SOLITARY OUTLAW - the sequel

"Pushed into an unlighted room,
the door banged (shut) and locked for ever;
I shall then have to light a lamp
of aggressive voltage in my mind,
to keep at bay the night."
Wyndham Lewis
from "The Solitary Outlaw"
by B.W.Powe

"But, the winds of power routinely snuff out such egoism. Differences and dissent, tolerated in theory, pose a threat to those, who want to shape opinion. Lewis' independent flame, which he believed resembled a blow torch, was almost blown out.

Risking the powers allied against you: this is the code of awareness. Lewis demonstrated that freedom of speech is a matter of who manages the media, who controls access to the public. He dramatized throughout his cantankerous career that debate matters; and, that if you talk truly to others as individuals, those who overhear will, however briefly, be powerless. He stated again that the worst crime for a citizen is to be unobservant, petty, asleep. He tested the limits of the intellectual's liberty, in the post-war west.

Now, the problems he spotlighted are more insidious. The drama of the word plays to an empty house. The solitary outlaw is both the writer and the reader. They are engaged in a strange exchange that is clandestine, even subversive; not at all in the best interest of an impulse-driven society, suspicious of privacy!"
B.W.Powe

SPIRIT WARRIORS
by Stephen McPhail (inspired by Black Elk)

FROM THE CENTRE OF THE WORLD
CLEARLY SEE THAT WHAT WE DO...
IS LIKE A SHADOW ON THE GROUND
WHILE OUR VISION IS WHAT'S TRUE...

OH GREAT SPIRIT, HELP US TO SWAY
AS BLOOMING BLOSSOMS ON YOUR TREE...
WE PERFORM OUR DANCE OF POWER
NOURISHED BY LIFE'S MYSTERY...

SEASONS RAIN FOR CRYING THINGS
HELP THEM GROW TO STAND UP TALL...
SPIRIT WARRIORS LAUGH AT THOSE
WHO KEEP TRYING TO MAKE US SMALL...

FROM THE CENTRE OF THE WORLD
GROWS AN ETERNAL FLOWERING TREE...
FULL OF LEAVES & SINGING BIRDS
IT'S THE SOUL OF BEING FREE...