President Barack Obama’s Quest for Peace Wins Him the Nobel Prize: What A Great Day For All of Us

I woke up this morning to the sad reminder that just a day before, my father-in-law, Gba Saide Kwia Wesley had just died at the wonderful age of 94 in Monrovia, Liberia, a country that for fourteen years was denied peace in one of the bloodiest civil wars ever. In my tear stained memory of the day before, I went to my laptop just to see what was happening in the world. To my surprise and utter joy, President Barack Obama, the great President of the great United States of America, the son of a Kenyan man, the visionary that has already inspired many young black and white youths was now the latest winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. I was elated.

Barack Obama may be the laughing stock of his enemies, but he continues to be the light and inspiration of many of us African immigrants, patriotic Americans, international people everywhere, and millions around the world. I was proud, and have not had a moment of regret for this win. I believe he deserves the Nobel Peace Prize, and I am so grateful that he has accepted the prize. America is again on the radar of the world. This is a great day not only for America, but also for the rest of the world. This is a good day for many of us who believe in vision and hard work, those of us who still believe that hope overcomes all evil, that words are greater than bullets, and that no matter who you are, you can be anything you want to be if only you can hang in there long enough to reach the end. Barack Obama and his beautiful wife deserve to bring this honor to their people, the American people.

Give Back Peace

Give back father, give back mother,
Give back grandpa, give back grandma,
Give back boys, give back girls.

Give me back myself, give me back men
Linked to me.

As long as men live as men,
Give back peace,
Peace that never crumbles.

by Sankichi Toge
Japan (1917-1953)

Here is the Nobel Committee’s statement quoted directly from nobelprize.org site.

The Nobel Peace Prize for 2009

“The Norwegian Nobel Committee has decided that the Nobel Peace Prize for 2009 is to be awarded to President Barack Obama for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples. The Committee has attached special importance to Obama’s vision of and work for a world without nuclear weapons.

Obama has as President created a new climate in international politics. Multilateral diplomacy has regained a central position, with emphasis on the role that the United Nations and other international institutions can play. Dialogue and negotiations are preferred as instruments for resolving even the most difficult international conflicts. The vision of a world free from nuclear arms has powerfully stimulated disarmament and arms control negotiations. Thanks to Obama’s initiative, the USA is now playing a more constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting. Democracy and human rights are to be strengthened.” nobelprize.org (Oslo, Oct. 9, 2009)

Despite all of the great things that President Obama has already achieved to deserve this selection, he was humbled and generous when he told the world that he did not deserve to occupy the same place as many deserving past recipients of the prize. Of course, this is a good thing to say to everyone, especially, to those who think that President Obama is not what he says he is.

Many of us who support the president believe however, that he deserved this sort of honor, and the world is better because he was awarded the prize. President Obama has given many of us the sense of pride in this great nation. I know that many immigrants have become citizens just in his short time in office simply because they now have a sense of belonging to a country they love. Many of us who travel abroad every now and then know the new feeling of reception that Obama’s leadership has fostered for Americans abroad. Many around the world are excited that there is a very simple, down to earth, caring individual in the White House, and are proud to be identified with the people of this nation. With time, President Obama will achieve his dream of fostering peace to the world.

Those of us from war-torn nations long for that dream to be fulfilled. It is important to us that anyone given the Nobel Prize for fostering world peace must be one that loves diplomacy and peace, one who is willing to be misunderstood in order to bring the world to a better place. President Obama does that for  us.

Many of us long to see the nations around the world enjoy peace, and we know that Barack Obama’s Nobel Prize for Peace will be another inspiration in helping him foster peace in the world.

As I pondered the surprising news this morning, I could not help connecting Obama’s selection for the Nobel Prize for Peace to Liberia and to my sad news of the death of my wonderful father-in-law, a man who lived the last two decades of his long life in a troubled country.

I could not help, but connect the world’s greatest President whose direct links go back to Africa, the great continent where majority of our people still live without peace, without the realization that there could be peace and how the Nobel Prize for Peace could be another ray of hope for us Africans. Unlike his critics and many admirers of the US President, I was not surprised about President Obama’s nomination; I was surprised that others were surprised at this gesture to a well-deserving man. I could not help, however, but remember the lack of peace in Liberia during the 14 year civil war, and now, Obama again was breaking newer ground as the third US sitting President ever to receive the Nobel Prize for Peace while in office.

Barack Obama’s win today is indeed an affirmation that black people are not only capable of violence as the stereotype suggests. No matter who wishes to argue otherwise, it is clear that the US President has touched the hearts of many around the world, and the Nobel Prize is one way through which the world is affirming him and the American people.

I am proud to live in these times. Congratulations, President Obama!

The End and the Beginning
…………………….by Wislawa Szmborska

After every war
someone has to clean up.
Things won’t
straighten themselves up, after all.
Someone has to push the rubble
to the sides of the road,
so the corpse-laden wagons can pass.

Someone has to get mired
in scum and ashes,
sofa-springs,
splintered glass,
and bloody rags.

Someone must drag in a girder
to prop up a wall.
Someone must glaze a window,
rehang a door.

Photogenic it’s not,
and takes years.
All the cameras have left
for another war.

Again we’ll need bridges
and new railway stations.

Sleeves will go ragged
from rolling them up.
Someone, broom in hand,
still recalls how it was.
Someone listens
and nods with unsevered head.
Yet others milling about
already find it dull.

From behind the bush
sometimes someone still unearths
rust-eaten arguments
and carries them to the garbage pile.

Those who knew
what was going on here
must give way to
those who know little.
And less than little.
And finally as little as nothing.

In the grass which has overgrown
causes and effects,
someone must be stretched out,
blade of grass in his mouth,
gazing at the clouds.

Wislawa Szmborska was a Polish poet. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1996.

________________________________________________________________________________________

Come, come, whoever you are.

Wonderer, worshipper, lover of leaving.

It doesn’t matter.

Ours is not a caravan of despair.

Come, even if you have broken your vow

a thousand times

Come, yet again, come, come.

———————————– RUMI

Truth & Reconciliation Commission Recommends Prosecution of Warlords, Blocking President and Other Officials from Holding Public Office- and There’s the Charles Taylor Question….

