This Life

by Quntos KunQuest

“Man, I—”

  “Look, stop fighting me. Focus. Think about what I’m saying. Yeah, the understanding that God works through people was in you. You just didn’t know it until I directed your attention to it,” Rise says. He studies Lil Chris for his response.

  Lil Chris nods. He slowly begins to get it. It dawns on him. It just bit him! “Yeah, yeah. I feel you,” he says. Starts to smile as he exhales gray cigarette smoke from his precious young lungs.

  Rise starts in, slowly …

  “Don’t wanna stray

  Stricken strabismal…strategy straddled

  Strenous streams strangle my strength

  I’m straight, but I straggle

  My stratagem structure stretches

  Strafes when it strikes

  If you can hear me, Listen

  Laugh when it bites

  Anger black as the night …”

  Lil Chris’s smile broadens into a grin. He bursts out laughing nervously, then hysterically.

  Rise joins him for a heartbeat. The short reprieve feels good. But he straightens up. Reins in his emotions. Bears in on Lil Chris. Yeah, it’s good that he gets that little morsel, but now let me offer him the plate. Try to get a breakthrough.

  “And, that’s what the deal is, you feel me,” Rise begins. “You wanted me to break bread, right? Well, what just happened here is what’s really goin’ on.”

  “Huh?” Lil Chris is perplexed for real now.

  “The purpose of this whole affair—”

  “What—”

  “The Lyrical Warfare thing they got comin’ up. The reason why I’m on some other stuff right now,” Rise puts in, insistently.

  “The Lyrical Warfare?”

  “Yeah. The war is for credibility. We’re fighting for attention, for real. We ain’t on no ego-clashing shit. We—well, let me explain somethin’ to you. Out of all the people that’s gonna be spittin’ mad flow that night, they will all be representing two primary factions. The battle will be for your ears. Each one of us will be straight-up talking to you through the music. Each of the two groups has a common message. We strugglin’ for power, for real. To win has nothing to do with us outdoin’ each other. To win is to become the voice that the majority of the people will choose to listen to. Over all the rest.”

  “Man, that’s deep!” Lil Chris’s eyes are ablaze.

  “That’s power,” Rise says soberly.

  Both are momentarily lost in their own thoughts. Lil Chris speaks into the void.

  “You said ‘each of you.’ You were talkin’ bout S.O.G. and Da One …”

  Rise nods.

  Lil Chris is at him. “Tell me about them. What’s happenin’ with them two squads? What’s up with y’all?”

  Rise hops down off the ledge. “I’ma lace you. That’s what page I was on when we first started this conversation.”

  “Yeah, but why you always gotta take the long way around?” the C’ster puts in. Frustrated. “Damn.”

  Rise folds his gray hooded sweatshirt and sets it on the ledge, over his notepad, to stop the pages from flying off in the wind. He turns to Lil Chris and says, “Let’s make a few laps.”

  The C’ster agrees. The two of them strike out walking. They keep a relatively slow pace, follow the prison yard’s perimeter toward the razor and barbed wires. Except in a few spots where construction has left the lingering smell of burnt tar, the air is otherwise clear and seemingly clean. As they make their way across the field, leaving the dormitories behind, the grass is like thick carpet underfoot. Once they reach the fences, the ground is more unyielding.

  Like two brothers walking together, they are close-mouthed, each alone in his own thoughts, taking in the panoramic view: the expanse of land, hills, and trees beyond the fences. The correctional officer’s quarters are a little farther up, the guard towers loom at each corner of the fenced-in area. Ultimately, their eyes rest on the hundreds of inmates amusing themselves at the yard’s various sporting events.

  As they walk, Rise breaks the silence. “You know, all of ’em’s just waiting for somebody to step up and tell them what to do. Most of them are craving an answer to one question: ‘How do we get out the joint?’”

  “And, from what I can see,” Lil Chris observes. “Those dudes that do step up don’t do nothin’ but throw movie nights. They take in the money our families send us and sit on it. That is, until the warden comes along and takes it to buy a slave bell, or some shit.”

