Rosa turns to Ernest and asks, “Is Jesus Santa?”
Yesterday Pearl Harbor Day, old men in pointed garrison caps and Hawaiian shirts saluting. There the president with a new crop of young men and women on an aircraft carrier. “Your time to answer the call, your turn to defend freedom.” Sailors on an aircraft carrier saluting. Pearl Harbor attack some 4,500 died, lives ruined, a nation called to action a nation challenged; impossible for Americans to avoid comparing Pearl Harbor and September 11th, weeping Dan Rather staring into the camera, calling it A Day of Infamy. And now, on December 7th, denizens officials the press going wild, comparisons and tears, firemen eulogized, all of it these times are trying. A little girl crying
at the funeral for her father.
To awaken a sleeping giant, et cetera. Stand mighty and tall, god bless, do you see those children on warships heading out to sea? Pearl Harbor and they call it 9/11. Where were you on 9/11? The assassination of Kennedy no way hanging with this one. Story of a lifetime, ineradicable mark. What the calmly crazed pilot was thinking as he banked his plane over water remains inexpressible. There he is, there he is, killing. There slaughtered innocents. And there boundless love, holding together Time and Humanity, bridging space. Just ask Rosa, see it in her eyes.
What will Ernest do? Will he ever drop to one knee? Can we do this union without money? What does my mother think of him now? Rosa, on Pearl Harbor Day, leaning over breakfast newspaper, worried, feeling helpless, watching things dissolve. The dissolution of Rosa and Ernest. No matter what you think, Rosa loves him, honest glow in her eyes, tears when she leaves for business trips. This is real and can’t be judged by us. Does Ernest succumb to disease? Her mother shut the whole project down? Or, do his parents, denying R and more than that? This multicultural yet sketchy neighborhood plays parts in tragedy.
Or it’s a love story, a song of love. Ernest and Rosa determined to make it to B. On the horizon, I can just smell it, Floyd the Drunk, already having robbed them, eyes their apartment, having also mugged a woman in front of the quiet, little, yellow house, stick a gun to Rosa’s ribs. Will Ernest attempt the heroic? And the bullet takes him out. Perhaps problems with these scenarios. Before you judge, every single time the sun’s down Rosa knows fear.
She will not walk alone outside in the evening darkness descending, will not walk home from BART nights. These are Rosa’s considerations; her important thoughts; and, I have to tell you this, they are on the horizon. I can smell them. Ol’ Floyd thinks he’s going to win. Ernest will be stubborn. The bullet will miss him, I believe that much. Ernest remembers thinking, “How can you mug someone during these horrible times?” And the blue spinning cap will not save them. And, truth be laid before your leige, modern times, Rosa always worried, Rosa tests for STDs every time she visits her doctor.
That particular narrative could go heinous and wipe them out: After all, nation challenged, you think the millions of South Africans who are affected don’t have stories to tell? You think there are those of the mighty word neglecting to tell their AIDS stories? The Pill, the mighty Pill, babies in formation arriving to swallow them. That’s pretty funny, sure, and she could become pregnant. Could be roses, sunshine, holding hands strolling vineyards, meadows, strands. They could die in a plane crash, on an icy road. All this death close at hand.
Could be Down’s Syndrome, jokes about killing them. Or the absolute miracle of Hannah, perfect angel, and what do we do about the clarity of that? Could go in any direction. Motel 6 one morning, Weather Channel flipping, tractor trailer plowing the front grill the windshield and the end of Rosa’s whistling. Seems to me, that when good happens, anything positive, any one thing worth celebrating, it’s undiminished miracle. Do you know how small the hole to hit for happiness? Do we appreciate how close we come every second to annihilation? Close your blinds tonight against winter’s dark chill, and be thankful. Let’s see where this story goes. Rosa wants to know. Of two, she’s the more curious.
Damn Pearl Harbor Day and Advanced Marketing Tech, workers still-employed thankful to have a job, unemployment rising sorry numbers rising, people on the streets begging. They launched a month-long campaign to see a sharp-looking memoir into the hands of the interested. This the Holiday Season. They received a list of war veterans and their spouses, surviving family members, anyone, history buffs with subscriptions to American History, sent them Buy One Get One Free calling it mass mailing, ready for the Holiday Season. And there was a photograph of the book on the pamphlet, men in uniform saluting, warplanes dive-bombing, planes on the ground burning; ships sinking; faded photograph in the background of Roosevelt at the microphone, and a shot of two tall buildings falling to dust, smoke, lives running.
Ernest worked late on Pearl Harbor Day. And on this day, those who care note, he worked hard, nose to the, thinking about his future, about family, about responsibility. He worked until sunset and it was 6 then 7 and Rosa came, drove across the bay for the city, dinner party at Hannah’s house. Along with saving the world from terror, pollution, and evil, Rosa composed a letter to the New York Times. A letter about the coal industry and tariffs on imported steel, on protectionism, pitfalls during these modern times as relates the president and his business interests, as finally relates the status of our clean air. She composed the letter, fired it off, and awaited its publication.
No longer room in the world for people who hate. No, no, no, I understand isolated pockets, various neighborhoods, people still going nuts globally, Israelis hating Palestinians and right back, Syria, Libya all of it and more. Of course of course of course. But we observe the geopolitical situation as it stands. Though hate exists, individual corporate regional civic high school post office Unabomber airplanes piercing buildings, all the things we fear, they’re becoming more and more isolated. Good is closing in: thoughts inspired by a nation provoked, a time of war. Love during the realm of challenges. Good closing in around Bad, chasing Bad into caves, isolating Bad democratically, stomping evil outright, chasing into the mountains, replacing Bad governments with Better, fucking trying to. People making valiant attempts, and within those attempts great strides. It’s the editors’ position, and Rosa’s, that Good encircles Bad, Evil fighting a losing battle.
And as desperate last spasms, Hitler’s final gasp, tall buildings avalanche, people smuggle plutonium, Iran’s nuclear bomb, Pakistan and India stubbing toes, all of it daunting. None of them can discourage humankind’s momentum. Arrived upon the species’ glorious age, songs to sing, poets vanquish swords, Rosa chasing into canyons, conquering in the mountains.
See darkness growing smaller. See minimized evil. See negative hiding underground.
What a thing for Rosa to say, expounding for friends, standing on her toes, during the time of falling buildings. Days of Infamy, battles fought battles yet begun, men and women dying, people burning jumping from falling, madmen sane men flying planes slanting into those buildings, clerics in Arabia calling Infidels versus Islam, the new Holy War, the Crusades, collapsing economies, crying babies who’ve lost their mothers, toddlers without fathers, mothers raising children solo. What a thing to believe, Rosa! Are you insane?
Bad crawling deeper into caves. Rosa chasing, underground; Rosa with a rose in her teeth standing on a slope victorious.
Rosa dredging the Hudson; Rosa paying a living wage.