Junglist

by Two Fingas

  This is my time, my age, circling within the hearts of darkness, waiting for the millennium to overtake me. Waiting for the madness to erupt again, for the fundamentalists to start us down the road to destruction with their no-compromise rantings. Just waiting. Knowing that I will be in the firing line. That I’m going to be one of those shot to pieces. The young always get it in the head. Why should my generation be any different?

  But that’s all in the future. Right now, right here. I’m dancing, running on the spot, my lighter raised to the ceiling, letting it all hang out. I fear no man, beast or god, for the music surrounds me, makes me strong. Feel the blood thunder in my veins as I reach explosion point, the MC screaming for the rewind, our voices lifted in unison with him. Of the same mind, linked, joined at the heart by the music. Jungle.

  SUNDAY

  “Hail for the rewind. Hail for it.”

  THE RISING

  My life, my life, my life. If you look into my life and see what I’ve seen, sings the radio.

  — Roy Ayers: Mary J — whoever, whatever.

  A revolution occurs every so often on the junction of Loughborough, this argument revolves around samples. The day starts as it will end: the Sunday elders pray for their weekly sins, the cabbies sell their greens to make ends, while the beast inspects the natives in this corner of the plantation.

  Craig’s mind began to spin, slow down, speed up then slow down again as he rose from the dark like a whisper to a scream. Put my head out of the window, he thought. The carbon dioxide in the air and the assurity that no one cares made him feel, I could just kill a man. Police sirens, Jungle bass echoing through the ecosphere, brought reality in like a bad rush. Home is where the hatred is: homes, white-powdered dreams. Home’s a bedsit above a chip shop with a mafioso Greek landlord. He had that dry taste in his mouth, an urge to do, the need to step out, the desire to feel the burning rush of riddim and bass. Phone calls had to be made, venues found, life had found meaning again.

  At that moment a call came in. He refused and allowed the answering machine to do its job. He went back to bed feeling in his heart he was winning this war. It had to come as a turnaround, viewing the horizon and seeing what was a cloud the size of a hand growing. The peaceful road towards high calm and chartless places would be a ghetto dream formed in the smoke of sensi. In this smoke Craig saw the world, felt his itch for cocaine, but coke isn’t it. He wanted to get high cause he didn’t want to feel poor. The ghetto circumstance was like shit on his shoes, so getting high was all so easy and all too sweet. Falling in love was too long, too hard, drawn out, risky, always painful and short-lived. Things had to change.

  Sundays always brought the witnesses of Jehovah at his door prying into his business, preaching a gospel of one sort or another, a gospel Craig felt today he’d rewrite.

  As they pushed the youngest of the group of four to the door, Craig watched through the spy glass waiting to pounce: a sweet girl done up in the glorious Sunday pinks; an ordinary girl, but he knew she was a virgin. Craig made that observation on a basis which reckoned only virgins could play the tambourine in those milieu of choirs outside Brixton tube, and she was it, chief tambourine and triangle organist, the one girl at front singing I’m saving myself for God. The shock would be one day they’d meet a hippie who’d say Hello, I’m the Lord.

  She came up to press the buzzer but, before she had a chance, he opened the door and began.

  — Are there any niggas standing on my door? Let’s see: one nigga, a paki and whitey — sorry: whiteys, plural.

  At first they didn’t know how to take it, but they ignored the statement. To Craig this was a good sign, they were veterans. They began their spiel, begging for souls with loose change and loose minds, Craig waited till they said the key word; God. He then pounced,

  — Let me tell you about God, God was a person, a person from another place, he came to Earth; thought he’d settle down. He knew he’d make a fortune here and has been cleaning up every Sunday.

  Here they began to look around to see how the others were taking it. For the most part these upper-brained, these almost pseudo-Bible-bashing intellectuals were baffled as to the venom of this verbal assault.

  — You wanna know the point? I’ll tell you.