• ” War is a way of shattering to pieces, or pouring into the stratosphere, or sinking in the depths of the sea, materials which might otherwise be used to make the masses too comfortable, and hence, in the long run, too intelligent. “—– George Orwell
  

When the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) concluded its hearings and recommended prosecution of Charles Taylor and other warlords, barring the Liberian President and thirty current officials and others from running for public office in the future, many Liberians had mixed reactions. The unfortunate reaction of the William V. S. Tubman era, where traditional leaders and other politically charged people came out and pledged their loyalty to the President and officials, began in Monrovia with tribal leaders pledging their support for the Liberian President and her administration.

Doris Parker, a friend of mine and Founder and Director of the Liberian Women’s Initiative taking the oath before the TRC in Saint Paul, MN, June 2008

Here I am, testifying before the TRC also in MN, June 2008. I broke down several times during my testimony and during the testimony of others. There is no explanation on earth for the kind of cruelty Liberians suffered at the hand of Warlords and their armies.

Now that the TRC has completed its job, there were threats against members of the commission for doing a very difficult job. This is even while Charles Taylor, the originator of the fourteen year blood bath is on trial in the Hague for war crimes against Sierra Leoneans. If Liberians do not have the gust to allow the perpetrators of horrific crimes against our people to be punished, how will they have the strength to move on? How can we guarantee that another Liberian terrorist will not come into our country with guns and crazy warriors tomorrow to begin another insane blood bath?

WHAT WILL HAPPEN NOW?

Her Excellency Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, President of Liberia Testifying before the Truth & Reconciliation Commission of  Liberia on Feb. 12, 2009 (Above)

Photos: Charles G. Taylor, warlord for the National Patriotic Front of Liberia (NPFL) in the Liberian Civil War (1989-2003)

Current Liberian Senator, Former warlord, Prince Y Johnson, warlord for the Independent National Patriotic Front of Liberia (INPFL

Former Warlord of ULIMO-K, Alhaji G. V. Kromah

Former Warlord, Sekou Damate Konneh of LURD

The Warlord of the defunct LPC (Liberia Peace Concil) George Boley

Liberians: A People of Many Contradictions–

Liberians have always been a people of many contradictions. We want peace, but do not work towards it. We want freedom, but cannot stand up for it. We want our leaders to be transparent and responsible, but we quickly heap praises upon them just to get small crumbs from them. We do not want corruption, but we support corruption and corrupt leaders. We do not want war anymore in our country, but when we are told to weigh in on how horribly the warlords have treated Liberians, we cannot accept the truth. How do we resolve our contradictions?

Is it because those that destroyed the country still control the country? Or what is it? Why did the Truth Commission work through all of the horrific stories, the tears, the recalling of horrific crimes against humanity if all we wanted was to come together and dance and drink to celebrate a false reconciliation? The truth however remains: there is no reconciliation with the covering up of the truth, the covering up of hurts without any accountability.

Image by ? Patrick Robert/Sygma/CORBIS

This is Charles Taylor, drunk with power after he and his unruly rebels had run over much of Liberia andcaptured the Omega Tower in Paynesville, near Monrovia in July of 1990.

The Truth Commission & Reconciliation Hearings in MN.

The TRC has made its recommendation; therefore, something must happen.

Most recently, on the July 14, 2009, I was contacted by Jamaican Radio, 93 fm, for a discussion of the ongoing Charles Taylor trial  in the Hague. During my discussion via telephone on Jamaican radio, what I was most concerned about was not that Charles Taylor was sitting in court and denying all of the charges against him; I was particularly worried that Liberians did not care enough that Charles Taylor’s war in Liberia deserve even more attention because of the gravity of his offenses in Liberia.  I was afraid that if Sierra Leone does not put Charles Taylor away for good, he will return to Liberia and cause more blood shed.

But most importantly, I was afraid that Liberians were sleeping through this all important trial of one of the world’s most serious criminals. There is the Charles Taylor question that every Liberian who preaches reconciliation must answer. What should Liberia do about Charles Taylor if the recommendations of the TRC are not followed? What should we do about the other warlords who are of course, in leadership today in Liberia?

This is what I had hoped by this time. I had hoped that the President of Liberia would have come forward with a statement, and not just a statement, but also, a call for unity and a commitment to stand by the Commission’s recommendations.If there were no intention of following through, why did they allow all of us to go through the hell of recalling our suffering in that war?

I expected something to happen, so I waited for something to happen before completing my blog posting. Instead, there all these people coming out of the Tubman-thinking era that believe that any group of indigenous leaders can line up and pledge their support to erase more than a century of injustices against humanity. That just because they declare their support for the President, then all will be well.

But I have bad news for them; this is not the 1950s or 1960s. The crimes against humanity in Liberia must be brought up to the forefront and discussed everywhere, debated, and those who must be prosecuted, must be prosecuted, those who earned money from such terror, must turn over to Liberia the money stolen over the years, and those who cannot occupy public offices again, must find other means of living. A country that is run by warlords will always go to war again no matter how many of us dance in the streets to declare our support for them. Too many Liberians have died; too many languish abroad; too many languish still in refugee camps; too much is at stake for us to return to the age-old Tubman day of “So say one, so say all.”

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Finding My Family

———-By Patricia Jabbeh Wesley

Good friend, please help me
Did you happen to see
two boys when you lived in Kataka?
One dark, chubby?
The other, light with dark eyes?
Good friend,
did you see them while you lived in Ganta?
One would have been ten
and the other this tall.
My big boy, Nyema, the small one, Doeteh.
Good friend, can you tell me
if they went to Tapeta?
Were they given weapons, did they kill?
Good friend, can you say
if they walked to Bassa?
Did they starve to death?
Good friend, can you say
if there was a mother walking by their side?
Was she healthy? was she treated well?
Oh, good friend, so this is where
they took them out of line?
Good friend, were they hungry
when they met their end?
Oh, good friend, I will follow
to wrap up their bones.
Thank you, good friend
But how will I know their bones?

Stop the Deportation of Liberian Immigrants:Tell President Barack Obama/ State Law Makers to Keep Families Together Here in the US!

_

During the 14 year civil war in Liberia, desperate Liberian civilians were given sanctuary in several countries, including the United States. That is what usually happens when innocent civilians must flee their country because of warfare. Tens of thousands of Liberians were given sanctuary in the United States as well. Those who were allowed to come to the US have lived here for nearly two decades. On March 31, 2009, that temporary protection comes to an end, and the United States is preparing to return these refugees and legal immigrants in mass numbers to a country that has yet to recover from the bloody civil war.

