With ax and hoe they carved it up
For Eden they sailed the sea
Then met a man and filled his cup
For that was all his plea
He spoke to them so eloquent
Of home so far away
And was it really common sense
To honor and obey?
A favorite of the general
Good judge of character he
He let Tom Paine seduce him
And so on Christmas Eve
The Englishman, new patriot
Spoke of the trying times
And how blood spilled as sacrifice
Turned living souls divine
The turning point, a paradox
The ragged men replied
They slipped across the Delaware
Their hearts and souls refined
The spy thought surely ... this will be the night
When they are overrun
And England she'll achieve her lofty goal
To make the world as one
To celebrate the baby's birth
Peace born in Bethlehem
The Hessians were merry to celebrate
The colonists slipped in
The blood ran freely in the snow
From throats and feet unshod
And Trenton fell to Patriots on Christmas Eve
Their battered souls for God
Painters and writers inspired
Made Washington royalty
Though he missed the spy within his ranks
And near lost liberty
Did we know there were plans
To draw us into war
Before colonials trained?
Paine's Common Sense -- the door?
A publishing sensation
The friend of Franklin he
Paid copies found in every hand and home
Of the sons of liberty
When Paine went home to England
When all his ink was dry
The war was lost, but he was paid
A traitor or a spy?
No demons in the new world ... not a weed
Till Europeans came
And brought with them the seeds and smallpox germs
Their boots and hands were blamed
Meanwhile Paine dispatched to France
To help them with their cause
To rally with his words the Third Estate
And win the Crown's applause
Instead he won a cell in Luxembourg
His head would soon be lost
But Jefferson, the statesman, intervened
And paid the scoundrel's costs
In bed with he who would have killed them
American Trinity
Washington, Franklin and Jefferson
Despite you ... liberty
And Paine who had extolled man's reason
And cursed Christ he once praised
Reconsidered that ... and died alone
No friend of liberty
We want to think the best of us
And praise these noble gents
Who courted a spy from England
While they feigned providence.
We want to think the best of us
By demi-gods inspired
An infant drew for Washington a pentagram
Naive and evil ... the patriot liar.
by Randall Carter Gray
As much as admirers of Houdini were convinced he could dematerialize. Trick gear shows otherwise
HARRY HOUDINI, whose real name was Eric Weiss, was the son of a rabbi, and arguably a messiah-like 'superman' who inspired immigrants yearning for freedom and success. Houdini was beloved by all who knew him. Toward the end of his career, with his hair beginning to show touches of gray, he devoted his time to entertaining sick children in hospital. He may have been murdered by friend turned foe Sir Arthur Conan Doyle of Sherlock Holmes fame. Sir Arthur was a spiritualist, close friends with several mediums, and convinced that Houdini could dematerialize. And Houdini thought Sir Arthur was a nut and said so -- which is a credit to Houdini's craft, in the sense that it is, after all, just illusion. The author of the enormously popular Sherlock Holmes stories was a practitioner of the occult, and who knows, he may very well have seen ghosts in the presence of these mediums, hence his strong reaction to Houdini's debunking efforts. Doubtful, however, that any "Watchers" (in Purgatory?) could be produced at will, or that they could ring a bell or do other spectacular tricks. Sir Arthur was too smart a man to fall for spiritualism unless his occultic experiences produced tangible results; and they very likely did. Houdini's medical records from a Detroit hospital where he was treated after allegedly being punched in the stomach, rupturing his appendix, are highly suspect in light of the marked indication for the appendix on the medical chart on the "left" side. Any legitimate health care professional would have readily known the appendix is found only on the right side. No autoposy was ever performed, and, Houdini's body was placed in one of his trick caskets made of bronze, placed on a train and whisked to New York before the family knew what had happened to the famed magician's body. Houdini may have been poisoned. Was Houdini a forerunner of anything or anyone? Arguably, histoty often appears to be constructed as art.
TANATA: Things (often) Are Not As They Appear
- Randall Carter Gray
- Signal Mountain, Tennessee, United States
- student of Coptic and Judaic studies, gentleman (amateur) scholar