  There was a sigh and a look on their faces: a wish they’d never knocked on this door.

  — The point is oppression. Yes, oppression. Oppression, suppression and repression of the word, a word God created in order that we further fathom and expand thought.

  Craig was speaking in his best tongue and only wearing his best Calvin’s (Klein).

  — Whether the word is bitch, cunt, slag, whore, fuck or cum, they aren’t used. Take this word nigga for instance, it is only a word yet its violence is tantamount to partition of the Red Sea or Abraham burning the marijuana trees. Or more to the point, God never liked too many people — he only ever spoke to Moses, so what the fuck you talking about?

  In fact the Jehovah people were quite relieved when he misquoted scripts from the Bible since they could correct him on his misdemeanours. However he wasn’t stopping.

  — Check it, if the Queen would just go on TV and say Nigga, nigga, nigga, nigga, the world would be an honest place, maybe some little Black kid won’t have cry because now niggas are niggas by appointment of the Queen.

  As a saving grace the posse of Jehovah’s Witnesses made a quick enquiry as to whether a Mr Black lived here and asked him if he’d like a touch from God in a copy of the Watchtower. Craig smiled and said yes, saying in a whisper.

  — You know God touches me… at night… it is quite marvellous.

  Knowing full well a Mr Black didn’t live there, they quickly left, but still Craig stepped out in the street and shouted.

  — Niggas, jews, whiteys! If there’s hell below we’re all gonna go, and anyway, we all know who the devil is, the devil’s the white man!

  He stood there in the street and took a look around. Kids were riding their bikes while parents stole glances to keep track of their young. The trees stood under the gaze of concrete, the clouds made fleeting visits. He began to laugh.

  — It’s all good, it’s all good when you are who you are, it’s all good.

  JUNGLE FEVER

  I lie in my bed, sated — the night over, the music pulsing around me — and wonder. What happens now? Deep thoughts for one so young. But it must be done sooner or later. I lie here contemplating my ceiling, wondering what I was placed here to do, why I am the way I am and when, if ever, will I change. I contemplate this and other things while I try to get off to sleep, my energy level still too high for the nonaction that is sleep. The fever’s in my blood and I can’t get it out. Lie here and think, roll, twist, turn. Think about my life, the high times and the basslines and know that, if I had the chance to do it all again, I’d start smoking a lot sooner, get blunted more often and try like hell to avoid Cassie. Peace.

  HELICOPTER

  Writing my name and graffiti on the wall.

  Greeting old walkways with darkness, a crude affection takes shape, a soul silhouette in the sun, voices drift through the concrete, screams of children racing through the column. Home was once an estate, a mile-high, mile-long tombstone.

  A smell conjures a feeling, a face emerges from the shadows, a face Craig used to know well (time takes its toll in the ghetto), a pram, a young face, she was once Mary and he was Joseph and then there were only six years in their lives. He would smile and share some words but he’s in then out.

  Craig’s mother called, she said Let’s not wait till the waters run dry. She meant let’s talk. The stairs smell, the sun shines yet nothing can warm up this tomb, not even the fires of hell, which, day by day, draw closer to this estate. She said, waters run dry. Craig listened to that message over and over again, hearing her use those words, hearing her voice uneasily speak into a machine hoping to reach her only son.

  Number 30, Craig was surprised but not shocked to find a metal grill guarding the door,
he knocked and there she stood, the smell of home embraced him, the warmth, this home, this tomb, in this city, on this island in Babylon.

  It was good to come home though he could never stay, he held her and hugged for all the love she had. There was reggae in the air and a crowd of aunts asking

  — Cynthia, is that Craig? My, isn’t he handsome?

  — What are you doing now?

  — Have you got a girlfriend?

  — I used to bath you.

