways to live and love through anything and everything<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I wanted to write a love poem today<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

About when we \u2014 my sister and I \u2014 were little\u00a0
And we had to travel down South\u00a0
By car\u00a0
By train
Or, by The Greyhound Bus\u00a0
as Southern people use to say<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

We always made special \u201cTrip Food\u201d.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Grandma used to make us huge bag lunches.\u00a0
You don\u2019t need a Green Book when you\u2019ve got a bag lunch
She always packed them in huge brown paper grocery store bags
And this is where \u201csaving the paper bags\u201d comes from<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Black people have always recycled<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Before a big trip, Grandma would fry several chickens and put them into doubled brown paper bags
Along with loaves of gummy Wonder Bread in wax paper<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Mom always liked the wings<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

My little sister would go crazy if she didn\u2019t get the drumstick
But this was cured when it was discovered \u2014 quite by accident
That she was a huge fan of the sliced ham and cheese sandwiches
Neatly wrapped in wax paper bags
And suddenly, I could eat as many drumsticks as I wanted<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

People ask me why I don\u2019t write other types of poems
Poems about ecstasy\u00a0
Or transcendence
Or peace<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

But that is all\u00a0I write about<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The ecstasy of naming daemons\u00a0
The transcendence of crystallizing my thoughts
And the peace that allows me to stare at the face of Gorgans again and again
Without turning into stone<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

I can write love poems, too<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

This is a love poem to Sonia Sanchez who asked me to find my fire and send it into the future<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

To Nina Simone singing God, God, God, with Nubian passion<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

To Gil Scott Heron who said we\u2019ve got to do something to save the children
This is a love song to my and my sister\u2019s yester-selves
I say that\u00a0
The inner child can never be healed\u00a0
But only hugged
And this is the best I can do<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

To big Southern women who urged us to \u201cStay together children\u201c
And the laundry dancers in galvanized steel tubs\u00a0
Who always made sure that we were clean.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

This is a love poem
As they all are.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

But most importantly this is a poem dedicated to greasy brown paper bags\u00a0
with huge oily spots in them\u00a0
that always seemed full\u00a0
And everything that they symbolized<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The comfortable freedom of bounty in an uncomfortable world<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

This is to the generations to come.\u00a0
You won\u2019t have to eat lunches out of brown bags
But you can still learn from this love song<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

 <\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

 <\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

(Photo Credit: N. Jay Jaffee, “Strange Fruit” \/ The Smithsonian American Art Museum<\/a>)<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Magical Brown Bags that Never Emptied Let me sing to you about magical, brown, road lunch bags that never seemed to empty. Of James Brown silencing the riots in the streetsOf an attorney general who actually reconsidered his initial strident positions Of AM radioAnd Black radio stations nationwide\u00a0Always found at the very top and bottom […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":306,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[6336,6562,6337],"class_list":["post-24379","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general","tag-heidi-lindemann","tag-love-poem","tag-michael-perry","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24379","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/306"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24379"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24379\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25286,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24379\/revisions\/25286"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24379"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24379"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.womeninandbeyond.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24379"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}