On March 31, 2009, mothers will be sent home away from their children; fathers will be torn apart from their American born children; families will be forced to once more abandon their new life in America to be forcefully returned to a home that is now nearly forgotten. Young people that came of age in America will also be torn away.

Send President Barack Obama a message that it is inhumane to bring African refugees out of danger, keep them here in the US for nearly two decades and return them to their devastated homeland. America is home for them today. Forcefully returning them is wrong.. They are not animals. These are human beings.

Below is a poem I’m sending for your reading as you consider my argument.

Monrovia 2008

——— Patiricia Jabbeh Wesley (Newer poem forthcoming in The Literary Review)

On the side walk, patches of people
linger late.

In the day, they are like rice grains
along the roadways,

and at night,
they wallpaper lame bodies
in the draft darkness
of the broken city.

Crowds of war returnees,
waiting for nothing,
day after day,

waiting for nothing
after refugee camp,
after their former cities
of refuge

spewed them out like dirt,
after wandering the globe.
After death’s passing,
they have returned

looking like returnees
from the dead.

The city is hot, burning like steel
with hunger.

The air used to belong to us here
one woman said,
there used to be a road
to take us back home.

Today, the road homeward is now lost
The road to Cape Palmas, filled
with dry bones.

But on the street,
a motorcade is coming.
Someone is living.
Someone is living on these bones.

Do you know any other refugees from other countries, including Europe, who were brought to the United States between 1989 and 2009, given TPS, and afterwards, deported by mass numbers? I don’t know of any.

Liberian Immigrants who were brought into the United States during the 14 year bloody civil war are now threatened with mass deportation back to Liberia. We cannot allow this to happen in our civilized world. Join the efforts to stop this mass deportation of innocent people who have already suffered enough. Call up your law makers, and stop this madness. Liberia is neither ready nor able to survive such a mass arrival of immigrants and refugees. The video below is what these law-abiding people came from. The situation has not changed that much; so, don’t  let anyone fool you. This is the time to prevent another tragedy. Do not wait until another tragedy happens. This is your time to make a difference.

Why am I opposing this move? Please allow me to give you my reasons. Please allow those of us who are peace loving, humanitarian minded, thinking, well-meaning human beings to make our case. There is something wrong with a world that allows innocent human beings to suffer such a horrific massacre of hundreds of thousands, the destruction of an entire country, and the mass exodus of about a million to foreign countries and refugee camps over more than a decade before intervening in that war.

There is something wrong when those thousands are given “Temporary Protected Status-(TPS)” instead of a permanent status in the United states when the country they were taken from continues to be in ruins. There is something wrong when those tens of thousands who have made their home in America, who have paid taxes for the past nearly twenty years, who are struggling to bring up American born US children are told that “this is it, pack up and leave everything once more and return to nothing.” There is something inhumane about this, and you and I cannot allow this human tragedy to happen.

This is the Monrovia I saw, where most of the refugees that were repatriated from refugee camps struggle to find a source of living. It is no place to dump more of those who were once displaced and dislocated, and are now settled in the US. Do for Liberians what has been done for other refugees.

You have to be angry about this. You as a good citizen of the great United States, you, the well-meaning, peace-loving human being must pick up the phone and call your State Senator, your state representative, your civil group, and rally with me and with all of the peace loving people to prevent the deportation of law-abiding residents who have already been dealt a heavy blow by the war. There is something inhuman about this threat to deport Liberian immigrants.

I took this photo of Water Side in Monrovia, Liberia while I was visiting my homeland in July of 2009. This is how crowded the city was before the deportation/repatriation of another thousands of Liberians from the Buduburam Refugee Camp near Accra, Ghana. Let no one fool you, the country side has not been made habitable for returning refugee due to the violence. The United Nations is still in charge despite a government recognized by the world body. Deporting more people to that crowded, devastated country could start a new wave of violence.

The Argument For or Against the Deportation:

Let me port forth the arguments on both sides of the issue:

Some people have been complaining on the Internet that allowing Liberian refugees who were given the “TPS” to continue living legally either by a general clemency or by an extension could take away American jobs. Some contend that it would be unfair.

This is my question to you: Who is it unfair to? Who will lose if Liberian refugees who have already been victimized by the ugly civil war and by world neglect of that war are allowed to remain here in the US?

These Liberians are only the unfortunate ones who were forced to leave their country, and were given refuge by the richest country in the world, a country that Liberia as a nation has stood by since its founding in 1847. Who will lose something when whatever jobs some claim Liberians will take are jobs that only the unfortunately uneducated are willing to do in this country?

Liberian immigrants who came out of the villages and from difficult conditions of that country did not have the money to go to college or the means to find out how, and many today serve as nursing aids in America’s nursing homes, giving care to Americans, paying their taxes, bringing up American children.

What does anyone have to lose by keeping these law-abiding people here serving a country that needs service? I believe that anyone claiming this argument is only selfish, and does not know what it means to lose all of your family, your personal property, your homeland, your culture, and all that is worth living for. Liberians have seen enough, and must be given a total clemency to be permanent residents and citizens if they choose in this country. This is time for America and for Barack Obama to give back to a people who have loved America for nearly two centuries.

I took this photo during my research trip to Liberia in July, 2008. I was asked to do a talk for this group of young women at a Life Studies (Home Economics, vocational) school. These girls had nothing much going for them even in this over-crowding condition.

The Argument Against Deportation:

Now, concluding- can I ask when we heard that refugees that were brought into the US from other non-African countries were returned in mass by the US government? Or if I am right, is this a rule that fits African immigrant /refugees only?

Whenever one country gives sanctuary to a people during their time of need, this is a great giving. All of those who were caught up in that bloody civil war, folks like myself are very grateful for that. No one knows  better than Liberians what it feels like to lose everything, to lose so many of your loved ones, to lose tens of thousands of your country people, to watch the utter destruction of your homeland, your culture, and to see the craziness of what that ugly war brought upon us.