  He never understood what they meant by I used to bath you and so they go on. He just smiles and looks at his many pictures that litter the room and hopes they could get their teeth into something else. Cynthia rests herself and the High Council of Women Elders begins. Craig still stands, it feels like an interaction and it seems Craig has no rights: she wants Craig to settle down, they explain his fate if he doesn’t change the errors of his ways. It would seem they care but they never understand. He’s accused of white girls, smoking, dreads, blasphemy, disrespect and Jungle. One aunt stands and does some dance and they fall about laughing. The phone rings, another aunt answers the phone, she knows who it is, she tells them to come down, she puts the phone down and together go for the kill, they tell Craig in no uncertain terms his life will amount to nothing if he carries on his way of life. They say, there are pretty Black girls and jobs, they talk of a good life, a life they’ve never had, always dreamt they’d find, but have now sent their wishes to God who will reply when they die. Craig agrees, he wants what they have all their lives prayed for, but know less how to get it and keep it in a lifetime. He promises, he lies, he lies a big lie, he says what they want to hear. He tells a joke and all’s settled this time. The tempo switches, Marvin Gaye gets a rotation:

  What’s goin’ on?

  What’s happenin’ brother?

  Flying high.

  Out comes the Yam, green banana, rice and peas, chicken, Vimto and Baldwins Sarsaparilla, the best plates and glasses, in this home there’s love and all is well. Marvin sings:

  Can I go to a place where good feelings await me?

  Self-destruction’s in my hand.

  He knows the sufferings of the Black man, he knew them well.

  As all settle, someone knocks the door, someone gets up, Craig makes a move for the wine, Craig goes to fetch a bottle opener but instead finds his past. He finds a shadow of a smile and a face that is the very essence of all Angelito’s negroes.

  — Hello.

  — Hello.

  — If I’d known you were here I’d never have come... I came to see your mum.

  — Well, yeah, thanks, she’s in the sitting room.

  They were only children when they first met, when they first found love, when they first made love.

  ANNA’S SONG

  Glancing from face to face, conversation to conversation, scrutinising every face and movement in the room with a smile of spiritual care, she noticed Craig’s stare, eyeing her every which way. In a moment she panicked, neither one had overcome their feelings and neither one had dealt with them, they broke up ‘cause Craig was excited by the new world he touched. His was and always will be the pleasure principle, the pursuit which left him one day facing the world alone and unhappy, only finding salvation in the pipe, lying low in the Jungle. She got up and held Craig’s mother. Cynthia loved Anna, a love Craig could never understand, but felt perhaps it was like his mother wanted to play with his toys, he found this analogy enough to keep tame his jealousy.

  — My, how the Black girl’s grown.

  She had found strength as a woman and at last she commanded Craig’s respect. For the most part of the day, they rapped, the enigma she called Craig to her was Marvin Gaye’s music personified, since her first love was music.

  SPECIAL DEDICATION

  My precious love, I built this garden for us. That was the beginning of a poem which Craig once believed in but never in his years did he believe that any one love in his lifetime could be so real. In that close quiet they’d hug, pull back, look into each other’s eyes and smile. His mind and body were sure, the air around them danced with little angels, their spirits produced an enviable charge, with this love, their world in their eyes was clear, pure and innocent, the concrete tombs were wombs and God lived among us, from the cradle to the grave. Sister love, his first Blue Note; his Chocolate City product, his own caramel flow of loving jazz rain, liquid chaos washing, baptising the streets and his soul.

  — Talk to me, she says.

  He says nothing, then:

  — Will I cry for friends lost?

  She seemed surprised by this, but she knew the overwhelming odds that his life had to face, she knew he was lucky to reach twenty-one. She said nothing and held him closer.

  — Always, things you see in your mind are never as they were.

  She kept quiet, not to disturb, to listen, not listen, agree, hold, smell, kiss, looking all the time into their hearts, setting that agenda that will bring them inspiration. Overcoming their fears and weaknesses with words of comfort, overcoming with reassurances, overcoming those many lonely nights.