  “Hold up,” Rise cuts the youngster off. “The warden ain’t doin’ nothin’ but his job. He’s—”

  “What?!”

  “Listen, man!” Rise frowns. He hits Lil Chris with a look that says he’s about to bug up. “You gettin’ your head together, but you’re still wild. But, I’ma give it to you from the shoulder. Damn what it sounds like. Digest it. Don’t make a habit of spittin’ up the real. That ain’t good. This is good game I give you. Lemme help you understand. The warden is exploiting business opportunities, no doubt. He’s a man, too. And, a man go’n get his hustle on. Just like you would, too.

  “Don’t practice looking at life from a singular perspective. You gotta have negative capability, hold more than one perspective in your head. If you don’t, you’ll miss something. That’s how you come up short. In order to keep a good understanding of the situation you have to be able to look at it through the other man’s eyes. You don’t have to agree with it.

  “This warden wasn’t put here to be your boy. He’s not your friend. He’s your keeper. Understand where you at. He was put here to run this prison and he does that well. In his world, there is no correction in corrections. Life means life. We are convicts. His job is to contain us as threats to society.

  “Now, he could have done that by brute force, but he on some space-age pimpin’. He manipulatin’ us. Straight institutionalizing us. Peep game. Security has total control over the prison.” Rise pauses, briefly, then plunges ahead. “All these cats that have been here 20 and 30 years have had to forge a lifestyle, right? They swept up all the revolutionaries and political-minded prisoners a long time ago. That left a small number of strong, predatory prisoners and a large number of weaker ones.

  “Security, being the only organized presence on the prison farm in the midst of the madness, was able to gain control. How? When knives were drawn, it was the prisoner’s code to not get in the next man’s business. It was security that came to stop the bloodshed. They established themselves with the weaker ones as their protectors.

  “From there, the weak began to rat more frequently. Security used this information to put the clampdown on all illegal activities. Both the strong and the weak prisoners who were violators had to suffer or else play ball with the uniforms. This means drugs and other contraband flowed through the security.

  “Remember, all the free thinkers and purpose-driven prisoners were in cells. Three-fourths of the remaining prisoners were gay. This was population. This created an illusion that became a comfortable distraction. The security came with the fences and the barbed wire to put down this unit-management scheme. To break the population down to workable numbers. They began to control how many gay prisoners were released into each camp. The ugly truth. They were the main ones turning out fresh fish, fresh off the bus.

  “Now, when they wanted information, all they had to do was come around and pick all the punks up. Keep in mind, back then there were no women around. So, again the seemingly strong had to break along with the weak. They all worked with the security.

  “It was around this time, the 60s and 70s, that Angola became known as the bloodiest prison in the nation. This wasn’t soul-jahs or revolutionaries. This was a bunch of booty bandits challenging each other for their manhood. And the free folks were the ring leaders, the instigators. That’s how dudes would kill with impunity. Shit, the security was doin’ most of the killin’ theyselves! Facts.

  “Meanwhile, state legislature drops the bomb. They took away any possibility of parole for lifers. And jacked up the
minimums on other crimes to make long sentences mandatory. That not only paralyzed the prisoners that were already sentenced to life, but now it slowed the killin’—’cause few dudes were dumb enough to catch a fresh life sentence.

  “The prison population was left numb. The freethinkers, having been languishing in the cells, were by then obsolete. They were non-factors. And they were the only ones truly paying attention! So, with no one to organize them, in the 80s, the 90s, the prisoners bathed themselves in drugs, sex, and prison sports. And, now, church. And, check ’em out. Think about it. Each of these primary lifestyles are totally dependent on security personnel.” He gestured. “No power.”

  Rise stops to look at Lil Chris. He can’t really tell if he’s been listening. The youngster is just walking with his head down, his hands clasped behind his back. Rise says a silent prayer that he’s listening and continues his talk.

