Who is Aberjhani: Award-winning Historian, Poet, Journalist and Fiction Writer

(Original cover art for I MADE MY BOY OUT OF POETRY by Gustave Blache III)

The shadows' blatant disrespect for light nauseated Spencer Holliman to a point of speechlessness. But stronger than his outraged sense of logic was the fear that had grappled about the veins leading to his heart and that threatened, like iron hooks on a giant brick wall, to tear everything down.

He had spotted the first shadow when it was no larger than a mouse, crouched along the south wall facing his king-sized bed. Immediately he had switched on the three floodlights installed above the bed. Though the shadow had disappeared for several seconds, it had, to his dread, suddenly returned with several friends as large as cats, rapidly growing until they were as huge as bears, elephants, stepping away from the wall and reaching for him.

"JESUP! JESUP! They're back! They're back Jesup, don't let them take me pleeease!"

One freezing tentacle of black lightning nearly lashed his face when he threw his lunch tray at it. At the turn of the crystal knob on the bedroom door, the shadows zipped back behind the planes of light and corners of the walls from which they'd come. As he stepped into the room, Jesup's eyes fell first on the crescent roll at his feet, then skipped to an engraved silver fork, a shattered tea cup, saucer, soup spilled on satin sheets and on up to the slight trembling form of his employer. Shielding his eyes against the hot glare of the flood lights, Jesup looked about the room before calling out, "Mr. Holliman sir, I'm here."

Spencer slowly lifted his face from the crater he'd carved into the pillow. He looked from Jesup's face, quickly beading with perspiration, to the walls and ceiling. Seeing only the expanses of white throughout the room--he'd had all furniture save the bed and two night tables removed-- he sank back against the pillows, sighing heavily.

"Thank God!"

He feebly held forth one wrinkled arm sheathed in silk. Jesup walked quickly to the bed, retrieved a stethoscope and blood pressure gauge from the night stand, took the appropriate readings and reported them to Spencer.

"Very well, good, thank you. Thank you. Did you see them this time Jesup?"

"Just barely sir. As I opened the door, a pack of them seemed to dive behind it, then somehow disappear."

Spencer nodded eagerly at this corroboration of his ordeal, then stopped, uncertain as always during those rare times that Jesup agreed with him. Was that a smirk threatening to crack the straight humorless line of Jesup's mouth?

"But they're gone now sir. And I do have to admit my surprise at their presence in the middle of the day when the sun is at its brightest."

He switched off the floodlights and the brilliance in the room did, indeed, dwindle only a little. The sarcasm in his voice, italicized by the brutal click of the light switch, was this time unmistakable. Spencer's eyes shot a hundred arrows of disgust at the servant but quickly called each of them back, stacked them on a low flame of mortification and let them burn.

Before Jesup could offer his assistance, Spencer slid to the other side of the bed and wormed his way into the wheelchair. His silence formed the order for Jesup to clean up the spilled lunch tray as he pressed a button on the arm of the chair and steered himself out onto the bedroom balcony.

What he needed was pure undiluted sunlight, oceans and oceans of it to bathe each of his cells, to wash his thoughts and memories and blood, to create for him an entirely new existence. He licked his lips at the thought that his desire was more than a fanciful piece of poetry.

As he looked out over the greenery of his estate, the pink and white blooming dogwoods, lavender azaleas and beds of green-white cabbage flowers, a suffusion of bird songs reminded him that he was still alive. There was still time to fight and it just could be --it just could be-- that a new miraculous weapon had been added to his arsenal without his knowing it. His gaze fell on the lush white blossoms of the magnolia tree directly beside the balcony. A smile struggled to pry his lips apart but he fought the urge lest it should prove premature.

He breathed in the gentle syrupy aroma of the tree, the fragrance filling his head like the milk-white light of a blessing. Since the tree had been planted twenty years before, it had sprouted from time to time a new branch or cluster of leaves but had not once blossomed. It had been planted as an anniversary present to his wife, the same year that one of them had given the other that slight discomfort, the souvenir of a summer spent too carelessly. Until a few days ago it had been his intention to have the thing removed, believing it possibly harbored those disgusting shadows that invaded his room. The blossoms, however, did away with that particular theory. Was it just a fluke or had the walls of his jail cracked at last? He had yet to meet the man responsible for the tree's resurrection of life and beauty.

Turning in his chair, he called out to Jesup, "Is the new man still on staff? The gardener. I never see him working."

Jesup, holding the silver tray in one thick hand, walked over to the open glass doors. "He says he prefers to work at night sir. As yet, I've found no reason to refuse that request."

"I see, I see. And he has said nothing to you about how he got Amy's magnolia to bloom? Nothing about his, er, methods?"

"No sir, but I must say he is a lot more effective than the last man. The pink and yellow roses along the front gates have never looked more vibrant, more alive with color."

"More 'alive' you say? And where will he be working tonight?"

"Somewhere near the house sir. Following your instructions, I had him first tend to the borders of the estate then to those areas immediately surrounding the house."

With Jesup's departure, the smile that had been struggling to escape suddenly burst upon Spencer's face as wide and glowing as the blossoms below him. He covered his mouth as he tried to slow the beating of his heart.

For the past almost two decades, I have found myself frequently inspired by the work of artist Luther E. Vann, so much so that essays and poetry derived from meditations on his metaphysical paintings and sculpture eventually helped produce the book ELEMENTAL, The Power of Illuminated Love. Last summer (2008) thousands of visitors to the Telfair Museum Jepson Center for the Arts in Savannah, Georgia (USA) discovered Vann's exceptional canvases on display during his ELEMENTAL exhibit, and this summer many more are discovering and re-discovering the artist following the recent announcement that he is one of the recipients of the 2009 King-Tisdell Cottage Foundation Arts Awards.

As an associate pointed out to me a few months ago, many very fine visual artists tend not to receive much validation of their work, or even of their identity as artists, within their home towns. With that in mind, it's truly inspiring to acknowledge the efforts organizations and individuals have made to recognize Vann's contributions to contemporary art.

The fact that my literary sensibilities encountered Vann's painted pursuits at an intersection of shared creative visions remains one of the more intriguing developments of my aesthetic and spiritual life. Even more curious (I almost want to use the in-vogue word "improbable") to me is the fact of our separate but equally authentic links to the jazz age era of the Harlem Renaissance: Vann's connection comes as a one-time student of Harlem Renaissance artist Charles Alston; and mine as co-author of Encyclopedia of the Harlem Renaissance. The synergy of our shared creativity may be seen not only in ELEMENTAL but also via the cover art that Vann graciously provided for my novel Christmas When Music Almost Killed the World and for my most recent volume of poetry, The Bridge of Silver Wings 2009 .

Yet it seems to me that the greater dynamic instance of synergy is not so much what we have been able to accomplish as cultural workers, but what something beyond our visions, or abilities, manages to achieve when readers and viewers add their individual experiences to the work. Their focused attention brings to it personal histories, conversations, interpretations, emotional responsiveness, and a quiet or not-so-quiet wonder that in itself transforms a moment in time into a work of living art in humanly-divine progress. Such moments can endow art with a functional capacity for revelation or healing, and they can charge an individual life with a renewed sense of purpose and meaning.

They can also make a literary artist or a visual artist more fully appreciate the anguish and joys of a creative journey that produced more than one ever dared anticipate.

by Aberjhani