"Plant a flower!"
This beautiful expression was the motto of the late, great Bernard Powell of Kansas City, Missouri, founder of the Social Action Committee 20, a now -defunct, black self-help, community improvement organization in KCMO.
I met Bernard Powell briefly in the 1970s here in KC, before he was shot and killed by a black man, a fellow KC "ghetto-dweller," in an after-hours club, who knew him well, it was reported.
The term "ghetto-dweller" is placed in quotation marks, because when I arrived here in 1976 from Washington DC, what they called the ghetto here was nothing compared to the District!
Bernard apparently sensed the nexus between squalor and broken spirits. Thus, his lovely, admonitory "plant a flower" motto yet resonates with me, as redemptive, worthy of remembrance.
Other sayings of this brilliant brother were "each one teach one" and "ghetto or goldmine? the choice is yours."
"Plant a flower!"
This beautiful expression was the motto of the late, great Bernard Powell of Kansas City, Missouri, founder of the Social Action Committee 20, a now -defunct, black self-help, community improvement organization in KCMO.
I met Bernard Powell briefly in the 1970s here in KC, before he was shot and killed by a black man, a fellow KC "ghetto-dweller," in an after-hours club, who knew him well, it was reported.
The term "ghetto-dweller" is placed in quotation marks, because when I arrived here in 1976 from Washington DC, what they called the ghetto here was nothing compared to the District!
Bernard apparently sensed the nexus between squalor and broken spirits. Thus, his lovely, admonitory "plant a flower" motto yet resonates with me, as redemptive, worthy of remembrance.
Other sayings of this brilliant brother were "each one teach one" and "ghetto or goldmine? the choice is yours."