In the Wee Small Hours… (for the Citizens of Ferguson)

In the Wee Small Hours… (for the Citizens of Ferguson) by Mark Anthony Neal | NewBlackMan (in Exile)
It’ll be half-past the minute of midnight, and Mr. Bland will be singing, as he does every-night—“Chains of Love…” 
Mr. Bland was of the generation of Black folk who know a little something about sundown towns, those places and spaces where Black  folk—who were never welcome—couldn’t be seen. 
Curfew ain’t never fazed us.
In and out of shadows, like Uncle Ray once said, “The nighttime is the right time.”
The nighttime is the time to plan.
Mr. Bland—“Chains on Love…”—trying to keep mind and home and body together. He be planning...something.  It’ll be well past half-past the minute of midnight before he stops singing this song, as death will come as surely as life will come walking back through that door.
One-sided shoot-outs on Chicago’s Southside.  Mark Clark and Fred Hampton lay dead. They was planning; that’s why them dead.
One-sided shootout—#handsup  #dontshoot #MikeBrown #Ferguson—broad daylight, world come now with cell phones that shoot picture.  Imagine that Chairman Fred.
Curfew ain’t never fazed us. 
Use the darkness wisely.

Now Mr. Gaye be singing…”in the wee small hours of the morning….”