Somewhere Between

Two years since writing, this poem feels even more relevant today

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Somewhere Between - Encaustic Mixed Media, by Crystal Marie

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In the midst of writing another post, this poem popped up in my Facebook memories. Written two years ago (and also posted to the blog when I was loading up previous samples of my writing before launching), it hits me how it feels even more relevant today, with many of the words I wrote taking on deeper meaning - go figure, in the year that I’ve chosen Deeper as my word of the year.

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Somewhere Between
by Crystal Marie

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