Juneteenth — Fireworks — Fireflies
Southside — Westside — Superfly

To keep it all safe—communication encrypted
For some weeks by that point I had felt anarchistic
I got my car fixed so I became convicted 

Another evening of work at Cook County Jail
The revolution of giving free rides in our cars
To people they free after paying their bond

We were a flow of young faithful, 
Pushed by pressure of moment
Through the city’s dark channels to its cold concrete heart:

The biggest jail in the country. A couple years back
I had been there before — back when Z was the leader
Who went into the warehouse to fight for the workers

At Amazon. They ship everything to everyone
He told me a strike would be 7 years yet
But the pandemic pushed the workers to act

It was him and some students out of Simeon High School
The young Southside vanguard worked with Z at the warehouse
They tasked me with finding legal factors and risks

So I called the thin lawyer, who’d conducted my wedding
He grew up in the same part of town as the pigs
He always advises: “the cops default to fascist”

But assessed what he thought they’d be likely to do
We struggled with the suggestion of offering cigs
But offered enough to get our moments of opening

Conversations about the truth of County and cops
People done with their day in our most miserable place
But rationale of recruiting made it not worth the time

For the group with its image of organized power
It was my last straw when it came to such schemes
It’s not structure I saw out in front of the jail.

Just who got out. I’m not greedy or foolish
To make just one moment where I might be useful
I have water and ways and a sense of the flow 

So the day of the looting, I thought of the lock-up
In the street I saw people running, jumping, and striking
There’s no washing in County, what CO would allow it

Do you know how cold they keep it in there?
Have you heard of the smells and the sounds of the screams?
And I know civil unrest will make the pigs more resentful

So should I go out after sundown and bike through the Southside?
Get over to Wentworth with gloves and Purell?
Was I a particle pushed by counter-gradient pressure?

Til now though my flow was not to the forefront
Such sideline support had taken three different forms:
Sunday 5/31 we flowed through our Main Street

Kept Purell supplied and safely wore masks
Appreciated by some, seemed we missed the arrests
It was the eye of the eddy between the smashing and marching

Then with the Meeting we held space for the peaceful
Quiet with candles we got honks and hassles
We carried our sword as long as we could

More lately in hats with the Legal Observers
I keep my eye on the cops and flow with the crowd
On the literal sidelines it gives a purpose and stake

The Muslims are marching like the movie The Message
They brought wheelchairs for their elders and water for all
The police had blockades all around their HQ

George Floyd deserves justice but it’s still day of Jum’ah
They pressured the cops to make room for prostration
“Get this salt truck out of the way while we worship!”

Families prayed and some chanted “abolish police!” 
The white shirt commander was short Irish and skinny
Supposed to focus on cops but I ran into some friends

I tried to talk to Sofia but my mask made it tricky
Abdallah who could have been communist cadre
As a sous chef he has some opinions on endive

Same day as the march I rose at three in the morning
Obama’s opponents had built a tent city
Demanding housing instead of developer pork

Me and the green hats kept vigil by moonlight
Unbothered by cops it was just supervised camping
When I left all the old heads were still chewing the fat

Then, on a Friday, we broke bread with the brothers
The old fellow farers in battle, the fight for the future
Our disappointed comrades from the Bernie campaign

We picnicked in front of the “Kumbayah Co-op”
Home to the Colonel of our whole campus campaign group
The first time since defeat we assembled again

We had frozen and wandered in the Iowa winter
The Colonel was born in that battleground state
He captained a caucus and got us campaign connections 

We had marshalled our best but come up bust sadly
After Missouri and Michigan I knew it was over
And spread of disease drained the hope from the world

So here we gather on grass in front of the Co-op
Divide the dishes with distance and divine what we can
A council of friends formed to feel out the future

I seek the Colonel’s advice, I offer up olives
He had already joined the work at the jail
He’s a real sincere stoner, notice his stillness

But exactly the guy to jump in and take action
He meditates silent but is the loudest on pickets
Early the next morning he got me in the groupchat

He gave impression I would have one whole day’s notice
But when I get in the mix there’s a crisis emerging
A round-up of hundreds on a “delivery” charge

After the looting they’d been watched for a week
The comrades seem flooded and needed a driver
So with permission from partner I made ready to go

