River of Community

A wind moved over the face of the waters. 
Moved over the faceless Deep.
And over the formless void  Moved over waters. . .
waters that didn't know their place 

Long ago, an ancient poet wrote about the creation,

The Genesis story presents us with powerful images
reflecting the world view of the Hebrew people
The Creator acts upon  chaos, upon  water,
upon formless void               
to bring forth dry land.

The poet has God say
"let the waters under the sky
be gathered together into one place,
and let the dry land appear.

And it was so.
God called the dry land Earth
and the waters that were gathered together         
God called Seas. 

Such a striking image of water!
Water as the primordial stuff
upon which the creator acted. 
Before this world forming act,  water wasn't in its place.
Water was everywhere. 
Water overwhelmed boundaries,
the poet depicts this water as chaos.

Thus went the myth of origin for the ancient Jews.
Order from chaos.
Land from Water.

I know what that poet was talking about.
I have seen water disordered, out of place,
engulfing everything in sight.
When I was a child,
I saw the waters rise,
and I saw the usual Order overturned,
if only for a moment in time.
Let me tell you about being six, and knowing a River.

My father worked as a construction worker
During the World War II, the demands for construction workers were intense
and we moved frequently
from project to project

When the war was over we moved to Dallas,
My father's family was centered in Dallas,
My first clear memories as a child are of Dallas.

There was this river in Dallas
and our neighborhood was right on the River.

Our river was the called the Trinity,
Like Langston Hughes,  I've known Rivers,but the Trinity was the first river I knew,
it made an impression on me.  As I recall most of the time the Trinity was nothing
to brag about.

In the Fall and in the Winter too, I would walk to school along the almost dry bed of that river.

That was more fun than going by way of the streets.
On the other side of the River,
I could see other children.

Those boys and girls would also be going to school,
to their different school.
We could see them,
but we never exchanged words
across the chasm of that almost dry river.

In the mid-Summer school was out,
and the river was a placid, slow moving, muddy thing.
On a hot summer night,
whole families would be down by the river,

On the other side of the river,
other families would gather,
but the community was divided,
and we did not mingle.
You see one side of the river
lived the  African-American community.

One the other lived White folk.

The African-American people were called
"the Colored" back then.
Dallas was segregated,  the system was called Jim Crow.

My family was mixed race, father had Cherokee in his background,

so in the never, never land of Jim Crow Dallas,
we weren't "Colored," and we weren't White.
There was another name they called us,
but that for another day.

All public facilities were designated Negro or white.
It was the law.
Adult white people maintained
and reproduced these arrangements.

Children were told to keep in their place,
to keep on their own side of the river,
and we went to white schools,
we sat at the front of the bus,
we drank from white drinking fountains.

It was considered rude, rowdy, disrespectful
to the Colored people, not to keep in our place,
and the White folk not to keep in theirs.

Children were told, "things are better,  when people keep in their place."

The World War had ended.but it wasn't forgotten.
The war had ripped youngsters out of the communities
on both sides of the river.
I remember seeing photographs of young men,
young men still called "my big boy,"
displayed in their childhood pictures,
next to photographs of the same boys in their uniforms,
their growing up pictures displayed as little shrines
on neighbors' living room coffee tables.

Big boys who would never come home.

Portia was the African American Woman
who came over the bridge to take care of us,
while my mother
tended by badly burned brother at the Shriner's.

Portia had lost a husband in the World war.
and she was raising small children,  who I came to know.
We were not rich, but Portia
and her family were poor indeed,  and uneducated.
Portia did not read,
and books were not part of her children's life

My parents said it was the separation
that made it like that.
They said the separation was wrong.

But our neighbors said it was the way things were.
No use fretting about things you can't change.
"things are better,  when people keep in their place."

The bus stop to downtown
was on the South side of the river.
African Americans would walk across the bridge
and stand at the bus stop with white people.
No one had thought of segregating
the bus stop. 

I remember that soldiers home on leave
from the North side of the River
stood at the bus stop
in their ironed khaki uniforms
with their black polished shoes,
same as the G.I.s from the South side of the River.
There were white people who didn't think it was right,
them dressing " 'them coloreds'  up like white soldiers.

My Dad had brought home a gun,  a surplus carbine.
he was so proud, 
he had got it "dirt cheap"  he said.

The people kept saying;
The Reds were coming,  there would be another war.
The Russians apparently didn't know their place either,
"things are better,  when people keep in their place."

My mother told him;
"don't bring that thing inside the house."
Father kept it in the truck.

Men would gather by a field by the River
with their army surplus carbines
and practice shooting.
At cans,  at rats, a rocks.

Mother said don't go down to the River
when the men are shooting.
I knew she didn't approve.

Now most of the time the Trinity was nothing,
at most a creek in a big river bed.

But in the Spring, the Trinity would rise.
Full of rushing muddy water
it would splash at the bridges
and backup the storm gutters.
Then it was a mighty river.
It wasn't any creek in the Spring - it was chaos.
water out of its place,

Easter 1949,  the Trinity rose.
Overflowed its banks.
Water rushed up the streets
and over the porches and up to people's houses.
Water, brown, gushing water;
water up to a little boys middle,
surged and flooded blocks South and North.
Into kitchens, into bedrooms, into living rooms
with their war memorial coffee tables.

Many adults went out into the waters,
helping people out of their homes
on both sides of the river.

Black and white,  and mixed,
men and women
worked together against the flood.
The ordinary conventions of segregation were put aside. 
They all seemed to know
where their place was in that moment,

working to help,
working to restore people to their homes.

Who were these people,
these people who in ordinary times
had gone along with the convention,  with Jim Crow,
but who in this crisis,
reached toward  greatness,
transcended the conventional?
They were pretty much like most people,  I suppose.

The river didn't divide the communities that Spring.
North side and South side were together
in the surging, muddy river.

Fifty three years have passed.
I am no longer a little boy.
Yet, Over and over again
I have experienced
the two side-ness of the human experience

One the one hand habits of elitism, and sexism,
racism and tribalism, divide us, set us apart.

And on the other hand, over and over again,
we discover our common humanity.

Do we need a flood?  Do we need a catastrope?
How can create a culture of peace
how can we learn to be human together.

Fifty three years have passed.
The experience of Jim Crow Dallas
the experience of being separated
and then seeing people come together
was I think a formative experience in my life.

What can we do to overcome the divisions
that endanger our world?

I believe building communities of purpose is one thing I can do
Unitarian Universalist congregations
that seek to welcome the stranger,
Unitarian Universalist congregations
that help each of grow and change

It may not seem like the grand reform,
but I believe that real change comes from the grass roots,
individuals learning to be community together.

It will take thousands upon thousands millions of grass roots efforts
religious communities are a good place to begin,
but I envision workplaces and neighborhoods as well,
it may seem like a far away dream,
but I do believe that a time will come when
diversity will not mean devisiveness,
when difference will not mean hostility,
but when world community will be realized.