One year, when we were still a family living in the white frame house on Morrell Street in Dallas, Texas, we ate beans and rice or collard greens nearly every day. Later that year, while out for Christmas break, we got used to inviting some new kids in with us for dinner. Of course, we were used to the food by then, but it was the first time that I had heard and got a different understanding of the phrase, “Like they going out of style“.
There were five kids in our family and we dared not flinch when those words came across the sparse dinner table from my brother’s invited friend, a boy called “Meatball”. He was squat, dark-hued, round with a bushel of uncombed hair and gave off the suggested shape of a big, well, meat ball. His rather large family was new to a duplex further down the hill that was Morrell Street. Even in the colder months most of them spilled out onto the porch and yard during non-sleeping hours. Up and down that block all of our families were just making due, but even our construction-job injured Stepfather had encouraged us to invite and share with the kids whenever possible.
Meatball didn’t bother looking up from his fast moving spoon through a bowl of crumbled cornbread and black-eyed peas. Even though he had used the bathroom sink to clean up it was not hard to find patches of differing colored dirt streaking his scrawny, short sleeved arm and pointy elbow as he ate. We had already prayed, passed the cornbread and Kool-Aid. Now, we waited on a spoon of steaming collard greens from a big, worn pot that sat at one end of the table when he blurted up, “Ya’ll eat beans like they going out of style!”.
We just kept passing our plates from one person to the next and waited for them to return with a layered serving of meatless collard greens. Secretly, we all hoped for one of the bacon or salt jowl halves that seasoned the greens, but that succulent meat often landed on our Stepfather’s plate. Meatball did not pass his plate. He continued to feast on the certainty of his beans and dodged the long arms that reached, grabbed and ignored his sloppy chewing. With all the plates in place our Stepfather called to the little complainer, “Gimme yo’ plate, son“. A moment passed before my brother grabbed and handed off the boy’s crumb-littered plate. Meatball started chewing faster.
For the second time that day neither of us five flinched as Meatball’s plate of hot collards was passed back to him. Mixed into the feathery stack of greens were the two curling halves of thick sliced, red meat and water pearled bacon fat. Again, the pain mellowed bass of our Stepfather’s words wafted toward Meatball, “You reckon dat fatback might be in style, Meatboy?”His mispronunciation kicked a big laugh into the room and nearly everybody corrected him, “It’s MEAT BALL, Mr. Howard“. It was the first time since being injured and returning home from two months of traction in a hospital bed that he smiled big and laughed a full throated guffaw. The bacon slipped in and out of Meatball’s greasy lipped mouth and the room grew brighter with his addictive and toothy grin.
It would be a few more months of beans and greens and visits from Meatball and others hoping for the fatback on their plates, but never from us five. Big laughs came slowly back into the white house at 1423 Morrell after the “meat boy” meal. There was new job with less pain and risk of injury for our slow moving Mr. Howard. Around the same time there was Christmas and five thunderous, overflowing, cellophane covered fruit baskets with hard, awkward nuts and candy canes with a single wrapped present. It all got shared on our screened-in porch, along with other toys from up and down Morrell Street…and the echoing, baritone laughter from just inside the door.
Jas. C. Mardis is a Poet, Quilter and Storyteller. He is a 2014 Inductee into the Texas Literary Hall of Fame.
Photo credit: Rosskam, Edwin, 1903-, Farm Security Administration – Office of War Information Photograph Collection 1938
I’m returning to fabric focused Art after a year’s long attention to learning leather bag crafting. It was fruitful and expensive and resulted in me settling on a series of Monocular Cases. You can find the final few available for purchase with two styles of Monocular
African Cave Drawing and Appliqué African Cave Drawing and Cameroon Coin Iconography on Designer Leather
I’m returning to Quilt and Fabrij
Portrait on Cotton Creating new fabric for Quilt work“Sons of Her Thunder: Not Another Boy Harmed” fabric printing, with Adinkra “energy” symbol, thread and raffia painting on raw edge cotton foundation “Nobody Told Me The Road Would Be Easy” printed fabric, leather pyrography portrait, African iconography, bone buttons and wood hanger with song lyric “Where From Here?”?leather pyrography drawing on piecework quilting with custom wood hanging system “My Father’s Rivers” leather pyrography portrait on created fabric with folded fabric on a custom wood and epoxy resin hanging system
Literally— Come Check ME Out — Saturday, September 10, 2022 My “Human-Book” is titled: “Grasshopper Pie”. How it works: Learn More about this program: click the graphic
The Dallas Public Library invites you to check out a person instead of a book!
