c. 2025 Rod Ice
All rights reserved
(1-25)
A frequent emotion that reverberates through the Icehouse is one of regret over having ever joined in the rowdy continuum of social media networks. These platforms, at first, seemed to offer a thrilling opportunity to connect with others, and share my written work. Yet upon further inspection, the technology has evoked demons that would have been better left in a dark pit of condemnation. Half-baked opinions and specious logic are allowed to fly freely. People behave with a brave sort of carelessness that would likely never occur, face-to-face. They yelp and squawk, and beat their chests with animalistic pride. And cheer over calamities for their foes. With each side quickly retreating into safe corners, as their supporters are deployed like flanks of armed combatants. It is a contest of echo chambers, bleating at each other in screeching tones of dissent.
Almost every day, I try to summon the courage that would let me delete all my memberships, and be done with this habit grounded in wasting time.
Yet there is a useful side to the pursuit. Beyond being able to post my manuscripts for a global audience, I also find that family members and friends, who I rarely encounter, do keep in touch. It is convenient and bolsters a sense of being connected.
So, on a recent day at my desk in the home office, I attempted to find some sort of balance. A midpoint in between the need to hush negative vibes, while discovering a different avenue of self-expression.
The result was something not new at all, but instead, germinated in the fertile loam of childhood lessons. Gifts from my maternal grandma, who was a poet and true believer in her family, community, and creator.
What followed was a stream of lyrics that might have been rendered on her humble, front porch outside of Parkersburg, West Virginia. Perhaps while strumming an acoustic guitar...
‘American Dream’
Well, I’ve lived for years on God’s green earth
And it’s a place I’d like to stay
But wild broadsides
And warring tribes
Take all the joy away
I believe what I once heard from a man
Who became our president
That the cause of national unity
Is a gift, heaven sent
There’s one land of the free
Where all may break their bread
Not a patchwork kingdom of separate sides
Colored blue or red
It’s one for all if you believe
And damn you if you don’t!
Face it friends, we’re all sailing along
In the same ol’ boat
That’s the dream
The American dream
Now I grew up with my grandma’s tales
Of hard times
And Great Depression lore
She raised a family on Appalachian dirt
Running a general store
I knew that marm was old and wise
I took her words into my heart
And even now, her Bible scriptures
Light a candle in the dark
So when I hear that faith in goodness
Has now gone out of style
It makes me think of a game being run
By sharp-toothed wolves who smile
I know better, I heard it first
That’s when I took the oath
A vessel that receives all mankind
Does not need to boast
That’s the dream
The American dream
I can’t think that our founders
Would want such rank division
With closed eyes
And secret allies
Taking up opposite positions
It makes no sense to fuss and fight
With members of the brood
Over slugs and snails and petty details
That stir the public mood
I might have thought differently
But that woman called me home
To sit in her kitchen, patiently
And read her hillbilly poems
That schooling made me smart enough
To survive beyond the yard
Where people lurk in shadows
And discerning truth is hard
That’s the dream
The American dream
Sisyphus rolled his stone uphill
And guilt made it come back down
That pompous ass
Got a master class
In terms of world renown
His acts of dread were condemned
By the gods Greece
Though once he bragged of conquest
Now, he knows no peace
And his kin in the modern day
Somehow think the rules have changed
But I know better from my grandma’s grace
Not a whit has been rearranged
The judgment of a thousand years
Falls like a hard rain
Spin it how you want
It all comes out the same
That’s the dream
The American dream
I’ll close this thought with a prayer
Just like we had ‘round the table
Everybody helps
Beyond themselves
According to who is able
It’s a great commission given
From the hand of a loving host
In the name of the Blessed Virgin
Father, Son and Holy Ghost
If you tread on a different trail of stones
Don’t think that’ll make us part
Under the same blue sky
We share kindred hearts
It is written, those who call ‘Lord, Lord!’
May only intend to deceive
When the tricksters cue up for anointment
It’s a scolding they will receive
That’s the dream
The American dream
A con man is no prophet
He thinks only of himself
A prince of darkness
Dripping success
With a jealous hoarding of wealth
He might have fooled a few
Yes, it stands to reason here
But not everyone will be convinced
His sainthood is in arrears
Once upon a time there was a season
Given for everything
A harvest of the fields
And then a reckoning
That hour will come and when it does
I’ll be on the side of love
Kinship, comity, and the rest
In a golden glow from above
That’s the dream
The American dream
I often think of Grandma McCray when riddles of a perplexing nature fill my head. Her gentle insight into all things kept me focused on righteous living. But it also taught me to honor others as equals. Regardless of their social status, or upbringing. She did not care about money or possessions, or the adulation of those seeking fame for themselves. Often, relatives in our brood described her as a godly woman. Yet I thought quietly that her way of living reflected the text found in Genesis, 1:26. Specifically, that humanity had been made in the image of a creator.
“Then God said, ‘Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness, so that they may rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky, over the livestock and all the wild animals, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.’” (NIV)
As a budding offshoot of the family bloodline, still naïve and searching for truth, I might have asked how to tell if a professed champion of goodness was genuine, or simply a fugazi in the flesh. And her answer might have been spoken in the plain language of a figure who held her homestead together with the durable affection of one who cared about her children, grandchildren, and generations beyond. More than any artificial representation of worth.
Or perhaps, sung in a Country Music lullaby.
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