I produced this narrated slideshow on Teviston—one of California’s Black Okie Communities—for the Framing Migrant Labor exhibit at Santa Rosa Junior College’s Agrella Gallery. My photos of the Wilson family are part of an exhibit that features Matt Black’s work, along with photos by Otto Hagel and Morrie Camhi.
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Thomas Spencer’s home and garden
Thomas Spencer welcomed me into his Teviston home and garden to document how he lived as a widower. He was proud of his garden and just putting up with the condition of his house. He worked part time in farm labor and would take other odd jobs, as they came along.
The Alba Madonna
I sit meditating
before the Adoration of the Magi —
Fra Angelico and Fra Filipo Lippi
together captured this joy
of Christ’s birth
in a wonder filled circle.
An echo of hands rise up in Hallelujah
here
. . . and here
. . . and here
in the crowd of shepherds.
Blacksmiths shoe the Magi’s horses.
Children dance on a wall
to better view the new child.
I sense another, also unable to break away,
from this vision of the brothers.
We exchange glances but remain silent.
Galleries later I am caught by the same scene,
this time by Botticelli —
Magi bowing to Child and Virgin
amidst Classical ruins.
“Look, the Magi are the three ages of Man.
This one mature
. . . him aged
. . . and here the young one.”
It is my companion of the first Adoration,
speaking a gentle brogue.
We explore together, quietly noting
Joseph’s sweet smile,
a Magi’s horse rearing with excitement.
I say, “Isn’t this human nature too,
not just Auschwitz?”
He is Father Sean from Ireland,
here on a Sabbatical of prayer and study.
I walk on alone.
Then another painting glows so intensely
I cannot break away —
Dosso Dossi’s Aeneas and Achates on the Shore of Libya.
The crowd of Trojan sailors,
two tall trees,
and the curving shore
all an Impressionist dazzle,
with the two heroes alone
still living in Renaissance clarity.
And again Father Sean stands besides me.
“Father, I am so baffled by evil!”
My hand sweeps around the bright scene.
“How, when we have such beauty in us,
how do we choose
to do so much evil?”
“That’s a hard one, son.
St. Augustine wrestled with your question.
His answer,
Evil is a state of deprivation.
You can only understand it
in the context of the good.
It can’t stand alone.”
Then I come finally to Rafaello’s Alba Madonna,
again a circle,
a painting I thought I knew well.
The Christ Child’s translucent nakedness
reclines against Mary’s thigh,
holding a toy in his right hand.
His mother gazes serenely at the toy.
Young John the Baptist,
clad already in animal skins,
looks up at the toy.
They sit upon wildflowers.
Orchards and fields,
farmhouses and forested hills
stretch off behind the three.
The Christ Child
is total peace
flowing
in a circle
of total peace
and the toy He holds
is
the crucifix.
July 1991, at the National Gallery
The Gospel at Friendship Baptist Church
Teviston, a Black Okie Community
Black Okie History
The West of the West Center has produced Black Okies, a documentary on the history of Teviston directed by Joel Pickford. You can view this film by going to this site:
https://vimeo.com/user25968631/blackokies Enter the password (case sensitive): Bokies0415
Michael Essinger is a doctoral student at UC Merced who is studying the forgotten history of African-American communities up and down the Central Valley. You can view or download his papers at this site:
Black Okie History
Mark Arax, Director of the West of the West Center, wrote several articles on Teviston in 2002 when he was a reporter for the LA Times. These are available at:
http://articles.latimes.com/2002/aug/25/local/me-blackokies1
http://articles.latimes.com/2002/aug/26/local/me-blackokies2
http://articles.latimes.com/2002/aug/26/local/me-okieside26
http://articles.latimes.com/2002/aug/27/local/me-blackokies3
Mark speaks of the migration to rural California and some of the people he found in Teviston in this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7LPBEb5PXBk&feature=youtu.be
Acres of Aspiration by Hannibal Johnson documents the all Black towns established in Oklahoma from the 1890s to the 1920s. They attracted independent, hard-working families from the deep South. This helps explain the strength of the younger generation that moved to California in the 50s to found Teviston and other primarily Black communities in California. One can order from Alibris.com.
Revisiting Black Okie Communities
In the 60s I discovered a number of African-American towns in the San Joaquin Valley, later dubbed Black Okie communities by author Mark Arax. These towns are a little known part of California history, which my photographs and radio shows documented for the first time. In the Spring and Summer of 2015 I revisited South Dos Palos (on the west side of Merced County) and Teviston (on Hwy 99 in Tulare County). To my surprise I found several families of the kids I’d photographed. I was able to photograph them at church and at family reunions in both towns.
I’ll be uploading galleries of photographs from the 60s and the present day, as well as links to articles and academic research on this forgotten side of California history.
Sonoma Fog Light
The last poem I wrote for Grace before she died.
I never managed to find a way
for you and me to live at the ocean
that and a thousand other dreams
I never managed to realize.
So now I drive up Highway One
through foggy landscapes–
you always loved them the best–
gathering the images of lupin in seas of grass
cedars and cypresses, sheep and cows,
barns and tacky vacation homes
all soft in their gray splendor.
I stop and walk along the Sonoma shore
pausing for you at the edge.
The sun breaks through the winter fog
shining the waves breaking up around black rocks
shimmering the water’s backwash
into flashing electric pulses
rushing to me through the milky air.
I know you’d know that vision
like you seeing your own true self in a mirror
like me looking into your clear bright eyes.
January 2014
Not a statue
We ran trips
in the park
overlooking paradise,
lost our way
when every way was equal
forgot God
while praising Him,
thought we were
our shadows
in the midst
of all this light.
Then she swam
in a man-made lake
while I meditated
by a man-made stream.
Little children
crossed a bridge
to me.
“Come here! It’s a statue!”
“No, he’s sleeping.”
“Touch him.”
“No, you touch him.”
“Look!
His skin moves
when I touch him.
He’s not a statue.”
1973
Medicine Bundle
In 1971 Rolf asked me to drive him to the Greyhound depot in Sacramento so he could turn himself in to the police. He’d killed a heroin dealer in a shootout protecting his former wife and child. He didn’t want to return to Santa Fe as a prisoner. I made a medicine bundle to renew his mojo and wrote this poem.
Take down these things from the Shaman’s tree –
three hairs from a brave white dog
a thorny seed curved round in spiral form
from a place where the earth was soft as breast
two pieces of jerkey from the deer D. J. shot on his first acid trip
a bracken mushroom like a gray furry rainbow.
Go through the bag of rocks from La Playa de Buriana.
Find one that looks like the whole earth.
Lick it to be sure.
Look through the tiny shells from a beach near Algeciras.
Choose the perfect one, though all are perfect.
Take a piece of abalone shell from Schooner gulch
out of your shirt pocket
one with silver waves sweeping a silver shore.
Search in Grace’s drawer for the flowery handkerchief
she bought in Granada.
Gather everything up and tie the bundle
with the leather thong that holds your hair
a limpet shell on one end, a holey rock on the other.
Drive your friend to Sacramento to catch a Greyhound
so he can go home without handcuffs.
Listen once more to the story of the battle,
the bullets through the ear and right arm
of this flamenco guitarist and blues man.
Tell him how he taught you to see your strength
by just saying, “Man, you’re so hip!”
when you felt so seriously square.
Tell him the story of this bundle of charms.
Be silent now.
Be still.
November 1971
Rolf performing in 1963