Welcome to the library of people! Instead of borrowing a book, indulge in the experience of checking out a person. Challenge stereotypes and prejudices through dialogue.
The Human Library allows people to come together in an informal, one on one setting, to have comfortable dialogue about often uncomfortable topics. Our human books are drawn from fascinating members of our communities who have fascinating stories that you MUST hear.
How it works: Come in during the hours of 10 a.m. and 12:30 p.m. and spend 20 minutes reading the following “books” (to be announced). Have a conversation, ask questions, stay open and learn.
The goal is to publish people as open books and to challenge stereotypes and prejudices through dialogue.
I’m still not sure what the boy’s name means. It comes up every now and again and caused a fight with my Wife when we were pregnant. I was rubbing her feet and saying beautiful, sexy, married people stuff to her, then she asked for the baby name book. “I wonder if there are any good boy names that begin with “O”? Hand me the book, babe”. Immediately my heart rushed to a heavy thumping miss timed jumble of thoughts, grade school fights and a memory of the day that Otha and his older brothers came rushing toward me and my little brother from an alley. Even as a third grade kid that boy was strange and hit-a-tree ugly. Seriously, we were in grade school and this boy had acne and bad teeth that grew into fangs across the front of his mouth. I had never told her about his fanged ass, but I knew, as fate is the most hateful declaration in the life of a man with a secret, she would turn straight to “Otha” and declare it the most beautiful name she’d ever heard. So, I got up from rubbing her feet lovingly; found the book on her side table in the bedroom, then threw the book out of the open apartment window.
In Third Grade, my Teacher, Miss Ruth Henderson loved me like a Mama. Because I could already read the simple word-calling books that she had to teach from, she often let me show the other kids how easy it was to say the words and use the pictures to make it all make sense. “James Chris is going to read for the class. Go ahead James Chris” she would say when the bell was about to ring and she needed to waste a few minutes before releasing us to lunch or recess. Soon the bell would ring and the circle of kids would push back our chairs and line up at the door to twenty minutes of freedom outside.
Once outside we were bound by the Hurricane Fence that demarked the school ground in the Oak Cliff section of our town. The name was right on point as beyond the fence line was a cliff-like descent of the ground into an oak tree-lined area that fell into a series of creeks and water run-offs for the neighborhood. Nearest the school was a lush grounds used as play and picnic areas by the residents as it flattened out before becoming a rock-strewn bank and creek. For us kids, wild with play on our hearts, the only rule that Miss Ruth Henderson gave was to keep the balls inside the fence.
That Otha boy had older brothers who taught him things that the rest of us wouldn’t learn until puberty or prison. On the playground he was a hard case and used football moves during dodge ball games when the rest of the boys were just trying to have fun. He had already been blocked from playing for doing a clothesline move on Gary Brown and throwing a body block on another kid. So, when Miss Ruth Henderson blew the whistle for the class to line up and go back to class, Otha saw the unattended red freckled dodge ball and kicked it as hard as he could. Everybody turned around from the line and watched it lift just over the four foot high fence towards the creek.
Miss Ruth Henderson waddled over to Otha and pinched his ear with one of her death twist-pinches that she only used on him. “Boy! What is wrong with you?”, she hissed. Turning to me she said, “James Chris, take this fool and go find that ball!”, then pushed Otha into action. I ran. Otha ran. At the fence I stopped and put my toe into the diamond, but Otha jumped and summer-saulted the fence. I was still putting my other foot on top of the rail when Otha landed, hop-skipped and vaulted back into the air without stumbling on the declining earth. When I landed on the other side of the fence I watched as he sped like a demon into the line of trees where he assumed the ball had settled. From the top of the decline I spotted the familiar red ball wedged in the crook of a low hanging branch.
I walked the few yards over to the branch and jumped until I swatted it free, then yelled to Otha that I had found it. He didn’t come right away so I walked back up to the fence and showed the ball to the Class, who Miss Ruth Henderson then guided back inside, saying, “Get that boy and come inside”. When I looked back for Otha he was just a few steps away and reaching for the ball sneering, “I found it! Give it here!”, then threw a straight punch into my right eye. I had moved the ball away from him in a reflex, so when he hit me, the ball fell over the fence on the school’s side. Now, the two of us were immediately throwing punches. I knew how to fight big boys from when they messed with my older sisters. Otha knew how to fight from his older brothers. I was bigger. Otha was quicker. From behind us Miss Ruth Henderson cursed and screamed for us to “stop”. Otha hit me seven times in the same eye before she and another grown up reached us. I managed two hard punches into Otha’s breadbasket. He stopped hitting me and fell to his knees. I saw that with my left eye.