We know what it means when we have to watch our country people returned forcefully to that memory, to that ugly past, to no jobs or food, some to no family and to ghost towns. If this ever happens, this will be a violation of the rights of these people. This is because when they were brought here and given that TPS, that was all there was, and all that we could get. Refugees are usually desperate people who do not have choices, who take whatever is given them when it is given. But most of these law-abiding people have been here for nearly two decades, making viable contributions to this great land. They cannot be allowed to be forcefully returned without a fight from you, the good American people, the good immigrant residents, the peace-loving people, the Human Rights Activists.

Tell Barack Obama to hear our cry. Tell your state Senator and representatives to hear our cry. Tell your neighbors, your church friends, your community groups to join forces with all of us to prevent the punishment of these already victimized Liberians. Some may say “why didn’t they do something all these years?”

Tell them that refugees who lose everything and must start a new life often do not have the means to fight the laws, pay lawyers, fund the expensive fees needed to fight for citizenship. Those who could, like myself, have done that. Many could only feed their families. Give Liberians a chance to survive this time. Don’t let the sun go down on these innocent people. Do not let the government tear up families this time around. Many Liberians are still torn apart with families all over the world. Don’t let the sun go down without your help. I love you.

This is what we saw in that war.

Here are some Links on the Issue: http://www.africanloft.com/liberians-in-us-face-deportation/

http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/02/09/liberians.deportation/

http://www.wrni.org/content/local-liberians-face-threat-deportation

http://www.startribune.com/local/north/40516512.html?elr=KArksD:aDyaEP:kD:aUnc5PDiUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU

As Liberians In the US Face Possible Deportation, their President, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf Apologizes for Helping to Start the Civil War that Drove them Into Exile: So What Does that Mean?

So what does this mean for Liberians abroad, for Liberians still languishing in Refugee camps, for Liberians who are afraid of the looming threat of deportation on March 30, 2009, when the current Temporary Protective Status (TPS) ends, and the US government refuses to let them remain here in this country? The President’s admission should not stop right here with her apology. Should Ellen lead Liberia into confiscating all the resources that Charles Taylor stole from our country during his bloody take over of our country, during the fourteen year carnage he waged? Those who are perpetrators should be brought to justice for sending so many to their graves and for sending hundreds of thousands into exile. She needs to join forces with thoes who are campaigning to grant  permanent resident status to each Liberian on TPS here in the US. I have had mixed emotions about the news not because I did not know all of this news before the TRC session with our President. I will wait to hear what my readers think, and what they hope we Liberians can achieve. I am sure others will politicize this to the limit, but this is a moment for everyone of us to reflect on. History is interesting when it unfolds before our eyes. To know that the war that many supported with their money continues to haunt us today is amazing. This is another moment for thinking Liberians to reflect on. Reflect with me, will you?

Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf said she had been fooled by Charles Taylor Read the news article from the BBC below. Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has apologised at a truth and reconciliation commission over her backing for ex-rebel Charles Taylor. She said she had initially supported the rebel chief’s war effort and even raised funds for him, but denied ever having been a member of his group. She said she had been fooled about the real intentions of Mr Taylor. He led rebels who toppled President Samuel Doe in a 14-year civil war that left the West African nation shattered. Mrs Johnson-Sirleaf was imprisoned in the 1980s for criticising the military regime of President Doe and then backed Charles Taylor’s rebellion before falling out with him and being charged with treason after he became president. FROM FOCUS ON AFRICA More from Focus on Africa She took an oath on Thursday in the capital Monrovia from truth commission chairman Jerome Verdier and then sat before the flag of Liberia. The 70-year-old Liberian leader faced the seven-member commission as she narrated her own involvement in the Liberian crisis that began on the eve of Christmas in 1989. “If there is anything that I need to apologise for to this nation is to apologise for being fooled by Mr Taylor in giving any kind of support to him,” she said. “I feel it in my conscience. I feel it every day,” she said, regretting her support to Mr Taylor. Charles Taylor now faces war crimes charges in The Hague The Liberian leader said she had paid him a visit in May 1990 at his base in the north-eastern Liberian town of Gborplay, on the border with Ivory Coast. “I will admit to you that I was one of those who did agree that the rebellion was necessary,” she told the commission. “But I was never a member of the NPFL (National Patriotic Front of Liberia).” In a separate case, Mr Taylor became the first African ex-head of state to face an international war crimes court last year. He is accused of responsibility for the actions of Revolutionary United Front rebels during the 1991-2001 civil war in Sierra Leone, which included unlawful killings, sexual slavery, use of child soldiers and looting. Read two of my poems written during the Liberian Civil War. Monrovia, Revisited (copyright-Taken from  The River is Rising, Autumn House Press, 2007) ——Patricia Jabbeh Wesley This is the city that killed my mother; its crooked legs bent from standing too long, waiting so angry people can kill themselves too. No grass along street corners— so many potholes from years of war. Immigrants from all over the globe used to come here on tender feet, in search of themselves. Abandoned city— a place that learned how to cry out loud even though nobody heard. This is the city where I first learned how to lose myself. Windy city, blue ocean city. They say a city on the hill cannot be hid. The city of salty winds, salty tears, where stubborn people still hold us hostage after Charles Taylor. You should come here if you want to know how sacred pain can be. All Dirges Have Ceased (Copyright: Taken from  The River is Rising, Autumn House Press, 2007) —- Patricia Jabbeh Wesley All dirges shall cease at the striking of the clock, at seven, when dusk comes creeping with death. No more dirges will be sung for those taken away or slaughtered or cramped together in camps around the world—this our war. Until we all wither like charred remains of brush after the wildfire burns itself out. And all the living creatures that once owned the forest lie about in dry ash. A snail shell, half burnt, a rattlesnake, coiled, after the fire has eaten away its flesh. A scorpion and her entire family, as if smoked or parched hard for the ground. And animals that used to run wild in the jungles are all dead. But who will dare mourn the passing of mere animals when humans are still perishing and being smoked and buried alive and put on the line for the executioner, who is our warlord? Where is everyone as kwashiorkor saps away our war children one by one? Our warlord tells us we cannot wail or mourn or sing a dirge and wear black lappas or bury the dead or send a letter abroad to tell those who do not know about our dead. Today when the sun comes into the kitchen through the kitchen door or window, let us catch its shadow, its rays; let us lock up the sun in a box, in a steel box, and put a padlock on the box. So tomorrow, there will be no sunlight for the whole world. Tomorrow. So there will be no more sunlight tomorrow.

