The Orange & Black

LYING SO WARM AND SECURE IN THAT BLADE OF GRASS

SKYWARD VIEW, I THOUGHT ANYTHING 

WAS POSITIVELY POSSIBLE, IT WOULD ALL LAST

GULF STATES STEEL

PUKED AN ORANGE NIGHT

INTO YOUR FACADE

OLE JOHNNY BOY 

WAS THE KING OF THE BLOCK

US YOUNG BOYS IDOLIZED

AS THE SOUND OF CAR ENGINES PLAYED

THOSE WARM SUMMER 

AUGUST NIGHTS

MELTED INTO SEPTEMBERS PAST

I ALWAYS THOUGHT AMERICANA WOULD LAST

TUGGIN' MY FATHERS PANTS 

WHILE HOLDING MY MOTHER'S GLANCE

I JUST ONE MORE CHANCE

TO SEE THOSE TIGERS TOUCHDOWN DANCE

I NEVER THOUGHT THE BLACK & ORANGE

WOULD FADE

AS I PEER OUT MY OFFICE WINDOW, INTO OBLIQUE ADULTHOOD

I NEVER THOUGHT OLE' GADSDEN HIGH, WOULD CEASE TO EXIST ONE DAY

* piece of work based off of a feeling of nostalgia as I listen to old 80's music that takes me back to boyhood.  The neighborhood I would ride my bike to meet friends in was a mile away.  My friends older brothers would invite us to play tackle football and we would take the pride of being tackling dummies.  On those old dusty warm southern summers although we hated the beatings we would idolize my friends brothers who were  5 or so years our senior and at the local high school, Gadsden High School.  Historically, one of Alabama's most dominant schools academically and athletically. It was nothing for major colleges to come to town to see our boys and give 'em a scholarship with some going on to the pros. Or our girls to go on and become home coming queens at the local universities.  Boys from as far away as Mobile would seek our girls for dates. Or our bands to be regular attendees in New York's Thanksgiving parades.  Our high schools, Gadsden, Litchfield and Emma Sansom were the place of dreams and legends.  As a boy my parents, both alumni. would take me to games and on the way there the communities steel plant would have it's furnace tapped and it would emit an orange glow into the sky right behind the school and football stadium.  An orange glow into a black sky was fitting since that was the school's colors. All I would dream about was one day being old enough to attend and seek that stadium glory as an athlete and walk those halls as a student.  And as I did so for one year that dream faded quickly as I transferred to a private church affiliated school in a town just south of Gadsden due to rampant drug use among students at GHS.   I needed a more steady and productive environment. The school's building was modernistic and had architecture like something one would see in the San Francisco area.  In 2007 the city decided to combine all the high schools into one new school with a separate identity.  Rivalries and good times were immediately lost.  But, never fully gone as they live on into those burning images of all us who when hearing a song, recalling a name go back to one of the best times of the human experience, that being the 1980's and 1990's.