In the Assistant Principal’s Office Otha’s lie about finding the ball and me taking it from him easily fell apart. The whole Class had seen me show it and him nowhere in sight. I was sent to Nurse’s office across the hall for an ice pack and soon heard Otha’s punishment being meted out. Mr. Petrie used a wooden paddle in those days and smacked out six hard “Get Rights”. Otha did not scream out. Otha did not cry a single tear. As he left the Office, Otha came across the hall and found me staring one-eyed at the opened Nurse’s door, and put a fist against his eye. Mr. Petrie saw him and meted out three more “Get Rights”.
It would take three weeks, but Otha and his brothers came for me. They waited in the alley of the street a block ahead of my home street. It was a long way from school and the watchful eye of the older kids who were Crossing Guards and broke up the afterschool fights. I hadn’t forgotten Otha’s threat and I could tell that he hadn’t forgotten those two big boy punches. My little brother was a grade below me, so I picked him up in his classroom at the end of school and we walked home. When Otha and his three brothers came out of the shadows I saw them notice that I was not alone. I told my brother to go ahead and wait for me at the stop sign, but he took a few steps and turned back saying, “Mom said don’t cross the street by myself. Come on, Junior”. Otha laughed and started bouncing on the balls of his feet in front of me.
Other kids stopped and formed a raggedy fight circle when Otha made his move. They watched his brothers move into place, but the remaining brother turned back into the alley. My brother was blocked from view with the closing crowd, but Otha’s brothers didn’t seem interested in hurting him. I dropped my book bag to my side by the strap and picked the brother to hit with a swing, then waited for Otha’s rambling hype-up to end and him to charge with a punch. It never came. Otha’s, “Yeah..Yea..Yeah” was interrupted by the circle of kids breaking open and his other brother pushing a small kid in front of him wearing a feather laced headdress. The kid was probably my brother’s age, but I had never seen him before with Otha. The crowd moved further aside as the kid stumbled forward, lost his balance and was caught by the older boy from behind. As the kid reached up to grab his headdress a blue feather dislodged and floated on the air. It landed on my shoe.
Without thinking about Otha and the other boys taking advantage, I reached and plucked the blue feather off my shoe and stepped over to the young boy. He had already begun to stretch his face into the start of a cry. “Its’ okay little man. I got it for you”, I said and put the blue feather back inside his headdress. The older boy stared at me for a moment, still holding the smaller boy who suddenly said, “Thank you”, then, “Look at my Indian hat, Bobby”. I looked at the older boy and watched him locking eyes with his brothers. He lifted his little brother into his arms and said, “He’ll stop if you hit him once next time”, then turned and walked back toward the alley again. The other boys and Otha followed without another word.
As the kids turned out the fight circle I saw my brother again. He had been standing off to my blind side and saw the feather part, but missed the three boys with balled fists and bad intentions. “Why did you give him that feather back? You got scared of fighting that big boy…didn’t you?, he said and mocked me putting the feather in place. “You a scaredy cat but you fight me all the time”. We made it to the STOP sign and waited for a clear crossing.
I pushed the window closed in our bedroom and was adjusting the curtain when my wife said, “Why’d you throw the baby name book out the window?” I didn’t turn around before answering. I just slid on my shoes and said that it slipped out of my hand when I was trying to close the window and I would be right back.
I ran thru the high, face-cutting slits of wild grasses and weeds, slipping and tumbling, then picking myself up and running further up the slanted embankment of the unintentional rock quarry behind the Rockwell Paper Company. The June, Texas sun bore down on my head like a swooping bird and hammered my already thrumming blood against the inside of my eleven year old head. I knew then that if I ever felt that thrum-hammer again in my life it would be at the end of my life. This time, it was marking the coming end of Edward Muse’s life.
I climbed to my feet again, knowing that blood was pushing up from my left calf and coating my leg and white Converse sneakers. I knew that my face was grass whipped and that pebbles of gravel would be falling off of my short afro as I pushed and jerked my aching and shocked body toward the open dock of the paper distributor. I knew that I would be out breath when I tried to yell for help across the open field of wild earth and hot summer air. I knew as well that below me, in the creek, Edward was trying not to scream and trade air for water in his lungs.