  “When I got here from juvie over a decade ago, the folks was routinely making sweeps to scoop up any inmates that showed signs of true leadership qualities. They then chose our leaders from whoever they were willing to speak to. On whatever terms they dictated to them. Usually, weak or ignorant prisoners that they propped up. Grateful recipients make loyal agents.

  “Inmate clubs had already been around for some time. But more and more, security made it a practice to rig inmate club elections, to set in puppet leadership—they couldn’t let us pick our own leaders. This is how most of our hip-hop generation found the prison when we got here toward the end of the 90s. At about the same time we got here, female correctional officers started trickling in. Women being less likely to put up with security’s corruption, security had to stop all the underhanded killing and dealing they were caught up in and clumsily covering up. They, in turn, then got distracted with sex rackets set to snare and entrap the lady officials. This gave hustlers and freethinkers, the truly strong prisoners, an opening to re-surface and start doing foundation work. The warden we have today also came in around this time, in 1995. During the stalemate. The religious manipulation became his thing. Opting for a more subtle grade of oppression and mind control. Facts.

  “Oh, you can trust and believe, I was just like you. Wild as hell, but I wasn’t stupid. No fear, though. Ignorant, to an extent, to grown-world reality. But, with the ability to understand. Just like you. This was 1997. I used to smoke bud half the day and spend the other half rappin’. It was my way of crying without shedding tears. A lot of us did that. Hell, No Love and Mansa Musa were here doin’ it before me. No Love was already a legend when I first touched this ground.”

  At the mention of names he recognizes, Lil Chris looks at Rise. The lil brother’s face reads deep concentration. He’s been taking it all in. This invigorates Rise.

  “You see, we was all riders. So energetic. All we did was get into shit. Getting moved back and forth from camp to camp. From cellblocks to population and back! While in the cellblocks, some of us came across those same true soul-jahs who had been separated from the rest of the population. People like the Angola Three: Woodfox, King, and especially Hooks. By then, they had already been in those cells for decades. A testament to their strength that they were still sane. They touched us with the game. Commissioned us to carry on the struggle. Not just for release from prison, but also for liberation, for social empowerment.

  “By dudes already looking for fly material to rap about, they started putting these socially conscious and cultural messages in the music. There’s only so many ways you can talk about the hood, right? Then there were the out-of-towners. Like Too Short, Fresno, and Wack. Mostly west coast gangbangers who got caught up enterprising down south. OG Smiley Loc and ’em. They got with Charlie Brown and the OG homies from up North around our way—Shreveport, Alexandria, Monroe, and such. More gang mentality in-state hotspots. Cultures more susceptible to group-think. They started the painstaking process of instituting this whole Cali concept of organization. But, modified to account for this prison’s realities. Machine in motion, among the young hardheads. By security being so well entrenched in day-to-day life, it was real touch-and-go. But all of us, myself included at that time, we were all so hooked up on studying Kemet and Egyptology. Greek mythology and the Homer epics and such. So, the natural inclination was toward the underground.

  “It seems like everybody had this thing for secret orders. As the children on the prison yard began to mature into young men, what was fashionable became an understood necessity.

  “I was already an avid reader before I got here. I was already up on a lot of things that most were just being introduced to. At first, I just stood back and watched them. I saw the hard times make these young brothers either break or choose survival strategies. I saw those practical strategies merge with book studies to form strong convictions about how they saw themselves, their situations, and what needed to be done about it.

  “I stood back and watched these secret societies fade out and link up. Eventually pulling the old heads in with their reach and resources. Mostly former Panthers and their ilk. That’s when shit really got serious. Until now, when there are only two left …”

  “S.O.G. and Da One,” Lil Chris anticipates.

  “Right,” Rise says, as they continue around the yard. Yelling and hollering floats over to them on the breeze from the nearby playing fields. “Da One ended up being the die-hard revolutionary camp. They see the world, now and then, through the lens of conspiracy theory. They adamantly teach each other that deception is their best weapon. Their bible is the snake book. They all study it—”

  “—I know. I ran across one in the dungeon,” the C’ster interjects.

