My words have been dormant in this post election storm, lying in wait while hate is made the new norm, laying like soft bullets all around me, scattered, disjoined, unformed, the word TOLERANCE is hiding behind the dresser, the word HOPE is lying quiet atop a laundry heap on the floor, the word PEACE is trapped at the bottom of a bottle, the word LOVE is the sound of a closing door. My words, soft bullets that will never bruise, that will never pierce through skin, that will never call for blood, these words and so many others wait like an artillery of dreams in the moonlit minefield of my consciousness, waiting for exposure, waiting for me to take a step into the unknown territory of this jilted demo(n)cracy, and use my voice even more for what is good, what is light, what is freedom, what is fight. The haze is wearing off, the smoke of disbelief, the shock of godlessness, a renewal of promise made into the still-star-filled sky, that my voice is a weapon of beauty, my pen is a sword of truth, my hands trembling across the keys will not fail us. WORDS, come back to me, let’s fight together in this revolution, I am gathering you up, soft bullets, forming you into explosions of light, into rockets’ glare of blue paradigms, into penetrating booms of grace, into a 21-heart salute of what can I do to make the world better today? This is not some hippy delusion; it is the means by which to survive these next four years. For me, it is gathering together WORDS and forming them into precise vibrations of outrage and hope, it is illuminating every act of conscious movement toward good, it is knowing privilege and using it to amplify marginalized voices, it is vigilance against all forms of hate, it is exposing darkness with bright magnifications of truth, it is combating fear with a promise to band together and fight, it is building bridges wherever they try to build a wall, it is protecting each other, it is protecting our stories, protecting our rights, protecting our dignity, protecting our humanity. This is the new old america, the united divided states, the blood red states and borders, the blue lighthouses of tomorrow, our fears are continually justified, this is a real human ache, his rancorous rhetoric is rippling out to the masses, the rotten stench of long-silenced hate is coming up through the floorboards of our country, but this is NOT our collective fate. At least now we know the hate is still there, we know exactly where to find it, we can see the white robes in the light of day. Still, there are MORE OF US on the side of inclusion, MORE OF US on the side of love, MORE OF US on the side of oneness, MORE OF US on the side of equality, MORE OF US on side of healing the environment, MORE OF US on the side of resistance to hatred, MORE OF US on the side of freedom from tyranny, MORE OF US on the side of light and beauty there are MORE OF US and we will not be silent, and we will not bend, and we will not stop our trajectory of spiritual evolution, this is a mountain, but we are ready for the climb, we have already tasted the clouds. Sometimes a catalyst for real and lasting change comes in the most difficult circumstance, sometimes it takes a rampant wildfire to rebuild a broken house, so today, I renew my purpose as a poet, I am coming out of my quiet disillusion, I am gathering up my words and taking a step into this dark unknown, aiming poems forged out of invisibility and fire, ready to light everything I possibly can with a vibration of hope.
