norman-lear-and-the-subliminal-underpinnings-of-a-70s-childhood &laquo; WordPress.com Tag Feed http://en.wordpress.com/tag/norman-lear-and-the-subliminal-underpinnings-of-a-70s-childhood/ Feed of posts on WordPress.com tagged "norman-lear-and-the-subliminal-underpinnings-of-a-70s-childhood" Sat, 25 May 2013 02:27:42 +0000 http://en.wordpress.com/tags/ en <![CDATA[Redd Foxx, Demond Wilson, Norman Lear and the Subliminal Underpinnings of a 70's Childhood]]> http://octoberbabies.wordpress.com/2012/02/07/redd-foxx-demond-wilson-norman-lear-and-the-subliminal-underpinnings-of-a-70s-childhood/ Wed, 08 Feb 2012 04:25:00 +0000 Susan Scutti http://octoberbabies.wordpress.com/2012/02/07/redd-foxx-demond-wilson-norman-lear-and-the-subliminal-underpinnings-of-a-70s-childhood/

Susan Scutti


Like a derelict Lazarus
the theme song to
“Sanford and Son” startles awake in
my memory …
with it an image of Redd Foxx:
gutter-theme comic
excavated from triple x
-rated dives,
sanitized with fresh cash
and prime-time televised.
Every episode showcased his same schtick.
Something beyond remedy or repair
happens
so the old black man fakes a heart attack.
Rolling his eyes
clutching his chest
he staggers
a stiff-legged Frankenstein.
Clawing at his heart
stumbling within soundstage living room
he calls for his dead wife:
“Elizabeth? I’m comin’ to join you!”

Lamont freezes, Lamont frets.
The good son
kind-hearted one
stays behind to help Dad
run the business
junkyard but business
private enterprise
(goddamit)
they own it it is theirs.
Week after week after week after week

we who were white
living separate yet near lives
watched the hilarious scene
transpire on a small screen.
Half an hour
to forget
broadcast beatings
and diode drive-bys
trespass on both sides
race war undeclared outside
locked doors.
Turned on & tuned in
we stared into vacuum tubes
to understand
the Other’s life
this price of strife:
an old man grasping at his heart
his wounded heart
his father’s heart
his human heart
his heart his heart his heart his heart.
Feeling him
the one way possible at that time
we began the healing
a resurrected dream of
freedom.


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