HANGING ON THE OLE OAK TREE

White men lynched black men with impunity back in the old days...

With the blessing of local police!

And today?

Black men are are 'lynched' by white men, by proxy of their bullets...

And they can STILL count on local police for support for their murder!

It feel like black men are still Hanging From The Ole Oak Tree!

RLJ

HANGING ON THE OLE OAK TREE

(Supply, N.C.)

The morning sun is already bright in the sky on this warm summer day in 1959.

The ole Oak Tree in the middle of old man's Parson's field soaks in the sun's rays.

The butter beans growing along the rows in the field reached for that sun, too.

And the mist rising up from the warm soil smelled like life and earth and morning.

The leaves of the tree are now full and large and mature.

Everything in nature recognizes the majestic fullness of a hundred year old Oak tree,

Its branches are thick and long and as strong as all perceptions of... an Oak Tree.

The 149 pound object hanging from a ten feet high branch puts no stress on the branch.

That object hanging in the ole Oak Tree on this fine N.C. morning is Ronald Lee Jones.

Or, because he has been hanging there through the night, it is his body gently swaying.

He died from strangulation from the pressure of the neck snapping noose around his neck.

Decomposition is already beginning to overcome the limp body hanging from the tree.

There are dozens of footprints around the base of the tree.

Obviously, a death or life struggle took place at the roots of time.

If only a 100 plus year old living plant of history could talk to tell its tales.

How many other black men have been hanged to death on its branches!

The inner liquids inside this man's body are leaking from his blackened, bloated mouth and nose.

The piss stain on the front of his pants is either from the release of death... or the horror of fear.

The candy wrappers, the cigarette butts and the soda cans on the ground around the tree denotes a party?

The whip marks across the man's arms and chest and legs tells just how hard the party was.

The police will eventually come to take the body down from the tree.

And as usual, Ronald Lee Jones will vanish from the sight of history as has so many before him.

Some will say, "He is just another dead North Carolina swamp Nigger who died before his time."

Some will say, "He was obviously up to no good... why else would a mob hang him to his death?"

And so... the sun goes down again as another day on coastal N.C. comes to an inglorious end.

The Oak Tree continues to stand tall and strong in all its magnificent glory.

The Butter Beans continue to grow and the soil continues to create heat and mist.

And the roots of the plants intermingle with the bones and the souls of the lynched dead!

RLJ