AWP Conference 2009 In Chicago, Illinois, and I Am Thinking In Poetry: Read A Few Poems from Some of My Favorite Poets

The Associated Writing Program Conference in Chicago will bring writers from mostly the US and a few from outside the US together. Last year, thousands gathered in New York City to read, sign books, present papers about writing and network for new publishers and agents. Last year, I did book signing and read my poetry with three other writers, Pulitzer Prize winning poet,  Yusef Komunyakaa, the acclaimed, award-winning, poet, Quincy Troupe, and the internationally acclaimed young African novelist, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. Quincy Troupe, one of my favorite poets and his wife Margaret became my good friends then. They are two of the most fun people I’ve met. This blog will pay tribute to some of my favorite writing friends or influnces. Enjoy.

QUINCY TROUPE

I took this photo during my visit to New York University where I was invited to read my poetry with two other writers on October 24, 2008. Here, Quincy was introducing me. But here is a clearer photo of him.

Quincy Troupe is the author of numerous books, including many books of poetry, and has won many awards. Some of his books of poetry include:
Miles and Me (George Gund Foundation Book in African American Studies)  Quincy Troupe (Paperback – May 30, 2002) and The Architecture of Language (Paperback – Oct 1, 2006). Quincy is the editor of Black Renaissance Noire, a literary magazine published out of New York University, and teaches at New York University. He and his wife Margaret are two of the most fun people I know. Below is one of Quincy’s poems taken from the webstie of Poets.org.

For Duke Ellington

— By Quincy Troupe

1.
that day began with a shower
of darkness, calling lightning rains
home to stone language
of thunderclaps, shattering, the high
blue, elegance, of space & time
where a broken-down, riderless, horse
with frayed wings
rode a sheer bone, sunbeam
road, down into the clouds

2.
spoke wheels of lightning jagged
around the hours, & spun high up
above those clouds, duke wheeled
his chariot of piano keys
his spirit, now, levitated from flesh
& hovering over the music of most high
spoke to the silence
of a griot-shaman-man
who knew the wisdom of God

3.
at high noon, the sun cracked
through the darkness, like a rifle shot
grew a beard of clouds on its livid, bald
face, hung down, noon, sky high
pivotal time of the flood-deep hours
as duke was pivotal, being a five in the nine
numbers of numerology
as his music was one of the crossroads
a cosmic mirror of rhythmic gri-gri

4.
so get on up & fly away duke, bebop
slant & fade on in, strut, dance swing, riff
& float & stroke those tickling, gri-gri keys
those satin ladies taking the A train  up
to harlem, those gri-gri keys
of birmingham, breakdown
sophisticated ladies, mood indigo
get on up & strut across, gri-gri
raise on up, your band’s waiting

5.
thunderclapping music, somersaulting
clouds, racing across the deep, blue wisdom
of God, listen, it is time for your intro, duke
into that other place, where the all-time great
band is waiting for your intro, duke
it is time for the Sacred Concert, duke
it is time to make the music of God, duke
we are listening for your intro, duke
so let the sacred music, begin

(taken from Poets.org.)

_____________________________________________________________

MARIE HOWE:

Marie Howe is one of my favorite poets, one who has influenced my own writing. I discovered her while I was in the Ph.D. Creative Writing Program at Western Michigan University. My professor then, Nancy Eimers, who herself is a great poet,  adopted Howe’s book, “What the Living Do,” and that semester changed a lot of style or my line structure. I love the book she is reading from on this photo. Her use of couplets introduced a new kind of couplets to me, couplets that were couplets even though the verse was as free as any contemporary poetry could be. My second is filled with couplets influenced by Marie’s style. One of my dreams is to meet her one day. I love not just her line structure, but her poetry, her intensity of feelings, her use of Christian images at times. Below is one of my favorite poems. Enjoy.

The Star Market

by Marie Howe January 14, 2008 (copyright: The New Yorker)

The people Jesus loved were shopping at the Star Market yesterday.
An old lead-colored man standing next to me at the checkout
breathed so heavily I had to step back a few steps.

Even after his bags were packed he still stood, breathing hard and
hawking into his hand. The feeble, the lame, I could hardly look at them:
shuffling through the aisles, they smelled of decay, as if the Star Market

had declared a day off for the able-bodied, and I had wandered in
with the rest of them—sour milk, bad meat—
looking for cereal and spring water.

Jesus must have been a saint, I said to myself, looking for my lost car
in the parking lot later, stumbling among the people who would have
been lowered into rooms by ropes, who would have crept

out of caves or crawled from the corners of public baths on their hands
and knees begging for mercy.

If I touch only the hem of his garment, one woman thought,
could I bear the look on his face when he wheels around?

_____________________________________________________________________

GABEBA BADEROON

Gabeba Baderoon (pronounced Habeba Baadaroon) is one of my favorite poets and friends. I discovered her or she discovered me more than two years ago when we both were attending MLA in Philadelphia. I had just arrived at the main conference hotel and was driving into the garage or being assisted by the valet. And since I was in a Penn State car, she, having just arrived herself with her husband, saw me and called me. At the moment, I did not know her, this my South African sister-poet-friend. From then on, she and I read together at University Park, where she teaches African literature. I invited her to my campus at Altoona, where she spoke to my students about South African Literature. She is the author of three books of poetry, including, “The Dream in the Next Body” and “A Hundred Silences.” She is an award winning poet from South Africa, a well traveled scholar and a dear sister. What I have learned as a poet also from Africa, from knowing Gabeba is how to know a hundred silences. She is one of those soft spoken people whose heart for the world is larger than anything you have ever seen. I have learned a lot from knowing Gabeba in a short time. My favorite memories of her to date is when she and I were at the African Literature Association conference, and I was complaining about my nasty hotel room, envying her in her beautiful hotel. She quickly offered me a place in her room, insisted that I moved in with her, and even though I did not take her up on her determined effort to be a true sister, I was quite moved by that. Of course, I stayed in my ugly hotel until I found a room in the better hotel two days later. Find Gabeba’s books and enjoy reading them. Enjoy the poem below.
_____________________________________________________________________

I Cannot Myself

______by Gabeba Baderoon

To come to this country,
my body must assemble itself

into photographs and signatures.
Among them they will search for me.