  “The thing is, they are so driven by contempt for the system that they have become like the very same thing they claim to hate. And then, there’s S.O.G.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Skies Over Gaza. For me to go into the meaning behind the name would lead to a whole ’nother breakdown dealing with pyramids and astrology and zodiacs,” Rise smiles faintly. “Look, I got a book in the dorm called Message of the Sphinx that will start you on that path if you want.” He waves his hand. “For now, I wanna put you on the S.O.G. stance.”

  Lil Chris makes a skullnote to get the book later. And holds his peace for the moment.

  “We’ve been accused of being reformist,” Rise explains. “To a certain extent, we are. But, we are not accommodationists, which is the tag they try to attach to reform. However, reform for us is not a defining ideology. Reform is what we consider to be the best solution to our common problem. Reforming the state’s dysfunctional criminal justice system is a far more practical solution. Remember the Constitution? The Civil Rights Movement? These conversations? Can you dig it? Especially when doin’ otherwise would justify the perpetuation of our livin’ hell on another generation of deviants.

  “This is why this whole Lyrical Warfare is so important. The music is how we speak to the people. True leadership hangs in the balance. Those of us who are conscious tend to guard what comes out of our mouth. The tongue is a powerful tool. It sets things in motion. Those of us with a sense of responsibility know that we are held accountable for our speech and our actions.

  “This is why we always, always, greet each other with a whispered reminder: ‘To touch without feeling is the ultimate sin.’ Because once you know the truth, how could you not feel it? As brothers, we respond, ‘Far worse than blasphemy.’”

  Later, Lil Chris goes in to work at the Education Building. Really, he just wants some time alone to think over all that has been happening.

  As he sweeps the floor, he finds himself looking blankly at his watery reflection in the linoleum. The Pro-25 headphones clamped on his head block out everything. He thinks of his momma and sisters. He often does this, though he rarely talks about them. His thoughts of them are his alone, thoughts he chooses not to share with this place. Shit, he has nieces and nephews he’s never even met.

  He thinks of them in the context of what he’s been learning.
History and politics. Concepts and philosophies. A whole other world. Very different from the one he was raised in. But he would be lying if he said his studies didn’t afford him a broader perspective. His momma’s struggles. The earning ceiling holding his sisters back. The mischief his nephews are already prone to get into from time to time. It’s all so exhaustive and exasperating to consider. So much to be done …

  Someone waves a hand in front of his face. Lil Chris picks his head up to see.

  “Hey, that song. I know that song,” says this tall, goofy looking white dude. A lieutenant, he knows by the single bar on his collar.

  Lil Chris pulls off the headphones and the world floods in. A moment of disoriented searching. The officer has this almost childlike voice and manner. There’s an air of testing about him. As if to him this encounter is some kind of experiment.

  “You playin’ wit’ me?” Lil Chris questions, indignantly.

  “Oh, no, no,” the officer denies, with a self-deprecating chuckle. Almost nervous.

  The C’ster recoils a bit. What’s with this dude? He checks the guy’s nameplate. Brecheen.

  “I was just sayin’ I know that song,” Brecheen explains. “The one you was just listening to. ‘You feelin’ kinda limp, nigga. Go’n brush ya shoulders off,’” Brecheen sings. Tryna rap. “‘Ladies is pimps, too.’”

  Every muscle in Lil Chris’ arm flinches with the impulse to lay the mop handle he’s holding across this white boy’s face … no. He jerks around, pulls the mop bucket with him. Splashes soapy water in an effort to create some space between himself and the temptation.

  “What?” Brecheen asks. As if he don’t know. Following the C’ster. Step for step!

  “Look, cracker!” Lil Chris whirls around. Mop cocked like a bat. Water flings everywhere.

  “Wow!” Brecheen throws his hands up. “Damn, brah,” he chuckles, again, uneasily. “You prejudice or somethin’?”

  It’s not his tone of voice. This ain’t the first redneck he’s heard speaking Ebonics. It’s his eyes. The utter absence of malice. Like he’s approaching the C’ster on the playground or some shit.