  — You say you want someone to love you, you say you want someone, but Craig are you ready?

  His reply was sincere.

  — I ain’t been nowhere since I had you.

  She didn’t believe that one phrase could wash away nights that had brought with them pain. Yet in one instant, the world had turned.

  The radio sits at the other end of the room, Craig puts it on, turns the volume down. She wants to hear Leroy Hutson, he wants to hear 105.3 FM. He decides on 105.3 FM and that’s final. The MC shouts — Do you like it? and replies — We love it. A deep underwater rhythm begins to pound, this is where life begins and where life ends.

  — We rock to it! the DJ shouts.

  — Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!

  The confines of the room burst open and quietly the Jungle beats, this time, in the dark they feel for each other, as if blind, they find their way round each other’s bodies. Making love like the first time, making love to last, her eyes slowly open, her brown pupils look to the window and sees the stars, she dreams their destiny and Craig following her look sees the moon and dreams of cool blue nights filled with love. They touched each other, touching in each other what each other wanted touched. Craig felt and felt her whole.

  FIGHT GRAVITY

  The sun sets on the dirty streets, neon heat gives little warmth to the cold truth. The facts are bare, nothing lies in the street, if only to then be blinded by people working on their own two feet.

  — Tell the peoples! sings the man, as heads rise from the underground in Brixton, facing a barrage of noise, the darkness, their thoughts. Tell them there’s a way, a new way to live. Tell them about Brother Dyah. In the belly of Babylon you forget where you’re from, you forget Zion.

  — Don’t be afraid! sings the man. All fear is, is fear itself. To remove that cloud that stands between yourself and the sun, between love, life and power you have to know where you’re from and keep doing whatever sets you free.

  From early in Craig’s years he knew that man-a-man on the street did not have to be abnormally sensitive to be worn down to a cutting edge by the incessant, gratuitous and humiliating danger they faced every day, all day. He had been well conditioned by his environment to not believe, to not take his culture seriously. Now things changed, here was something he could believe in.

  So while people in this city will have enough to do in learning how to accept and love themselves as well as each other, when they have done this, which will not be today or the tomorrow promised yesterday, the joy lost in hate and found in love will be found in the youth, the youts from the deepest, darkest heart of Jungle.

  What’s real? In all, where is reality? Time works as we spin, all that goes around comes around. When the riddim beats our hearts into propulsion, driving us closer together, forging a new consciousness in the heat of the dance hall, we come back, our intentions are with love and as the riddim hits hard
no one feels pain.

  In the streets, things are plain, clearly advertised and clearly defined, everyone knows their rights. Here you’ve got to live, hustle, find a gimmick, a trade, and fast, before you get caught and, like cattle fodder, eaten, shitted, and left to the earth. This was the crew, each one would teach one.

  METH, Q, BIGGIE, AND CRAIG.

