Concrete Despair
By Justin Marlowe
The aroma of savory cuisine at every intersection. Fashion aplenty. Cultural abundance. Aspiration, ambition, and vanity readily drained from pores. A scintillating ambiance rampaged every alley and street corner. Nightlife on steroids. Midtown dazzled with more brilliance than a chandelier.
Too much for me at twenty. My craving for home had my insides more algid than ever. A heart had been set on open space, camaraderie, and comfort. Hungering for a state of familiarity. Admitting homesickness would be sacrilege, yet being inwardly disloyal would be increasingly compromising.
It’s Okay to voice when you aren’t Okay. Don’t prepare. Just get on the steel horse and return to the place you’d shunned. Shame composed within candor isn’t shameful at all. Quite the opposite. Honesty may be hazardous in the short run, but over time, its forthcoming vibrance leads toward an angelic path of sovereignty.
Justin Marlowe is an award winning African American author and poet who holds a Bachelor of the Arts degree from Virginia Tech and has worked as an educator in the public school system for about 16 years. In the past ten months, he has had his first book, a memoir entitled, “Perfect Strangers: Echoes of a Black Suburban Youth,” published, in addition to a published poem entitled, “Five Star General.” He continues to make strides within the literary world making notable connections within the topsy turvy arena of book publishing. His upcoming novella, “The Overlord,” will be coming soon!