Excerpt--Spoken Word Prose

The Second Line is also a performance piece in development as a one man show combining excerpts from The Second Line with Shakespearean monologue. The book also provides the basis for an upcoming musical theatrical production featuring the members of the Hot 8 Brass Band. In this excerpt you can hear how easily the words might transfer to the stage...

‘The folk of my city are some strange’ I thought, ‘and I am the same, sitting here scribbling, giving strangers names and reasons for living.'

Saint Rita ran through a burst of rain on Piety and stopped in the sun at Independence. Big Easy weather is unfettered by logic or common sense.

Then a baby roach broke my focus on nature’s impetuosity as it scurried across the bottom of the window sill. I said aloud, “go ‘head with your nasty ass,” then leaned to the side and let his little body pass. “Hey pocky way!”

I thought to smash the thing but Papa Fat said “Nooo. You aint no better than that roach. He is our dishonored elder on Earth. Him and his kin witnessed dinosaurs give birth and you’d best believe they will trample over you, me, and all of humanity once we turn to dirt. See, while we giants wander the world fussing and tussling, bugs go about their business of hustling, always up to something. Despite the weather, in wars and in peace, through trouble and in the rubble left behind, little things remain still. They must be in God’s grace, or just goddamn hard to kill.’