How Fares My Sweet And Sinful New Orleans? [View All]

[dbt]

My Darling, I am a faithless lover. I have not been back to you since Katrina because I have not the strength to look upon you in your devastation. I cannot bear to see you as a cripple now, not after all the passionmarks you have left on my soul.

So I watch what passes for the TV News in the America that kicked you to the curb. And it tells me that all the hotel rooms are full and that the Parades are coming. Is this the Truth or is it what a few Corporations want me to think?

I hear that the Tourists are coming back--that there will be another Mardi Gras. Is this so? Then I see the People who still don't have electricity or running water or even safety from bullets, and I grieve again. I see Chocolate Ray asking where the money is, then I see that Homeland Security Fool who looks just like Satan assuring me that all is well and on schedule.

So I come back Here after swearing to myself I never would, because there are a Few Who Know. I call on them now: Swamp Rat, BOSSHOG and any/all of you DUers who live near Her and who know the Real Deal about New Orleans. Can I quit my crying yet? Do I dare drive across Ponchartrain again? Did the Gumbo survive and how are the Old Men at Preservation Hall? Do the Neville Brothers still kick everybody else's ass right down into the Gulf, and what of Doreen and her Jazz New Orleans out on the street by the grocery store of a Sunday afternoon?

Can I BELIEVE again, or is it All Over?

Anxiously Yours,
dbt
I :loveya: New Orleans