  MONDAY MORNING: JIMMY CRACK CORN

  Listen to the minds, hear what they say: nothing, nothing, on the morning train. Locked in their cocoons of silence, ascension, achingly, adrenalin, ahh, ain’t, alot, amanda, amethysts, angelou, aquamarine, aretha, armani, arse, arselicker, aryan, atcha, attak, aways, baaaaaaaaaaabee, backs, balham, bandana, basslike, bassline, batmans, battersea, beatbox, beatles, beatifically, bec, bev, bicep, biggie’ll, bjork, blag, blige, bloodclot, blowback, bm, blm, bollocks, boonies, boxers, bpm, brats, brixton, brockie, bubblegum, bullshitting, bwoy, calls, camden, cassie, castle’s, caz, cd, cept, chillout, chugg, cigs, clapham, clapham’s, cotch, cocks, commentary, conversations, cortina, cortina’s, croydon, crucifixionlike, cunt, da, dalston, dancefloor, darkcore, dat, daytona, daz, dazs, dear’s, dears, dem, deodorant, derek, dervishes, dicked, diggin, dirtbox, dissing, dj, dj’s, djing, djn, djs, dodgy, donny, duff, duffs, dulwich, duvet, eco, eeeeing, elvin, em, emily, erika, everytime, ex, existers, featherlite, feeli, fella, fevers, flav, flava, flipside, flynn, fm, foghorns, fozzie, frictionless, fridge, fu, fuck, fucked, fucker, fuckin, fucking, fuckrees, funkin, g’s, gales, garms, gaye, gettin, ghettoised, gipper, giri, girlfriends, globulous, goliaths, gook, gotta, grooverider, guestlist, haagen, halen, hammersmith, hangin, hardcore, harley, harman, harrasing, hathaway, havin, headfuck, heathrow, hefting, heres, herne, hilda, hmmmm, hmmmming, hmmmmmmm, han, hnd, holl, honeys, hounslow, hughie, hummah, hyperspace, i’d, i’m, i’ma, ian, icarus, iceni, ii, ikea, ikea’s, illuminous, im, inbetween, indechiperability, info, innie, insubstantiality, intro, it, it’sa, itv, jamms, jap’s, jeeping, jelica, jetness, jodeci, johnathon, jolson, jordan, juddering, Jungle, JUNGLIST, kani, kardon, kennington, kensington, kermit, kickin, kingsize, kramer, la, langston, lauren, laurent, lazerdrome, lazerdrome’s, leeds, lettin, lewisham, limpish, linford, ll, luton, lycra, macs, mage, mandy, mansell, marantz, markins, marlboro, maximus, mc, mccree, mebe, megadrive, megatron, merc, metamorphasised, meth, meth’s, mic, micky, midian, minefield, mirrorlike, mobiles, moistness, morphs, moschino, motorbikes, mottos, mph, mtv, mum’s, mumblings, munchies, muppet, musketeers, musklike, nah, naw, necks, ngowurah, nigel, nigerian, nigga, niggas, nintendo, noo, nows, nuff, nutter, nuttin, o’neal, ogden, oooooooo, orion’s, outie, outro, outta, overdrafts, patball, paulette, peckham, peckhams, perefection, picard, pimlico, pistoning, plz, po, ponce, practised, prams, proteck, puffhead, pusy, putney, puttin, q’ll, q’s, quentin, ragga, ralphie, rawmblings, rantings, ravers, receptors, recharger, reebok, reggie, reinventing, revolver’s, ricky, riff, rizla, rizla’s, rizzla, roach, rollin, roughass, royce, rpm, rubbishness, rumbelism, rupert, sade, scamming, schott, schwarzenigga, secs, sega, semseterisation, sensi, seperatist, sexuual, shaquille, shekels, shits, shite, shoppers, sibilants, skool, sl, slickly, slipmatt, slipout, slippin, smokers, smokin, snapple, somalians, somewhere’s, sony, soughta, soulmate, soundbites, soundstage, spasming, spliff, spliff’s, spliffs, sprites, st, starlike, std, stockwell, streatham, streetfighter, sunray, supplications, swaying, sweeney, swingin, sydenham, thai, talkin, tannoy, tanya, tarantino, tck, technics, techno, tekno, tenner, tess, thang, thanx, throwin, timestretch, toke, tonite, touchi, tractibility, trafalgar, tuff, tulse, turfed, tv, two’s, tyres, uni, unitisation, unles, unmoving, unseeingly, unwrinkle, up, vans, vauxhall, versa, versace, vess, virtua, vs, vu, wack, wais, wanked, wanking, wankered, wankmeister, wanna, wannabe, wearin, welling, wembley, whatcha, whinee, whirr, whispery, wid, wilds, winder, windscreen, wipers, workload, wraiths, wrestler, wuz, ya, yasmina, yell’s, yep, yessir, yo, yorkshireman, yr, yves, zippo. Note: Fuck and It are key words in the Ghetto vocab.