Somewhere Between
This post was originally written July 12th, 2020
Somewhere Between
Some days
it is hard not to lose hope
hope that this country will find its way
back from the great divide
hope that civility will be restored
hope that a cure will ever be found
for COVID
or systems built on white supremacy –
the virus called racism
hope that truth will hold as effectively
as a politics lies
hope that justice will ever be served
hope that equality will finally be won
hope that reparations will ever be paid
by the government for their crimes against
the brown who’s land we invade
and the black who built it with
blood on their backs
by the church for its complicity
and extolling of shame
for its twisting of the word
and the use of God’s name
enabling a man’s life
to be valued less than a mule
and an ox could repay
even less for a woman with no babe to be laid
But hope is a thin slip of a broth
to offer the poor
along with a bone called blessed
for kids who live in a cage
to cut their first teeth
without compassion or touch
or a parent to praise
no mask
nor blanket made of cotton or wool
not even a toothbrush
or lawyer or school
hope is a luxury only the rich can afford
it placates the giver
but seldom the worn
Yet to not-hope is a non-remedy
to not-hope is to stay hidden
to let the fire grow cold
and the water stay stagnant
to not-hope is a disease
of the spirit that feeds
on the lost cause
a black hole
no light can extinguish
to not-hope is to stand
outside the arena
while the church bells name
the latest loss of a man
who had no choice in the game
and the voices cry out
for the lives of the slain
Somewhere between hope
and the not-hope
tubers sprout and reach
up the wall of the kitchen
as if the purpose of this five-dollar bag
was not in the way it would nourish
the body
but in the way it would flourish
the mind to imagine
with its red arms that climbed
up the back of the cabinet
and pressed with its might
through caulk somehow holding
a synthesis of memory
of ancestors
working the ground
riding the waves
chained to the walls
left in the shade
like that five-dollar bag
of vegetable root
not to be nourished
but held down with a boot
The same ancestors once danced
to a rhythm they knew
from the knowledge of freedom
not learned from a song
but endowed by Creator
whose laughter was worn
with colorful pride
a garment of praise
a tent that stretched wide
freedom which fear
could never contain
before bended knee
or knee-on-neck became
heritage
in a land drunk with disdain
These ancestors told tales of
the great day of rapture
when working in fields
one had been taken
and one still remained
not a thing to look forward
but a curse from their past
wake oh ye sleeper
and gather your light
we search for the valley
of Somewhere Between
where words become actions
and actions are seeds
from the fruit of that freedom
the ancestors sing
To hope without ploughing
is to not-hope
to pray without reaching
is to not-pray
to love without freeing
is to not-love
and the lifeblood of the rhythm
of freedom
cannot be found
in the feasting on stories
of the very fine people
on both sides
and the passing of laws
to eliminate evil
in the land where evil
has been given a throne
and a scepter of lies
meant to divide
mother from son
In the valley of Somewhere Between
there is a tree where the ancestors sing