On the dock, a Black man was sliding the forklift into the rack that held a tower of paper wrapped in green and white covered stacks. I saw him see me rising up and stumbling forward. I saw him lock his focus directly on me and open his mouth in the start of a yell. I saw his eyes grow wide as he slammed levers and braked the machine. I saw him pointing the way for others to follow. I saw him see me start to cry and point the way back to Edward.
When he was near me the Black man shouted, “Who hurt you, boy?!” and he searched the direction of my outstretched arm for who was following. “My friend is in the creek! My friend is in the CREEK! I shouted…”an I can’t swim!” . He straightened and yelled, “In the Creek” to the new men emerging from the darkness of the loading dock and another Black man shed his tool belt and burst toward us with amazing quickness. I was pulled to my feet and carried under the man’s arm and heard him saying, “Show me, son! Show me where he went in. Its okay! Show Me, son!” The other man passed us in thundering, sure-footed stomps. He was a huge man and I swear, even now, all these years later, that the grasses parted and the ground seemed go sturdy itself for his rampage to the creek below. Moments later I was dropped to the ground as both men shouted, “I see him! He just went down again!” and “Damn, dere he go, Frank!”
I got to my feet and fell down two times before getting to the edge of broken concrete slabs that Edward and I had crossed earlier, just before the creek water swallowed him whole. The big man was hanging from a broken rebar with his body lowered into the creek where Edward was submerged. The water was as clear as glass and I could see Edward’s eyes bugged and alternately squinting in a painful expression. He had grabbed onto the big man’s work clothes and the man held Edward’s forearm and was pulling, but he wasn’t emerging. The first man stood confused, then suddenly dove into the creek toward Edward. This section of the water swallowed him, too and I could not see his entire body once he passed Edward. The big man’s face turned toward me and I could see that he had begun to weep and tire from the struggle of holding the rebar and that his strength was waning.
Suddenly, the strain in the big man’s face released and he yanked so hard on Edward’s arm that the boy thrust out of the water with a burst of yelps, coughs and spews of creek water. The big man pulled Edward into his chest and yelled for me to “Grab him, boy!” At the same time the other man emerged from the hole that had swallowed him with a cough and spewing of water. He bobbed back into the water for a moment then flung himself to the nearest concrete slab with more broken rebar and caught himself before submerging again. Gripped in his free hand was Edward’s blue jeans. Men from the dock suddenly emerged from all over the area with ropes and one carried a box with a red cross on the cover. I was pulled aside and two men grabbed Edward’s shirt and pulled him further onto the slabs and safety. Other men pulled the big man free of the re bar and hauled him from the creek water. He smiled a huge and hopeful glance at Edward and asked the new men, “Did he make it?” Then, looking quickly at me he said, “We got him, son. He’s alright! He’s alright!”
Edward coughed and vomited the creek water for almost ten minutes as the men around him slapped their big hands on his back and stood him erect between them. His legs were bleached of color and dangled from his drooping white BVDs and shook uncontrollably. One leg seemed to seize up and he cried out between vomiting the creek water and fell against the men holding him up. “That’s jus’ ya blood coming back to ya legs, son. Stomp ya feet!”, a man said. Another man agreed.
From behind me a group of men helped the first Black man to compose himself and asked about Edward’s blue jeans. “Man, them crazy snapping turtles jus about had his ass! Two of ‘em, big as hubcaps was pulling on his jeans and taking him to the bottom! They was gonna have a feast in that hole!”, the Black man replied. “Damn, Frank! Two of ‘em?!, the gathered men responded and looked at the soaked jeans that he held out to them.
A gurgling and plop sounded from the creek and everybody turned to see one of Edward’s tennis shoes come to the top of the water. It was in the mouth of a huge turtle. Behind the turtle’s huge head, his shell floated up under the swimming clawed feet that were the size of a grown man’s hands. The shoe was then submerged and the man, called Frank, headed over to Edward with the soaked pants.
