Deep Diggin' and High Risin'
photo: Maria Ruth
The Central Park Five, The Vietnam War, and Country Music. Ken Burns has gifted us fifty years of documentary films, a storehouse of gems, watched and rewatched on PBS. His sweeping trilogy tells the United States story with consummate honesty: The Civil War, Baseball, and Jazz. Burns never omits or pretties. Marking his entry into political activism, his May 25th commencement address at Brandeis University ranks high on his list of accomplishments. One passage in particular nails it. “We are at an existential crossroads in our political and civic lives. This is a choice that could not be clearer.” Vote for Biden and Harris. “The deformed picture of the soul is revealed” in the Republican nominee, the “opioid of all opioids.” Vote for Biden and Harris. That’s it—that’s all. Either this democracy endures or it does not.
Two worthies of Burns’s camera: Simone Biles and Alvin Bragg.
Four-time Olympic champion and soon trying for five, most decorated gymnast of all time, nine-time U.S. all-round gymnastics title-holder, two of Simone Biles’s other accomplishments stand even taller. She testified in 2021 along with some of her Olympic teammates before the Senate Judiciary Committee, detailing sexual abuse that she and countless young girls experienced from the USA Gymnastics physician. Convicted to a life sentence, this serial child rapist’s actions were covered up by his employer USA Gymnastics, mishandled by the FBI, and glossed over by his alma mater Michigan State. Articulate, outspoken, and sensitive, Biles blames the system as a whole, a system designed to protect and to insulate itself. She’s a champion of mental health awareness and access for treatment. In 2022, the youngest recipient ever, President Biden awarded her the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
At the same time, Biles caught a case of the yips. Airborne at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics, she lost all sense of where she was. Landing became instantly life-threatening. These “twisties” cancel any chance of competing. The yips, anxious overthinking by athletes, freeze instincts and muscles. A baseball pitcher can’t throw anywhere near home plate. A tennis player can’t toss the ball to serve. A basketball player can’t shoot a free throw. Can’t. Biles attributes her yips to her pandemic isolation and ongoing mental health issues. She didn’t compete for a year after Tokyo, unable even to watch televised gymnastics, and sought therapy. Then, she decided on one last try so that she’d have no regrets. “Getting over those demons, so many days I would come back to the gym, and it was one step forward, five steps back, one step forward, five steps back.” The yips hung around, circling and undercutting her. But. Now. She’s all the way back and better than ever. “I’ve just been through so much trauma, so much healing….” Look at Simone Biles.
Alvin Bragg, Manhattan’s District Attorney, was the first African American elected to that office in 2021 with a whopping 84% of the vote. He grew up and still lives in Harlem where as a youth he was stopped at gunpoint by the NYPD three times. After his first lawless stop, his minister taught young Alvin how to file a civilian complaint. The DA still attends the Abyssinian Baptist Church where he teaches Sunday School. Bragg’s priorities focus on increased trust in the area he serves: meet mental health and substance abuse challenges, increase gun prosecutions, expand already successful gun buybacks, and partner with youth. Among his creations: the Special Victims Division to support all sexual assault survivors, the Worker Protection Unit to combat workplace exploitation, and the Police Accountability Unit to foster integrity. Earning Harvard undergrad and law degrees, Bragg chose public service.
Recently, he oversaw a team of lawyers handling a trial garnering unmatched attention. The drowsy defendant awoke to his conviction on 34 counts of Falsifying Business Records in the First Degree, a class E felony. At first reluctant to bring election interference charges, Bragg shut down the investigation, facing criticism and the resignation of the two lead prosecutors. More assured of the strength of his case, he eventually moved forward. Everyday Americans who didn’t ask for jury duty did their jobs, engaged and serious, scrupulously reviewing the evidence. The DA team shared over 400 slides with the jury in closing arguments, wrapping tight a perfectly-executed prosecution. Attacked nonstop by the convicted felon online and in the press, Bragg continues receiving race-based hate messages and threats of “potential death and destruction” against him, his family, and his staff. Likened to Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, Bragg received a rousing salute at Abyssinian Baptist Church on the Sunday following the May 31 verdict.
Our criminal justice system, fragile and resilient, holds. Hunter Biden respects it. His father Joe respects it. His mother Jill respects it. This democracy deserves our whole hog, sleeves rolled up, skin in the game commitment.
You deserve poetry and music.
Poet Sandra Maria Esteves turns up the music recorded by an only child’s best friends. A girl won’t be alone, no matter what, whenever she’s gettin’ it on with her singing “Sistas.” The Supremes make Motown her hometown and oh the first time ever she heard Roberta Flack. She learns her sistas’ songs and joins in, “takin’ it higher / hittin’ all the notes home.”
Ana Lucía Torres
John Ciardi shares his poetic home with us “On the Patio.” He sits as twilight nears, looking at a rose. “Ribbons of a scent that snares me / whorl from it.” He stares, intoxicated. “When has a rose been looked at enough?” Never. Such a joyous, impossible task to know a rose completely. Red, yellow—roses always surprise—pink, white. Such precise petals!
“I woke up to the morning sky, first baby blue.” Like Ciardi sees roses, the Black Pumas see “Colors.” Gray clouds—green meadows. “A good day to see my favorite colors, colors.” This performance added to the celebration at the 2021 Biden-Harris inauguration party. A good day, a good day, a good day, groove the singers… guitars, keys, and drums right on time.
Longtime pals Ry Cooder and Taj Mahal jam in the jumble of a cozy room. “Hooray Hooray.” Check out their seating, their hats and hands, their tapping feet and twinning instruments. “We’re gonna rock the house tonight / Everything will be alright.” The cool-hatted drummer softly strokes the song’s heartbeat.
A serenade of birdsong awakens us. “Here’s a hymn to welcome in the day / Heralding a summer’s early sway.” Wearing his harmonica and guitar, the lead singer meshes with the accordionist, the keyboard sweetener, and the string pluckers. Beauty. The Decemberists tenderize daybreak with their “June Hymn.” Thrushes and wrens bicker. Bulbs and branches bloom. Whiffs of jasmine vine—clothing on the line. Sit in the living room? Yes.