Mural-San Antonio
Everyone laughed at the impossibility of it,
but also the truth. Because who would believe
the fantastic and terrible story of all of our survival
those who were never meant
to survive?
Joy Harjo “Anchorage”
Sort of quick update and an even more sense of urgency: Dr. Christine Blasey Ford’s testimony, the backlash and out right lies made towards her and about her. The elevation of a mediocre jurist to the Supreme Court are shocking but not surprising. Power and privilege by wealthy white people are on full display. The presidency which was a minority election means that all of the people making policy for this nation were not elected by the majority of voting Americans. We are really in an awful state. But as Joy Harjo’s poem reminds us we “survive.” Indeed, we can thrive, but we gotta fight for that nurture.
This is a very crucial year for this Republic. We have a chance to put into place new and different Representatives, governors, et al in the Congress. But that will not happen if people are not registered or do not vote.
I am from Arkansas and I still remembered the many roadblocks placed in way of voting by Black people. Folks died across the South trying to exercise a right of Citizenship, the right to vote. It is also telling that once acquired, Blacks begin to exert serious political power and once that happened the Republicans began to use every trick in the book to undermine that power. We are where we are now because Black and Brown people have been “legally” removed from voters’ rolls. Voter suppression is a wound in this nation’s governance. A serious one. Russians have not done as much to harm the electorate as state legislators from Wisconsin to Georgia.
On 9-29-2018 I joined women poets including a trans woman to read in an event to raise $$ for the Democratic Party. I tend to see myself as independent, but I am a registered Democrat and this year that makes me know that I am on the side of civil and human rights; gender equality; environmental protection; education; and health and the protection of Social Security.
There is little poetry in politics, but if the political culture changes even more, and sooner or later poetry will be at the core of politics–why not dream.
VOTE as if your life depended on.
Cutthroat Journal pub this amazing collection 2-2017. Proceeds go to ACLU