I must leave behind all uncertainties.
I cannot myself be a question.

_____________________________________________________________________________

CYNTHIA HOGUE

I discovered Cynthia Hogue’s poetry naturally because she and I were published by the same press. New Issues had just published her book, “Flux” came out in 2002, so she was obviously signing books at New Issue Press book table, and the late Herb Scott, who was at the time my mentor, introduced me to Cynthia. I had read the entire book, so imagine how happy I was to meet the poet herself. From then on, Cynthia has always been one of my biggest supporters in the world of poetry. Over the years, I have turned to her for that sister-poet relationship every poet needs. She is the author of five or more books of poetry. Her book, “The Incognito Body” is one of my favorites. I am looking forward to seeing her this year at AWP. Last year, we played the “someone is looking for you” game at AWP New York. I would go to a table, and someone would say, Cynthia is looking for you, and she would get the same world, and not for the thousands of others looking for one another, we may have found each other at that over-flowing New York City AWP. Enjoy the poem below. This is Cynthia for you with her sly power over words.

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Tree

by Cynthia Hogue

It’s just like her to cry,
Oh, stop living in your head ,
Billy! It makes more sense

where the sun always shines
on dreams programmed for optimism.
Often the man wakes up laughing.

He’s lost his wife and calls
himself divorced, but each night
she says, Good night, my dear,

as if she still lived in the house
he bought for her. He hears her
in the live-oak through the open window,

telling him what to do. Everyone tells him
he’s better off. He thinks,
I’ve wasted my life! The man wishes

his wife would come back because
his beard has grown like Spanish moss.
Letters in his book swim through the room

like zebra fish. The salamander-
colored dog noses the screendoor.
The man knows somewhere there’s a reason

to go on. He wrote last week that he hoped
“to build a new life.” He sent the letter,
with his baby picture, to the Times-Picayune,

which put it in the personals. Someone
called to him from the magnolia tree,
which has bloomed into huge, disk-like flowers,

so many satellites waiting for signals.
Goldfinches flit at the tree’s foot.
He loses himself in the perfumed air.

His wife loved hummingbirds,
though the feeder has hardened
with old sugar.

_______________________________________________________________

JAMES SCHWARTZ

James Schwartz was born 2.19.78 and raised in the Old Order Amish community in SW MI. where he currently resides. He is the author of several poetry chapbooks including The Scarlet Band and Other Poems (2005). Schwartz’s poetry has been published by Poetry Life and Times, The Rainbow Gazzette, the Australian poetry / art journal OutSide the Lines, The Poets Haven, Babel: The multilingual, multicultural online journal and community of arts and ideas and The New Verse News.I discovered James or he discovered me as it always goes, when he sent me an e-mail after visiting my blog some weeks ago. The Internet is one of the ways in which poets and emerging poets merge today, and was I glad to receive a note from a young poet with Michigan connections, one whose voice I quickly took to. I love the ability of poetry to explore the inexplorable, to venture into ruined territory, into the places words aren’t supposed to visit. James has other beautiful poems on his own blog and site, and you might want to visit him at: http://jsgossip.blogspot.com or http://jamesschwartz.towerofbabel.com. Enjoy this young talent, and visit his blog.

Alpine Aire: A Sonnet

by James Schwartz

The poet searches for Love, Truth, Beauty.
In the garden of winter snowscapes.
These matters of the heart are new to me.
January aire, Christmas cityscapes.
Though I walk in the gardens of winter.
Heart entranced by eternal summer aire.
Though my iced path may collapse or splinter.
I walk on warm til I see your face fair.
I have found Truth in Beauty and in Love.
No winter storm could measure my passion.
The heights of love scale alpine peaks above.
Soaring dreams that no poet can ration.
The poet’s quest ends with hearth, heart and home.
His blazing being no longer alone.

JAMES

Breakfast Blend: A Sonnet

by James Schwartz

The Bard’s web log: Now Serving Breakfast Blend!
Civilians get wasted, Soldiers gaysted.
Devout clubbers lay servitude to trend.
No queer queries poetry untasted.
War and Religion rage on in the dawn.
The Soldier and Civilian part in the street.
The Soldier to wells from which courage is drawn.
Sailing the high seas of thought with his fleet.
Availing to avenge his desperate hour.
Racing the Devil with bells on his feet.
To the Bard’s bower, the Poet’s tower.
Drinking with comrades he chanced to meet.
To greet his lover’s lips, tousle his hair.
And hear his Poet’s step upon the stair.

Barack Obama’s Inauguration:What A Worldwide Celebration for America, for Us Black People, and for Evryone- God Bless America

WHAT A DAY, WHAT A MOMENT, WHAT A HISTORICAL MOMENT TO CELEBRATE

Millions gather in Washington D.C. and around TVs all over the world to watch how the world can be changed for once. My father in Liberia and my brothers and sisters and hundreds of thousands of Liberians gather with the world around their TVs and public TVs to celebrate the birth of a new day for the world. Barack Obama is now President of the United States of America.

President Barack Hussein Obama of the United States, the son of an African father, the first time a black man is in the White House- Isn’t that wonderful?

Our young and beautiful First Lady, Michelle Obama- She looks like us, and isn’t that good?

Barack Hussein Obama is Our President now. Because of his dedication and hard work, because of his election, my sons and my daughters can have a face where they could not, in America. Whether you believe it or not, it is difficult to be a black person in America.

Today has opened up the door a bit wider. Thank God for Barack. Thank God for all the good Americans who disregarded race and fought to make this day possible. Thank God for a better tomorrow for us immigrants of African descent.

I have written my own poem to celebrate President Obama’s African heritage and connection to us African immigrants who also worked day and night to help him get elected because we love him and we love America. This poem was written the night of his election as the 44th US President.

