South

Maxwell’s Silver Hammer

“Joan was quizzical; studied pataphysical

Science in the home.

Late nights all alone with a test tube.

Oh, oh, oh, oh.

Maxwell Edison, majoring in medicine,

Calls her on the phone.

“Can I take you out to the pictures,

Joa, oa, oa, oan?”

But as she’s getting ready to go,

A knock comes on the door…”

Do you know the story of Victor? Did you empathize with his heartache? Could you fault him for delving into his experiments as an escape from his sorrow? Seriously…have you heard this story? The one about the young scientist chipping away at human limitation, one oversized limb at a time? Can you imagine yourself as the engineer of such a destructive force? Do you know the story of Victor and the creature that destroyed things that did not understand him? Do you know the story of the creature that came to be known as Frankenstein? Surely you know how this creature evokes fear and revulsion amongst the “civil” world? Do you know the story of Victor Frankenstein, the creator of a savage that has taken the brunt of the burden for his own indiscretion?

They’re hopeless, and want what you have. They want your opportunity, your privilege, your resources; hell, they’ll settle for your general right to exist. What they have is a set of very limited options and detrimental influences. They’re hopeless, and will TAKE what you have, right? If that were even possible. If they weren’t confined to the South Side of Chicago, tucked conveniently away and left to prey on each other, that is. The savages- by design- have their habitat, and you have yours.

Has history painted Victor in nearly the same light as his creation? Or has the iniquity fallen solely on a creature that struggled to come to terms with such a dismal reality? Why is there no outcry for the lack of opportunity by those with the ability to provide such? Why is one viewed as a sympathetic figure, while the other has been labeled a savage nuisance? Furthermore, why is their so-called “barbarity” met with a convenient obliviousness? Why is their existence condemned?

Accountability rarely falls onto those in position to create change. That responsibility somehow falls onto those trapped in an environment of someone else’s creation. Savages created and placed in less than ideal conditions…

Victor eventually came to understand the error in his judgment. His recklessness afforded him a place as the victim. Hindsight has deemed him the tragic genius. He was unfortunate enough to create something that should not have been and a system in place that he himself would object to. He is pitied, while the true victims are admonished. But pointing out that dichotomy is frowned upon…

The protests and discussions are all well and fine. Town halls to address Black on Black violence open a very important dialogue, but where do YOU go after you leave these conventions? Home, away from the turmoil that surrounds the very people you claim to “educate” and “help”. Weird how quickly hollow intelligence dissolves into an obtuse, sheltered, wiggity-wack bunch of fuckboys, huh?

Yet you come and tell them they’re all a bunch of insensible animals…

Trapped. Isolated. Far-removed. But THEY’RE the ones lacking self-awareness…

Do you remember when the savage murdered Frankenstein’s family? You don’t, because that literary device just may make you face your guilt. And who wants that when deflecting is simpler, right? Right??

You remember the monster. You remember the damage, disruption, and disorder. The unabashed anger and brazen savagery from this beast. But do you remember how he was created? South Side wasn’t made by Us; it was created.

A.J. Armstrong is the creator of The Fly Hobo and His World of Oddities

Obstructed

Little Andre knew there was something more. Rather, he felt there was. He had no idea what caused these thoughts to bounce around in his dreams; his intuition oftentimes caused him to lose sleep. On those nights, he would just stare out into the Southwest Atlanta night, beyond the terrace sprawling below him and past the apartment buildings stretching around him. Every now and again, a young boy would enter his frame of focus, but the image was always a blip of faint light that barely registered. This feeling would cut through all the distracting images flowing into his room and deafened the noises that accompanied them. Andre had it all figured out; he just didn’t know it yet.

Sasha took it all in. Everything competed for her attention and she enjoyed walking amongst the commotion. Her foundation was in this concrete jungle. Life began here and Sasha never figured- nor was she taught- that it could end elsewhere. These few blocks were comforting and provided a pleasant shroud of ignorance.

Sasha loved Andre because he was tall and funny. He liked to talk about things she didn’t quite understand, but she enjoyed the way he said them. They would sit out in the terrace and he would sometimes just sit there with an odd look on his face. Sometimes he would look directly at Sasha and she would look down as if she was searching for an answer to a question. She never really knew what his eyes wanted to know and maybe she should have felt uncomfortable, but she never did. She would just search and, for a few seconds, his gaze silenced the world.

Andre loved Sasha but felt an unexplainable sadness when he thought about her. He loved her spirit and vigor, but wished she could truly take it all in. He never understood how to live in the moment and was taken by Sasha’s ability to do so. She always seemed in such a rush to go nowhere, though. That’s why his favorite memories of her were always in that terrace; it was as close to subdued Sasha would ever seem to be. It was in those moments Andre could steal a few prolonged glances into her eyes. They were beautiful and busy and resigned to never leaving these few blocks. He knew growing apart was inevitable; he just hated that he couldn’t do a thing about it.

One particularly starry night, he sat quietly on a bench staring beyond them while she simply glanced in passing while resting in the only place in the world that mattered. The distance between them was never as abundantly clear than when Andre turned and asked Sasha what she wanted out of life.

“Baby girl, you ever think about what you wanna do when you get grown?”

“What you mean?”

“Just like…what you wanna be when you grow up?”

“…Alive.”

Andre looked directly into those busy eyes, hoping she was only downplaying her plans. It broke his heart to see that she wasn’t. He cast his stare back above the buildings that surrounded them both…

Time went on. They got grown. Andre returned home only to find Little Sasha was gone; her mama said she was ‘with some nigga that be treating her wrong’. It was saddening but not the least bit surprising. That summertime exchange on the bench all those years back had forced him to stop denying what he already knew. All the noises and blips of faint light that had harmlessly danced about Andre’s room swallowed Sasha whole long before she had realized it.

That bench is still in the middle of that terrace and whenever Andre comes to visit, he sits and thinks about Sasha. He also thinks about how those stars seemed to pull him away from his environment, even if only in his mind for a few detached moments. That was usually followed by the tinges of sorrow for those that could never find escape in them and preferred to remain distracted by their realities. However, like Sasha, these thoughts were relegated to the terrace and those buildings. They were left to linger as Andre stood up and walked off into that beautiful unknown.

A.J. Armstrong is the creator of The Fly Hobo and His World of Oddities