Audubon Ballroom

Lupe Fiasco has a song called 'Audubon Ballroom', hence the title.

A strange music echoes through the hall -

An explosion of sound; then none at all

Then the tinkle of lead casings

Against the linoleum

Like the mournful, final flourish

Of a violin…

They say he preached intolerance and violence

Now his sermon gives way to silence

They say he preached racism and hatred

He taught his people to love black, and hate red…

Guess his message resonates within me on some levels

While I don’t believe in blue-eyed devils

I do believe, to my last shred of being

That the colour of my skin

Don’t make me a second-class human being;

Men are equal in their wretchedness,

Equal in their ability -

And equal in their wickedness.

Black or white, I can be as evil as you

White, as well as black, is a heathenous hue

Or Red, or Yellow, or whatever other colour -

You are still my sister, you are still my brother.

 

But he was such a strong spirit,

Voice ringing from the booth

He turned against his own brothers

For the sake of the truth…

How he loved his people,

Brothers, sisters and children!

How he struggled for them,

Right up until they killed him!

The speeches and the marches

Protesters united, singing -

The passion, the courage,

And the shots ringing!

So committed to the cause

That his own organisation fired him

So brave, and so bold,

That his opponents admired him;

Whether they were disciples

Of Elijah or Muhammad.

 

His voice still roars;

His legend, his story

Echoes through history

And rings still in the generations’ ears

Like the shots that tore through

The Audubon ballroom.

 

Author's Note

Form follows function and this one.
'Heathenous' ... I plead poetic license!

Reviews

[TLK]

I find 'heathenous' to be a perfectly cromulent word.

First two lines lull me into a short feeling of music... then you snap out of it exactly in time with the lead casing. I found that flourish particularly masterful, and I cannot imagine anyone who truly understands it being unwilling to read on afterwards.

What follows of the first stanza has all the irrepressible quality of a contested truth. You try to keep hold of it but it doesn't allow itself to be forced into any strict scheme -- but you do impose some regularity on to it. This heightened the veracity for me.

Then the historical points achieve the oratory heights of a fully-voiced sermon. As with all truly despicable historical events, the edges of the past have been dulled by time, and somehow it seems to be seen through a dimmed glass. Certainly, the switch in tenses gives this impression, and I feel there is something else too. Perhaps the exclamation points and shorter length of lines gives it a more "school-room account" feel.

The last stanza frames the whole piece, puts it in a wall, displays it for all to see. For me, personally, this took Malcolm X from whatever dusty corner of my mind that he had languished and made me hungry to read about him and of him again. It also confronted me with the fact that a righteous and essential anger can be stopped with its senseless and unnecessary cousin so easily.