Second Chance…#43

There are times when I am dreaming outside my door is the gateway to the city of destiny; nevertheless each night when I dream I open the door walking into another sphere of everlasting pain, mentally and physically, a bright light gives me hope.  No one pushed me through the gate, I walk willingly and I feel confident that I can handle the tragedy that I know will be waiting there for me.  Tucked deep inside my confidence there is fear, within the fear there are secret things, distrust and lies that over shadow happiness and joy.

The darkness is the most evil; a blood red moon framed by the stars hangs above me.  Hearing strange tongues frightful and shrill, filled with anger, strikes fear into my heart, they go beyond goodness.  Sometimes I weep as the outcries reach my ears, as I do not have a stainless claim to my own life.  I fear for the souls, even the depths of hell may refuse them and they will be lost forever in the darkness.  Don’t they see the light, the glow of wonder and joy?

I question, is there hope with death, will we have memories of the earth and of the lives that remain when we are gone?  The souls that I hear are loud, their tears are blood red, and each is crawling in vile mud.  I lower my eyes, on this path to the end will they have rebirth, if they lived in blaspheming is this terrible wailing their fate.  Have I done enough to feel the light on my face?

A bitter flood of doubt rushed over me as each pass going to their final resting place.  They seem conscious of their nearing doom or happiness.  It is in this darkness that each was given a second chance to feel the love of God upon their faces, many refused. At the entrance of another gate, the ground broke from beneath their feet, and I seem to be sinking with them to a meaningless dreadful shore and I am afraid that I will not wake from this nightmare.  Will I be given a second chance?

©elizabethannjohnsonmurphree

Author’s book at Amazon.com

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Heaven and Earth…#42

Artwork by: Elizabeth Ann Johnson-Murphree
Acrylics and Watercolor

Sunbeams descend in every nook and cranny; the birds make a beautiful noise against the glow of the morning.  The crow lands inside a Blue Spruce, boughs sway underneath tiny-clawed feet, bobbing of branches holds the interest of a squirrel who believes a nut may fall to earth soon. 

Walking while the imagination falls into motion, a leaf lands at my feet, I look up and the clouds become a living canvass, breaking over and under, profound, alive, forming images of the imagination.. 

Everything is alive here upon Mother Earth and in the Heavens, we tend, we produce and make room for those who will come after us.  Only when we are gone our pain ease, our cries quelled and peace will be delivered unto us that wait in patience.

©elizabethannjohnsonmurphree

Authors Books located at: Amazon.com

The Aunt’s and the “World’s Oldest Profession”…#41

It was early 1800 and the harbor in Mobile, Alabama was bustling with upriver planters looking for a good price for cottonseed.  The waterfront also was home to a variety of establishments; café`, boarding houses, hotels, saloons and other places know as the gentlemen’s entertainment houses.  This special select group, the gentleman houses became known as “Shakespeare’s Row”.  During the South’s Antebellum Era prostitution ranked high in the South.  Later a ban was placed on these establishments calling it disorderly behavior public or privately.  The fines for “keeping a disorderly house” ranged from $10 to $25; there were no consistent laws on the subject.

It was during mid-1850, when my Aunt Molly and Modena Veste found themselves in Mobile near the waterfront, a distant cousin passed away, and the Veste twins inherited a hotel on the waterfront and Shakespeare’s Row.  Neither Molly nor Modena wavered from having a good time.  When they inherited the Hotel, the entire family encouraged them to turn their lives around and make a living running it as an upper-class establishment, a boarding house for the elite who visited Mobile frequently. 

They called their inherited property, “The Veste Gentleman’s Club and their dreams quickly became a reality.  They did not identify themselves with the Shakespeare Row prostitutes, but they did discover their need to pander with men.  Of course, the sisters paid well and this was a draw to get some of the most beautiful Southern Bells to work for them.

These two young women catered to the wealthy, card playing, cigars smoking and liquor-drinking gentleman and women.  Upon paying a substantial monthly fee to join the Veste Gentleman’s Club, a daily fee deposited at the door would give the gentleman their choice of available “Ladies of Pleasure” or “Ladies of Easy Virtue” for one hour. The city agreed to turn their heads to these nightly “Whore Parties” as the Clergy of Mobile called them, for a reasonable property tax!  A wink and a nod condoned and protected prostitution at the Veste Hotel for almost 50 years. 

Therefore, Miss Molly and Miss Modena brought the red-light district to all of the larger cities in Alabama.  The Veste Gentlemen Clubs were some of the few buildings left standing when the Yankee troops pilfered their way through the South.  The women that worked in the hotel were not cheap, and a visit to the bed of the Veste sisters’ could be costly.

