Red's CD Project Part 12

Note: Well, this is the end. I won't say much here because I think I'll type up an afterward talking about the entire project in the next couple of days. I may do that instead of a 1,001 album list this week. Snake still needs to do an encore for last week anyway. I hope you've enjoyed reading this journey half as much as I have enjoyed writing it. 

Disc 2

Track 16
Redemption Song
Bob Marley and the Wailers
Legend

Won’t you help to sing these songs of freedom? Cause all I ever have redemption songs.

The two days to follow similar attacks were successful in both New York and Los Angeles. The country’s three biggest cities were cast into turmoil with the police force in each decimated. The National Guard was stretched thin. Crime waves swept through the cities like the evening tide over a sandy beach.

Even worse, hate spread like wildfire. Fingers pointed everywhere. Angry families of the slain formed mobs that marched through the cities burning and pillaging everything and everyone.

Finally on the third day, Abdul stood up via a taped speech delivered to NBC news. Hal watched alone and in silence in the living room. Mary was still packing things at her parents’ home. When the broadcast ended, Hal went to a drawer and removed the letter. It was late afternoon and a steady spring breeze blew across the farmyard.

Hal walked down the gravel lane that led to the barn thinking about how Abdul had looked on TV. Abdul had rambled on and on until he brought out the pictures.

He held one up to the camera.

“For this, I do this.”

He put the picture down and lifted a second.

“For the blood spilt upon this sajada, I do this.”

He flicked the picture away. Abdul took a momentary look at the third picture. His face contorted. The millions of Americans watching thought it was the face of a maniac, Hal knew it as the face of man whose heart was breaking again.

“For her, I declare jihad against the world that let this happen.”

The picture turned to the screen and the image faded away. The news anchor appeared ready to spin the tape. The anchors talked about the man and the possibility of a holy war.
The pictures faded from consciousness of the media and America.

Hal reached the spot in the field and the sun fell behind a cloud. He opened the letter and read.

Dear Misba,

I believe my freedom rests in your hands now my love. I have told you that I am compelled. Hate fuels my dreams through the night. I envision the world burning at my toes and I feel my heart taking pleasure in the flames.

But, when I think of you, I feel the jets of water quelling the heat and I am content. The compulsion for great evil only smolders in the embers of tiny coals instead of in the giant torrents of a mighty blaze.

They are releasing me this morning and I plea for you to meet me the day you receive this letter.

Come away with me then and be my wife. Let us, you and I, flee and leave the night behind. Let us outrun the howl of the wolf and leave the snake’s hiss behind. Perhaps, we will return to the garden and begin again.

Maybe the Christians are right. That freewill exists. We can choose our destiny and not be prodded toward to it. Perhaps, we can prove that true. Perhaps, I can turn this rage into love.

Perhaps.

Abdul

Hal read the letter aloud one last time before taking a lighter from his pocket and lighting it. He dropped the paper to the ground of the field. It curled in the heat before the breeze came along and blew the ashes up. They danced for a moment in a swirl of air and then skipped away across the field.


Disc 2
Track 17
The Wind
Cat Stevens
The Very Best of Cat Stevens

I listen to the wind. To the wind of my soul. Where I end up I think, only God really knows

Hal let the chest’s lid close softly. He snapped it shut and with it all the memories of the past few months seemed to settle out of his mind. The things he did would not haunt him. Oh, he thought every spring he’d be compelled out to the field at dusk to stare at the sunset, but no more than that. Every bit of evil in him was concealed in the wooden chest left to collect dust in the attic. He sat peering out the window and the sun hit the rows made by tiny green plants.

The door at the bottom of the stairs opened and Mary walked up. Her hair was matted with sweat, but she still radiated a glow. The kind of glow only a woman has when she’s nurturing life within her. Hal smiled and watched her climb up.

“Whatya doin’ up here?”

“Oh, I was just putting some stuff away. I got caught up looking out at the fields.”

“Yeah, they look OK?”

“Pretty good.”

“Yeah. They going to grow up in big straight rows then.”

“Yep.”

He grabbed her around the waist and planted a kiss on her lips. They smiled and looked out the window together.

“Yep, they’ll grow nice and tall. The crop will be mighty.”

Mary just moaned in approval.

“Then we’ll knock it all down again.”

They stood in the quiet attic for a few minutes looking at the young crop then turned and walked down the stairs.


Disc 2
Track 18
Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World
Israel Kamakawio’ole
Facing Future

I like the dark and I think to myself. What a wonderful world.

Henry hadn’t been home for years. He loathed the way his passive father had floated through life. His mother had been a quiet, humbled woman. She had died when he was 18 from breast cancer. Henry had left home shortly after and not spoken to his father very often.

Henry had been working his way through medical school in California, but he wasn’t that interested in becoming a doctor. It just felt like something he should do. A week ago, he received a letter telling him that his father had died suddenly of a heart attack.

It had taken him a week to get home and his father had already been buried by then. He opened up the old farm house and thought about all the memories of growing up there.

On the kitchen table there was a letter.

Son,

If you take nothing else from here, take the old chest up in the attic.

Dad.

Henry thought the letter was odd. Why would his father leave a note for him if he didn’t know he was coming? His father had not expected to have a heart attack. There was no way for him to know.

Henry scratched his head above his ear and then walked upstairs to get to the attic. When he got there, the dust was thick and irritated the scar on his cheek. He’d been in a bar fight a few weeks ago and a guy cut him with a broken bottle leaving a long curved scar on his cheek.

He found the chest at the top of the stairs and decided to have a look inside before he took it anywhere.

He popped open the old, rusted locks and the musty smell of a long sealed container burst into his nostrils. On top of a heap of artifacts was a white envelope. Henry opened it up and inside was a letter.

Son,

Yet. It’s a small word my son. In fact, as I write this you are not born yet. But you will be and even though no one has told your mother and I the sex of the baby, I know you will be a boy. See, there is a promise in the word ‘yet’.

It’s a promise that brings you here, hopefully many years from now. It’s a promise that is fulfilled generation after generation.

It’s now come to you. I am sure you don’t understand. But you will. You haven’t seen or done anything in your life like this. At least, not yet.

Hal Glock

June 1, 2009

Henry put the letter down with his eyebrows curled. On top of the heap of stuff was an old Polaroid camera. He put his eye to the shutter and a gruesome scene started to play.

After a few minutes, Henry put the camera down. His stomach turned and part of him wanted the heave himself down the steps toward the nearest toilet. But he stayed still. After a couple moments he looked out the window. He could make out the long straight golden rows of the fall corn harvest in the field behind the barn. A grin crept up at the corners of his lips.