Back up the incline and resting on the dock with the men, one of them brought Edward a dry, one piece uniform to change into. Another man shared his lunch thermos of hot soup and a sandwich as everybody waited to see if Edward was going to be okay. The man called Frank sat beside me as I watched Edward getting all the attention and food. He spoke quietly to me and asked, “You gon be okay, little man? You know you saved ya friend’s life today, right?” I looked up at him, not knowing what to say back. Frank said, “It cost you something, too. I know ya scared about errthang, but ya friend gon be alright in a minute. The Boss man wanted to call the Police about what happened, but we got him offa that notion. But, y’all don’t need to come back ‘roun the creek again. Okay?” I was scared at the mention of the boss and the Police, but Frank patted me on the shoulder and I managed to mumble, “No Sir. We ain’t never looking for crawfish in the creek no mo”. Frank laughed at that and said, “Son, ain’t never been no crawfish in that run off hole”.
Looking down at my lap, Frank then stood and went to a bank of lockers against the dock wall and returned holding another of the one piece uniforms. “I imagine you don’t want to be walking home with that smelly creek water on the front of ya pants.” he said and handed me the clothes with a smile and a wink.
May 2021 I return to the display case of the Main Lewisville Library. I’m displaying laser enhanced designs and hand pyrography items with small quilts and the new wood hangers and candleholders. The laser engraving machine is part of the Library’s HIVE MAKERS SPACE. I was introduced to the progressive creative space during my 2019 Library case exhibition and enjoy the knowledge and skills of the HIVE staffers.
Jas Mardis: Hand & Laser Pyrography and Portraits runs May 1-29, 2021. Mask up and see the work, then tour THE HIVE. #LPLthehive Tell them I sent you!
11″ x 17″ color prints on acid-free Fine Art Paper are $200 per item, s/h included in the price within the United States using Ground Postal rates. Expedited FedEx shipping will be quoted.
If the PayPal button does not appear on this page please email me your request at MardisArt940@gmail.com and you will receive an invoice via email.
“Yal Royalty” is available on 11″x17″ acid-free coated German Etching Fine Art Paper.
Love Field Airport has featured me for the second 2020 exhibition: Jas MARDIS:HOME for the month of June. The highlight of this exhibition is a fabric and leather piece from the series, Mothers & Sons: “Sons of Her Thunder” subtitle: “Not Another Boy Harmed!”. Select pieces from my “Just A Crown” series on pedestals and two leather burned portraits on new stands complete the display.
Dallas Love Field Airport featuring Jas Mardis: HOME
“Sons of Her Thunder” uses a leather drawn image and a printed image on cloth with the backdrop of an andinkra symbol for energy. John and James, “The Sons of Thunder” from Luke 9:54 who asked Jesus of their enemies, “Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them?” In Matthew 20:20 their Mother famously asks Jesus if her sons could sit in an exalted place in Heaven. In consideration of the current climate I offered a twist on a Mother’s response. “Rain Thunder, Lord, on those who would harm my sons! Bring them home to sit beside me!”
I have thought a thousand times
of being caught
in the space between your
eyes
as we kept passing our ships
on that night’s first seas
thought a thousand more
of how there is unquestioned
magic
in finding ways to say once
into each locating glance
that Yes, I am seeing You, too
since that night
Your face has danced my
fingers
in cloudy verse… in foggy visions…
and so I wonder–
will you know my ship
by the splash of a thousand fast oars…
will I know your harbor
by your own thousand
searching lamps….
Jas. Mardis
3/25/2015
(44aa)
————————————-
SEAS: Me
This time makes a full first one thousand
grains of sand passing thru the narrow path between
what has been and come whatever may
this is the instance the best of moments on new winds
this drawing of you near to me from across the ocean that is this room
your anchor swaying your angles among this fog of bodies
become a recognizable mast
the sails in your smiling glance full-winded, then folded fast behind your closing lips
gathered shamefully away on the softly-browned deck of your face
the iceberg of restraint is broken beneath the surface of greeting
broken, most importantly, where it has been heaviest built
How strange to be strangers when so many know our names
Forge the smile-readied waters of this greeting
we are grown our keels made true from having been kissed
having been held close in fragrant gardens at midday and midnights
having been pressed against ruffled linens down pillows disheveled quilts
having been called gently and longingly from distant rooms
distant, beautiful, magnificently just departed rooms and being instantly needed back following moments that began just like this
my ropes are moored to the pier of this distant chair
there is a breeze gathering and shaking my lamps
you can clearly see I have no Captain to calm their clattering song
you can clearly see
at my feet there is a newly lighted torch
Jas. Mardis 05/2015
(54aa/hb)
Jas Mardis 