©2019.elizabethannjohnsonmurphree

The characters in this material is fiction, a creation of the writer’s imagination, it is not intended to be no more than a work of fiction. uote;\lsdsemih

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Artwork by Elizabeth Ann Johnson-Murphree Acrylics and Watercolor on canvas.

It worked…#40

I had to revisit my blog to let everyone know that the “little nitty gritty” blog filler worked. I made a cup of coffee…and the words returned to me. I have to share those first few words with all of you. I will be gone from tomorrow 5/8 to 5/20. Those of you who are mothers enjoy your day.

GENERATIONS OF SECRETS AND LIES – Working Title

In the cold damp room soft moans came from the young woman lying on the bed; she was a skeleton covered with pale flesh; beneath her, a cornhusk mattress covered with a collection of old newspapers and worn out sheets made from bleached flour sacks; waiting for the reality of the coming birth.

Her strength gone, she looked out the window at the moon hovering over the top of a row of pine trees; it gave the appearance of hanging on an invisible thread in the shadows of the western sky.  She prayed to whom she thought might be holding the moon in place another invisible person…GOD.  In the waning March moonlight tears fell from the corner of her eyes the pain unbearable, finally, the birth was over; she looked at the motionless baby at the foot of the rusty iron bed; maybe it was dead, or would die soon.  Still she heard no crying.  

“Miss Ruth you have a baby girl,” Allimay Schumaker their neighbor and a mid-wife whispered softly as she tried to place the baby in her mother’s arms. 

“Get it away from me”, the sound came between clenched teeth, like a caged wild animal, yet, it was only a whisper.

 “She so tiny Miss Ruth, I doubt she will live don’t you want to hold her”.

                “I told you to get it away from me”.

So it continues

Love and Peace

Elizabeth

https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=elizabeth+ann+johnson-murphree

The below artwork painted by Author in Acrylics

Writing…staring at the blank page…#39

AUTHOR’S NOTE: After spending the morning staring at the blank page I thought of Anne Lamott who wrote an entire book called “Bird by Bird”…if you are a writer and have not read her books do so, you will find how she feels about writing “the shitty first draft”.

I find that thinking of the many “shits” in the world sometimes allow my brain to be kick started and put the first word on that blank page. Yes I know it not the best but it serves its purpose for me.

Let me see in the senile stage the many kinds of shit there are: Goose shit, Fish shit, Elephant shit, Wildebeest shit, Horse shit, Caterpillar shit, Rhinoceros shit, Bird shit, and then there is Chicken shit.

Whale shit, I have never seen, Fly shit I see clinging to the door screen, Wolf shit, Giraffe shit gathers speed as it falls, Turtle shit is dotting the earth as it eliminates during a slow crawl. 

Shark shit, rarely seen as they are vicious, quick and mean, camel shit is ghastly dry by the time it hits the sand getting covered by desert flies.  Alligator shit is a massive green, the shit you see, the alligator makes its way quick and clean.

Chigger shit is so tiny and small; you could be sitting on it and never care at all.  Baboon shit you want to stay clear, it will pick it up and toss it into your ear.  Redheaded Woodpecker shit is my favorite of all, it pecks a hole, fills it with shit and the tree grows strong and tall.

A playful poem may be the best of all; you hit and run with it…before the “shit” hits the wall.

Love and Peace

Elizabeth

©elizabethannjohnsonmurphree

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=ann+johnson-murphree&ref=nb_sb_noss

Debris…#38

Within the soul emotions abound, both fear and truths stored out of sight behind invisible doors.  Filtering the mind is the only way; it may stop the possibility of getting lost in the fog of yesterday.

Clear the mind and soul of clutter, congestion and conflict; free it, keeping such thoughts will create an existence into which one will be doomed.  Knowing self-value is the first step for the soul to hear freedoms call; living in the “now” is the only way to tear down internal prison walls.

Love and Peace

Elizabeth

©2019.elizabethannjohnsonmurphree

Casualties of Our Times…#37

The homeless cannot sleep on cold nights, they gather around a burning barrel, men, women and children, forgotten, shattered and despised.  In the distance, a baby cries.  Begging for food, living on the streets, no jobs, family no longer sound. 

Government talks end up in contradictions, poverty is the prediction.   The spirit freezes, fruit of labors rot, life squeezes and struggles persist.   Bad luck smothering heart and soul, hope ceases to exist. 

Shifting winds turn into storms, will the world grow wiser or beaten back into servility?  Trust departed, a cardboard box in the streets is where the homeless make their beds, hope disappears and the future appears dead.

Love and Peace

Elizabeth

©2019.elizabethannjohnsonmurphree

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