Once the car started rolling I had to get on the phone
The attorney I work for had told me to tell him
About any repression protest arrestees reported

I related the whole weird “delivery” round-up
“Watch out for the cops” who he’d heard had been pushy
“If you need to,” he said, “you can make use of my name”

Van Morrison played on the college radio station
The sun set and I listened til the sound static’d out
HPK’s signal doesn’t spread too far west

I flowed down Chicago’s industrial colon
I pass warehouses and car shops down by the canal
It always makes me think of organized crime

I went under the viaduct and switched to CD
Curtis Mayfield the last thing I‘d apparently played
Superfly overture as I pulled up to jail in the sunset

There’s the obvious tent and good place to pull up
Under the shelter is a surfeit of snacks
Sanitary supplies, pens and binders for planning

Of the three in the tent one was a quite tiny zoomer
One older and broader, with overalls and kind-eyes
And a third bone thin, with dark skin and bleached hair

His eyes were kind but afraid. “Ah, this is Andres”
I was able to think thanks to alert in the chat
They had said a visitor who was “clearly unwell” 

When I arrived he was decently sweet and serene
But obscure meaning, he kept on about lawyers
Claimed to have contacts in the White House

“To Arizona.” He stressed over and over
“I want to go to the airport”
He said that his sister was building a house

There was scarce instruction but the mission was simple
Overalls guy had kind eyes but a hint of suspicion
I kept asking questions about how the thing worked

Two guys got out who got hit with “delivery”
One a bald tweaker, one old bluesy and black
They got their refreshments and rides, we were pretty well staffed

With Overalls, Savina, and Mikaela the zoomer
Were there with me and Friend Andres, from then on few releases
Andres attracted more and more our attention

With the famous fireworks of June 2020 in force
He panicked and cried, we looked for some ear plugs
Now and then he’d be needy or just wander off

Overalls said it was ok though he had gotten aggressive
“Much like Mary.” He gestured a way
Off to the side where she had sat all the evening

Apparently she also had mood swings
But could at least be predicted, a plan for her day
With parochial school manners she would ask us for snacks

Savina got there just a little bit later
She was a mainstay of the effort and a little maternal
She spent a lot of the time talking to Andres

He had tags on his wrist but I never got a good look
We tried to call family but they were “far away” 
And took no responsibility on them. He eventually left.

When my guy got out he had the tell-tale baggie, wore red
The bulls cap et cetera, but he almost ran off
After using one of our phones for a call

He hustled to get himself homeward by bus
Smiling he saw us but I don’t blame any who book it
We’re some nice enough hippies but I’d want to go home

Like many at first he offered to pay
The crowning moment for us, we get to correct him
I asked and he said that he lived on the Southside

All good, I could drop him and get myself home
My one condition that he go on wearing a mask
“No it’s all good” he said, an agreeable guy

Time to acquit myself driving in my idealist Uber
He said he was going to 79th St.
Only 25 blocks down from my part of town

The road by the jail took me away from the highway
I stayed on the surface 35th to Dan Ryan
He lauded the project, I talked about my work for the lawyer

The efforts against supposed “extremist” entrapment
What the Bureau resorts to to justify budgets
I said never talk to the FBI and he laughed

We analyzed the ongoing firework onslaught
He said he couldn’t wait until after The Fourth
He saw the bus by the red line but I got him to Cottage

Shortly before Cottage we talked Carbondale
My downstate hometown. “ah word? My whole family is there”
His name was BJ and I bid him good night

The night was warm and well peopled 
Off the glowing corners of Cottage
In sleepy Hyde Park you forget such a city

Street life is for living, even during pandemic
At night on The Nine they are having their thrills
I don’t get it twisted, it is what it is

In a sense a city is a hydraulic system
People are pumped along probability vectors
Maybe outliers us along less likely lines

The day of these actions was known as “Juneteenth”
A celebration of emancipation’s arrival
A sinew of time in midst of all made anew

In June 2020 it was decreed and described
But believe it or not I forgot while assisting
My practice was presence, pure and sweet

They say and they see how all these days will seem later
As history lesson or hieroglyphical seal
I set it all down not to get sentimental
But to record and remember the raggedy real