The People Walking In Darkness: A Song for Barack Obama
by Patricia Jabbeh Wesley

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.
Now, put the music on, I say, put the music on, and let

drums sound in the hill country and in the dessert country,
on the dry road and the muddy road. Let the dancing girls

come out tapping their feet lightly to Wayee and to Sumu,
and let the young men, beating their drums sing no longer

with mournful cries. Let the young men in the village
square hold on to their young girls as the town crier rings

out the Klan-Klan-teh with the pounding of drums.
Obama has prevailed over his foes. The lion has sprinted

ahead of his pursuers, so let trumpeters and the men,
blowing their horns come sweating with music, oh Africa—

Let the earth keep silent, I say, and may our elders take up
the freedom only tears can bring. The day has broken

over the fields, my people, the day has broken over the fields,
and all our children, wandering in the forest have found

their footing once more. On the road, a farmer stands no longer
in mid-road. Come, and let us hold up the fire so the lightning

can pass, so our children can pass, so lovers can come out
of hiding, so daylight can come out upon the hills, so our dead

mothers and our dead fathers who lost their footing at the hands
of slavery shake lose grave dirt in their unmarked graves.

Obama, the son of woman, the one son we were going to bring
forth has become ours. Bring out the kola nuts and the spiced

pepper. Let the libation grace these parched surfaces where
the earth has bled. Let young women let loose their hair.

Let the earth be still- the souls of our ancestors are passing.
Let the earth be still- the souls of our ancestors are passing.

The child that was left behind has cleared the path so our
feet can find new footing, so our wailing can end.

The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.
The people walking in darkness have seen a great light.

The election and now the inauguration of Barack Obama, a son of an African father and a white American mother, the realization of the dream of millions of African Americans who have fought for this dream to come true- this is a moment in history. For me, this is a solemn day of both a celebration of how far we, black people have come, how far people of color all over the world have come, and how far America as a home of immigrants, a home for freedom and peace and equality has come. This has been a moment to live to cherish. I have not ceased to tear up just to be alive here. To know that my grandsons some day will no longer be likened only to Michael Jordon or Magic Johnson, that when someone looks at a black boy, he will no longer be examined through the eyes of low expecations, expecting all little black boys to end up in prison, and that such an individual will have to think before they speak about how much a black boy can accomplish.

THE WAR IN GAZA: Hold Up a Candle for Peace, Will You? Pray for the End of Fighting Between Isreal and the Palestinians- Civilians Are Dying on All Sides

STOP THE WAR, PLEASE:

Look at the images and hold up a candle to end the war in the Middle East.

W. H. Auden is one of my favorite poets, perhaps, one of my own influences. This poem below reflects how I feel the world should react to such carnage that war, and particularly, the war in Gaza is causing.

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone

———-W. H. Auden

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

Civilians die when there is war. Children and old people, no matter whether they believe in the fighting or not are indiscriminately killed by the fighters on all sides. We all pause even as we enter the new  year and wish everyone well, for the end of the fighting in the Middle East. All peace loving people around the world should stop all the arguments and seek to bring back peace to the people of Israel and Gaza.These pages are to commemorate all those who have already been killed on all sides, and to pray for those still alive, for the leaders on all sides to begin talking and the end of war. War is horrible.

Isreali Poet, Yehuda Amichai, who lived from 1924-2000 could not have written more about today.

Memorial Day for the War Dead
——-by Yehuda Amichai

Memorial day for the war dead.  Add now
the grief of all your losses to their grief,
even of a woman that has left you.  Mix
sorrow with sorrow, like time-saving history,
which stacks holiday and sacrifice and mourning
on one day for easy, convenient memory.

Oh, sweet world soaked, like bread,
in sweet milk for the terrible toothless God.
“Behind all this some great happiness is hiding.”
No use to weep inside and to scream outside.
Behind all this perhaps some great happiness is hiding.

Memorial day.  Bitter salt is dressed up
as a little girl with flowers.
The streets are cordoned off with ropes,
for the marching together of the living and the dead.
Children with a grief not their own march slowly,
like stepping over broken glass.

The flautist’s mouth will stay like that for many days.
A dead soldier swims above little heads
with the swimming movements of the dead,
with the ancient error the dead have
about the place of the living water.

A flag loses contact with reality and flies off.
A shopwindow is decorated with
dresses of beautiful women, in blue and white.
And everything in three languages:
Hebrew, Arabic, and Death.

A great and royal animal is dying
all through the night under the jasmine
tree with a constant stare at the world.

A man whose son died in the war walks in the street
like a woman with a dead embryo in her womb.
“Behind all this some great happiness is hiding.”

A pall of smoke rises after an explosion from an Israeli missile strike on the Hamas controlled Islamic University in Gaza City on Monday (AP photo by Hatem Moussa)

Emily Dickinson, one of my favorite poets wrote about everything there was under the sun. Her poems are as timeless as this one.

I Measure every Grief I meet (561)
————by Emily Dickinson

I measure every Grief I meet
With narrow, probing, Eyes –
I wonder if It weighs like Mine –
Or has an Easier size.

I wonder if They bore it long –
Or did it just begin –
I could not tell the Date of Mine –
It feels so old a pain –

I wonder if it hurts to live –
And if They have to try –
And whether – could They choose between –
It would not be – to die –

I note that Some – gone patient long –
At length, renew their smile –
An imitation of a Light
That has so little Oil –

I wonder if when Years have piled –
Some Thousands – on the Harm –
That hurt them early – such a lapse
Could give them any Balm –

Or would they go on aching still
Through Centuries of Nerve –
Enlightened to a larger Pain –
In Contrast with the Love –

I always come from the perspective of someone whose very life depended on whether those on all sides would just sit and talk to one another. You sit there and watch the bombs fall, watch children die, watch executions, and wonder, where is the world as all of this is happening. You wonder how anyone can get up and go to work, how anyone can cook a meal, how anyone can put on nice clothes wherever in the world they are while other human beings like you are dying.
The times are nightfall, look, their light grows less
—-by Gerard Manley Hopkins

The times are nightfall, look, their light grows less;
The times are winter, watch, a world undone:
They waste, they wither worse; they as they run
Or bring more or more blazon man’s distress.
And I not help. Nor word now of success:
All is from wreck, here, there, to rescue one—
Work which to see scarce so much as begun
Makes welcome death, does dear forgetfulness.

Or what is else? There is your world within.
There rid the dragons, root out there the sin.
Your will is law in that small commonweal…

_____________________________________

SAY A PRAYER, WILL YOU? END THE WAR NOW!!

Miriam Makeba- Mama Africa, Warrior Woman, Dead at 76- Come, and Let Us Lay Out the Lappas

AFRICA, MIRIAM MAKEBA – WEST WIND

MOTHER AFRICA IS NOT REALLY DEAD- YES, SHE LIVES ON!

