Category: Columns

by Ernie McCray

I, along with a room
of other people,
just spent
“An Afternoon with Josefina Lopez”
who just happens to be
an award-winning
highly acclaimed Chicana
playwright and screenwriter
who gave to the world,
early in her career,
the play, “Real Women Have Curves,”
which later
became adapted into a film
and then
a Broadway musical,

by Ernie McCray

I’m nearing 88 years
and along with that
there are, of course,
a few fears,
anxieties rising
just from seeing
all my meds
set in front of me
on the coffee table
where I used to place a few knick-knacks,
and there are the
aches and pains
suddenly appearing like hoodlums
crashing a party,
and the loss of the ability to do
things I once
did very well
like getting up
and sitting down
without making a sound,
and I am constantly using my cane

by Ernie McCray

Oh, I wish so much of the news
didn’t give me the blues,
as hearing Dolores Huerta weigh in
on Cesar Chavez’s sexual abuse
of women and minor children
with allegations
of situations
he put her in
darkened my soul
like midnight
on a moonless night,
making me weep
as I read of her emotional pain,
of how she has kept quiet
over time
so as not to bring negative attention
to the United Farm Worker’s struggles,

by Ernie McCray

Say what?
Students are facing
being suspended from school
for standing up|
against ICE’s
muggings and
cold-blooded killings
of citizens?

Based on what?
Doing the right thing?

I mean if I was still a principal
of a school
and my students
decided they wanted to make a statement
about some goons
who had never heard of
or cared about the Golden Rule,
I’d be out there with them,

by Ernie McCray

What in the hell is wrong with you
Republican Congressmen and Congresswomen?
How have you
come to losing your way
so dishonorably,
like a ship without a rudder
in foggy weather,
wandering aimlessly,
trapped in a web,
like helpless insects,
at the mercy
of a demented madman of a president
who has you, for one thing,
for instance,

by Ernie McCray

The murder of Renee Michele Good

in her neighborhood

for reasons as unjustified

as a motive

could possibly be

has grabbed my attention dramatically

due to such action being extremely unlikely

considering

that law enforcement people

by Ernie McCray

We, Maria, my heart,
and Lillia, her bosom buddy,
and I,
just returned from Cuernavaca
where we visited
Josefina Sosa Catalan,
a longtime friend.

What a time we had
from the time we got there
until the very end.

On the plane ride home
I relived,
in my thoughts,
how radiant and graceful Josefina is,

by Ernie McCray

As the year 2025 closed
American citizens held out hope
that 2026
would be a better year,
considering that 2025
had us shaking in our boots,
in fear,
crying in our beer,
shedding tears,
but now, just a few days
after the new year arrived,
before we could

by Ernie McCray

2025.
A year in which I often
watched, in disbelief and grief,
as a president who, between
cheating at golf
and decorating
the White House with gawdy appearing gold leaf,
constantly and relentlessly
stood before a mic
spewing
disgraceful overly racialized
cockeyed jive
in braggadocious tones
about the crackdowns,
featuring ridding the country of dark-skinned immigrants,
he had going on
on our borders
and in our cities and towns,

by Ernie McCray

As I look at a picture taken a few years ago
of me with my children
I find myself thinking
of how
all I ever wanted for them
and their children
and their children’s children
on and on
in future times,
was for them,
and all of the nation’s citizenry,
to live in a country
where their life’s dreams
could be fulfilled
in an atmosphere
where love and human respect

by Ernie McCray

Oh, as I looked back at pictures
of the “No Kings” protesters
in San Diego
I so wished that I could take to the streets
as I’ve done so many times before
over my lifetime
but standing and walking
for a longtime
would not treat me very kind.
But it’s plain to see
that this kind of massive togetherness
is the key
to our surviving the mess
we find ourselves in,|
chaos brought to us
by a madman
whose goal in life
is to do us in

by Ernie McCray

I remember my grandfather
always saying to me
“Well, son, I guess that’s too much like right”
when my most logical response to a situation
should have been put into action but was not,
and lately I’ve been saying that to myself a lot
as I look at what’s happening
here and there
around the country,
thinking, particularly,
about what if we bypassed all the rigmarole
with regard to Bad Bunny
headlining the halftime show
at the 60th Super Bowl,
singing in Espanol,
and instead praised him
for how he rose
from work as a bag boy at a grocery store
in Puerto Rico
and became a global music icon