Celebrations (2 page)

When we come to it

We, this people, on this wayward, floating body

Created on this earth, of this earth

Have the power to fashion for this earth

A climate where every man and every woman

Can live freely without sanctimonious piety

Without crippling fear

When we come to it

We must confess that we are the possible

We are the miraculous, we are the true wonder of this world

That is when, and only when,

We come to it.

Dear Oprah,

On the day of your birth

The Creator filled countless storehouses and stockings

With rich ointments

Luscious tapestries

And antique coins of incredible value

Jewels worthy of a queen’s dowry

They were set aside for your use

Alone

Armed with faith and hope

And without knowing of the wealth which awaited

You broke through dense walls

Of poverty

And loosed the chains of ignorance which threatened to cripple you so that you could walk

A free woman

Into a world which needed you

My wish for you

Is that you continue

Continue

To be who and how you are

To astonish a mean world

With your acts of kindness

Continue

To allow humor to lighten the burden

Of your tender heart

Continue

In a society dark with cruelty

To let the people hear the grandeur

Of God in the peals of your laughter

Continue

To let your eloquence

Elevate the people to heights

They had only imagined

Continue

To remind the people that

Each is as good as the other

And that no one is beneath

Nor above you

Continue

To remember your own young years

And look with favor upon the lost

And the least and the lonely

Continue

To put the mantel of your protection

Around the bodies of

The young and defenseless

Continue

To take the hand of the despised

And diseased and walk proudly with them

In the high street

Some might see you and

Be encouraged to do likewise

Continue

To plant a public kiss of concern

On the cheek of the sick

And the aged and infirm

And count that as a

Natural action to be expected

Continue

To let gratitude be the pillow

Upon which you kneel to

Say your nightly prayer

And let faith be the bridge

You build to overcome evil

And welcome good

Continue

To ignore no vision

Which comes to enlarge your range

And increase your spirit

Continue

To dare to love deeply

And risk everything

For the good thing

Continue

To float

Happily in the sea of infinite substance

Which set aside riches for you

Before you had a name

Continue

And by doing so

You and your work

Will be able to continue

Eternally

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

If my luck is bad

And his aim is straight

I will leave my life

On the killing field

You can see me die

On the nightly news

As you settle down

To your evening meal.

But you’ll turn your back

As you often do

Yet I am your sons

And your daughters too.

In the city streets

Where the neon lights

Turn my skin from black

To electric blue

My hope soaks red

On the gray pavement

And my dreams die hard

For my life is through.

But you’ll turn your back

As you often do

Yet I am your sons

And your daughters too.

In the little towns

Of this mighty land

Where you close your eyes

To my crying need

I strike out wild

And my brother falls

Turn on your news

You can watch us bleed.

In morgues I’m known

By a numbered tag

In clinics and jails

And junkyards too

You deny my kin

Though I bear your name

For I am a part

Of mankind too.

But you’ll turn your back

As you often do

Yet I am your sons

And your daughters too.

Turn your face to me

Please

Let your eyes seek my eyes

Lay your hand upon my arm

Touch me. I am real as flesh

And solid as bone.

I am no metaphor

I am no symbol

I am not a nightmare

To vanish with the dawn

I am lasting as hunger

And certain as midnight.

I claim that no council nor committee

Can contain me

Nor fashion me to its whim.

You, come here, hunch with me in this dingy doorway,

Face with me the twisted mouth threat

Of one more desperate

And better armed than I.

Join me again at today’s dime store counter

Where the word to me

Is still no.

Let us go, your shoulder,

Against my shoulder,

To the new picket line

Where my color is still a signal

For brutes to spew their bile

Like spit in my eye.

You, only you, who have made me

Who share this tender taunting history with me

My fathers and mothers

Only you can save me

Only you can order the tides,

That rush my heart, to cease

Stop expanding my veins

Into red riverlets.

Come, you my relative

Walk the forest floor with me

Where rampaging animals lurk,

Lusting for my future

Only if your side is by my side

Only if your side is by my side

Will I survive.

But you’ll probably turn your back

As you often do

Yet I am your sons

And your daughters too.

When great trees fall,

rocks on distant hills shudder,

lions hunker down

in tall grasses,

and even elephants

lumber after safety.

When great trees fall

in forests,

small things recoil into silence,

their senses

eroded beyond fear.

When great souls die,

the air around us becomes

light, rare, sterile.

We breathe briefly.

our eyes, briefly,

see with

a hurtful clarity.

Our memory, suddenly sharpened,

examines,

gnaws on kind words

unsaid,

promised walks

never taken.

Great souls die and

our reality, bound to

them, takes leave of us.

Our souls,

dependent upon their

nurture,

now shrink, wizened.

Our minds, formed

and informed by their

radiance,

fall away.

We are not so much maddened

as reduced to the unutterable ignorance

of dark, cold

caves.

And when great souls die,

after a period peace blooms,

slowly and always

irregularly. Spaces fill

with a kind of

soothing electric vibration.

Our senses, restored, never

to be the same, whisper to us,

They existed. They existed.

We can be. Be and be

better. For they existed.

Our souls look back

In wondrous surprise

At how we have made it

So far from where we started

Fathers, brothers, uncles

Nephews, sons, and friends

Look over your shoulders

And at our history

The night was long

The wounds were deep

The pit has been dark

Its walls were steep

I was dragged by braids

On a sandy beach

I was pulled near you

But beyond your reach

You were bound and gagged

When you heard me cry

Your spirit was wounded

With each wrenching try

For you thrusted and pulled

Trying to break free

So that neither of us

Would know slavery

You forgot the strength

Of the rope and the chain

You only remember

Your manhood shame

You couldn’t help yourself

And you couldn’t help me

You’ve carried that fact

Down our history

We have survived

Those centuries of hate

And we do not deny

Their bruising weight