On Hearing That Mama Africa Is Dead: A Poem for Miriam Makeba

Patricia Jabbeh Wesley (copyright)

Miriam Makeba- Mama Africa, Warrior Woman, thunder,

before the earth knew thunder.

Mama Africa, dead today, before the warrior child

who came out of years of fighting had time to pick up the gourd.

Mother Africa, you whose tears some of us grew to weep

for before we knew the meaning of tears. Mama Africa,

Thunder Woman, Town Crier, the stone at the edge

at the outskirts of South Africa’ flames

Wailing for Africa before our feet found the footing

that only the warrior woman knows how to walk.

Mother Africa, Miriam Makeba, I tell you, tears alone

are insufficient to quench the fire you breathed on us

for decades, before I knew how to see this world.

Mama Africa, all the ancestors have now lined up

at the gates with kola nuts to welcome you home where

only the brave can sit and relive.

Mama, did you go with news of all the things, happening?

Maybe, at your bedside, someone whispered to you

what the town crier came to say.

Maybe someone told you that today, today, in America,

one of your sons has been given the stool to sit on.

Maybe someone whispered to you as you journeyed beyond

that all the dreams you cried so hard for are now here with us

and that it is not only South Africa you have saved.

Maybe, the ancestors you join will tell you there is now

a new day. Maybe you knew before we knew, our time

has come. Mama Africa, we love you.

Mama Africa, your children now stand at the gate

waiting with wreaths to usher you homeward.

Mama Africa, we love you!

EVERYBODY DIES –I SAY

All of My Poetry/ English Professor Friends, Whites and Blacks Are Voting for Obama-WOW, Please Remember to VOTE!!!!

This is an historic election, no doubt. Everyone is at a standstill, waiting. All over the world, everyone is waiting. My friends around the world have told me they too are at a standstill for America. They love America and also wait like all of us.

What is most interesting to me is the circles of associations that we have formed around the election. Around me, many of my neighbors are for the opposition, but you have just to enter university territory or neighborhoods or college professors vitual world or poetry lanes, and you have Obama support everywhere to encourage you. My first duty as a supporter of Obama tomorrow is to drive forty minutes to State College to pick up my son, MT, who is registered in my township to vote. Besie, our eldest will be voting near her Penn State campus. After that, I will go to my campus to see if I am needed to drive students to the polls. I will work with all my strength to see Obama elected. I have given the few hours and few dollars I could. In my family, I am proud to say that my very intellectual two older children have their heads on their shoulders and are voting for Obama. My children want a better life for themselves and their children.

OBAMA LOGO—

My poetry friends are all up in arms with excitement and fear for the elections and Obama. But all will be well, I tell myself. Writers and artists and teachers and professionals at college campuses know the toll college education is taking on all of us and our children. They are on the field where art has been pulled out of schools, where poets can no longer get funding, where student drop-out is related to who makes policy of education, and we are counting the hours. One of my facebook friends, a very fine and renowned poet had her hours and minutes counted to the hour of voting. November 4, 2008 will be a day to keep in history. If Obama wins the position he is expected to win (if no one cheats this time), it will be a great day for most Americans and for all of us around the world.

DON’T BE AFRAID, EVERYONE- THE SAME GOD OTHERS BELIEVE IN IS PROTECTING OBAMA’S LIFE.

Listen to this poem: A Poem for Obama by Ainsley Burrows—-

Who Says Students Won’t Vote? How come the young Democrats on my campus are gearing up to vote? This is the Time To Be Alive!

I saw an announcement that made my heart jump. The young Democrats on my college campus are all gearing up for a big turn out on election day. According to the announcement, they will hold rallies every night now until election day; then on election day, they will march all day in groups, get loaded in vans, and march to the polls to cast their votes. As a professor for many, many years, I am so excited that our kids, our young people and all those college kids we never expected to pay attention have now seen the light, have seen that this is their world, that this is their right to take control of their world, that no one can and will scare them away from casting their votes, and that they will make up their own minds instead of being pushed by their parent’s to vote for their own candidate. They registered in amazing numbers during the weeks before the PA deadline to register. If they do not learn anything this year, they will end the year at least, knowing that they are as important to the history of their country and to the world just as any old woman or man who has voted for fifty years.

I was struck yesterday when in an encouragement to remind students to vote, for the first time, I asked the ultimate question: “How many of you have registered to vote?” And out of my nineteen student class, as far as my eyes were clear to see, they all had registered to vote. A young man, the most reticent of them all as far as I know, volunteered to tell the class that he had already voted by absentee ballot. Others had registered to vote in our town of Altoona even though they come from New York, Jersey, etc. That is amazing. That is progress. These students will grow up knowing that they too, can become President of the United States. They too have helped changed the mind of this country.

–photo courtesy: Patricia Smith

I was not concerned about anything else- whether or not they are Democrats or Republican. What is important to me is that they vote, whether immigrant American or not, they must vote. Whether or not we like it, America is important to the world; therefore, everyone must take the job of voting seriously. I did not follow up on the student’s statement about his voting. I had a class to teach,and it is not my place to wonder about which candidate my students vote for as long as they vote.  I will only encourage them to vote because this is all we can do as professors.

But isn’t this a great time to be alive and to be living in the great United States? I was driving through what we used to call the Gheto area of Grand Rapids, MI, when I lived in Grand Rapids area in the 1990s. This time unlike any other election I had lived to see in my twelve years in Michigan, I saw Barack Obama’s signs on the lawns of the most dilapidated houses. There were Barack Obama signs everywhere. I thought then to myself a couple weeks ago, Wow, so the Gheto too now is taking charge where  they were told they weren’t that important! Yes, they can, and they too, like the millions of students int his country will turn out to vote on November 4. We cannot afford to return to the past.

Democracy by Langston Hughes

Democracy will not come
Today, this year
Nor ever
Through compromise and fear.I have as much right
As the other fellow has
To stand
On my two feet
And own the land.

I tire so of hearing people say,
Let things take their course.
Tomorrow is another day.
I do not need my freedom when I’m dead.
I cannot live on tomorrow’s bread.

Freedom
Is a strong seed
Planted
In a great need.

I live here, too.
I want freedom
Just as you.

-photo courtesy: Patricia Smith