Waxing poetic on thoughts, theory & the times
911,
Whats your emergency?
The world as we knew it ended,
And we are still picking up the pieces
And will be,
Indefinitely,
From the impact and blowback,
For years into the future,
And for somethings we won’t
Even be sure why,
Though we will remember,
In our lived history;
Memory survives.
Lead weighted hearts hear the names,
Of beloved trans siblings slain,
Heads bowed low,
We are “a gentle, angry people”,
And we sing,
We sing for them,
We sing to them,
Their beautiful lives too early taken
Is this our world?
Do we accept it?
That one’s true identity,
Should get one killed?
That one’s self-love should mean the end?
“Enough!” We shout,
To murdered and missing,
To disrespected pronouns,
To the slippery slope of hate,
To ignorance ending their fate,
Gentle, but angry,
Mourning, but strong,
We gather here to honor the lost,
To vow for their dear memory to live on.
My thoughts and prayers are held captive,
By a sickness,
An ailment that will never be named
Though it’s alabaster anger
Terrorises our days,
we can do nothing but weep,
As we think,
And pray
We are the meld
Of the melting pot
That they fear,
The unification of contradictions,
That makes it possible to think,
And not be compelled to remain within party lines,
We are the ones they fear,
They know they cannot control,
Because we know the story,
Know the game,
Know the values,
And are ready to play,
We are the ones told to “go back” from whence we came,
For attempting to be in,
and to fix a broken system,
And know there is silence when our less pigmented brethren do the same,
I am at once proud and ashamed,
And trying my best to be colored beneath a Star spangled banner,
A country that was never designed for me,
Or you, or you,
The oligarchy keeps the barriers in place,
And erects new ones,
Barbed wire fences,
To keep masses divided,
I am not your enemy,
Though I will be villainized for speaking my truth,
For not averting my eyes,
My identity will be used when convenient,
To make a xenophobic point,
Or alternatively for one to save face and prove they are not
Racist,
They fear not just vengeance for centuries of Injustice,
But passing, successes, rewritten social castes,
They fear reality,
That we have no place else to go,
Because this is,
as much for us,
as it is for them,
Home.
We want to say
“We are all the same,”
And believe it with our core,
It’s the message we were taught from cut and pasted MLK,
We don’t see the whole picture
If we close our eyes and assert the truth of our sameness,
But are we all the same?
Not in experience,
I cannot say I’ve lived a day in your shoes,
To appreciate how life is as you,
Human, sentient, even then variation makes our experiences
Different,
Location, soci political climate,
Characteristics that dictate our place in it,
Social qualifiers that mark our skin, our minds, our bodies, our heritage,
And the histories behind them,
Must not be glossed over,
It must be worked through,
Recognized,
To see the truth beneath,
And the real meaning meant
Of “we are all the same”.
Build up border walls,
Build up greatest show on Earth,
Build up divisions,
Build up, build up, build up while
Infrastructure falls
She of Letters 