Author: Ernie McCray

by Ernie McCray

Oh, these hair-raising
misguided
shortsighted
folks
waving their
red, white, and blue flags
and wearing their red, white, and blue
caps and hats,
and red, white and blue
tennis shoes,
on the news,
unmasked and
confused and unglued,
packing heat,
singing the blues
because they can’t
do whatever
they want to do,

by Ernie McCray

Oh, I want so
to be out and about again,
to just grab a hold
of my children and grandchildren
and great-grandchildren
and friends
and hug them
for eternity,
or at least
until my arms fall limp.

By Ernie McCray

My mother has been on my mind, ever so vividly, lately. I can see her in moments in our lives.

Moments where she’s waving goodbye to me as I take off for school or play, against a background of clothes to be washed and hung up to dry; dishes to be washed and dried; floors to be washed and dried.

Moments when she’d hug me, fighting back tears brought on by the sheer energy required to raise a son alone, a Howard University graduate of the Class of ’31, working her fingers to the bone as a janitress at the Mountain States Telephone Company, cutting hair and selling Avon products and doing tax returns and a ton of odd jobs on the side.

Moments when, because of her heavy load, she’d say to me, shaking her head and chuckling, “Sometimes you got to laugh to keep from crying” and the next thing I knew we’d be slapping our knees and rolling on the floor doubled up, grabbing our bellies – overcoming, momentarily, the “race cards” the country had dealt us openly and hatefully and not the least bit regretfully.

by Ernie McCray

If I have expertise
in anything
it’s kicking back,
chilling,
being at ease.
Why not,
since stress,
can buckle your knees.
But now
after maintaining
my cool
for 82
revolutions
around the sun,
I’ve become kind of an edgy
son-of-a-gun

by Ernie McCray

I’ve been thinking of my son, Guy, my second child to depart this earth before me.

We had so many memories, running the gamut of father and son relationships but my thoughts have mostly been about some of our really special moments: going at each other on the basketball court, one of our favorite things to do; hiking along the Junipero Serra Trail on some incredibly beautiful days when the sky was clear and blue; a road trip to Sedona, the Grand Canyon, and Vegas on a Spring Break; lounging along the shore in Rosarito Beach for a week; him singing and playing guitar at my 50th birthday celebration…

And when I think of his fine musicianship I’ll always remember his graduation in 1977 from John Muir Alternative School, a K-12 school I helped create with some incredibly innovative educators who were absolutely great.

So much happened on the campus that year, students feeling their oats, enjoying freedoms not many students ever achieve,

by Ernie McCray

I had a pretty nice birthday, the other day, my 82nd such day.

I got the day going up on my feet, getting down to a funky beat. I posted it on Facebook for my friends to see, hopefully, as a treat.

Later I celebrated on Zoom with family and friends, got some reading and love making in, greased on some shrimp and grits and lost my soul to a moist super delicious vanilla pound cake.

But, hey, it wasn’t all happy and gay because I clicked on my TV, feeling a need for a brief summary of what’s going on with the coronavirus, and the first images I happened to see was a bunch of European American “patriots” waving “Old Glory” like crazy.

I mean it was a sight to see: grossly misguided misfits open carrying automatic weapons, all pissed off that they’re being told what to do to lessen their chances of losing their lives to a deadly disease. “Don’t tell us to stay off the street! This is the Land of the Free!”

by Ernie McCray

My acupuncturist, a lovely person and practitioner, just brought into the world a little girl. I emailed her:

“Oh, Julia,
what a beautiful
baby Olivia is.
Like her mom,
the woman
with needles
that heal,
the woman with
such a soft heart
(better to mother with),
the woman who plays Miles
for me
as I relax
head down
to the music
and the treatment
that soothes me
and eases
my mind.
Enjoy this bundle of joy.|

by Ernie McCray

Wow, what a trip this coronavirus thing has been. I mean one moment you’re going about your day, maybe checking out a movie or two, dining with friends, getting a round of golf in…

Then the next day you’re living under a mandate where you’re to cover your mouth and stay in your house and if you do go out into the streets don’t come near to anybody.

It’s like you’re in a dark tunnel wondering if you’ll ever see the light of day again.

There’s something déjà vu about it for me as I’ve had feelings like I’m feeling now before. Nothing, of course, on the level of dealing with a pandemic disease, but an experience, never-the-less, of having my life changed, seemingly out of the blue. In a moment in time when my life was hunky-dory fine.

by Ernie McCray

Out of fear
and despair
there are folks
on their knees
in prayer,
pleading for a return
to normalcy
when this nightmarish
coronavirus
health scare
allows us to breathe
more easily –

by Ernie McCray

To ease my mind in my isolation from humankind, I’ve been basking in memories of better times in my life and I don’t recall ever having more fun than I had at the San Diego Fringe Festival in 2014 – narrating “On the Corner of Rhythm and Rhyme” as a brilliant company of tap dancers, the California Rhythm Project, brought my words to life as they danced to my vocalizing and, in-between some lines, tapped to music, then back to my poetry, in an urban streetscape setting, kicking it off with:

There’s a corner
unlike any other corner
you could ever
conceive in your mind.
The Corner of Rhythm and Rhyme.
And it’s just that, rhythm and rhyme,
big time,
cuz, when your feet
step on the concrete
on the Corner of Rhythm and Rhyme,

by Ernie McCray

Had a fright
in my sleep
the other night,
dreaming one of those dreams
where you’re
fighting for your life
but you can’t move
or scream
and suddenly you
spring to
an up position in your bed,
saying to yourself,
in relief,
“Oh, thank goodness
that was a dream.”

by Ernie McCray

This COVID-19 thing
is so far beyond
anything I’ve ever seen,
disease-wise,
and I’ve
been around a
health scare or two,
born to a mother
who, because she
had lost a lung to TB,
raised me
to practically seek cover
when someone coughs
or happens to sneeze,
to not, for goodness sake,
ever eat off somebody’s plate
or take a sip of their soda or shake…