Dreams
Hold fast to dreamsFor if dreams dieLife is a broken-winged birdThat cannot fly.Hold fast to dreamsFor when dreams goLife is a barren fieldFrozen with snow.Langston Hughes
Who Said It Was Simple
By Audre Lorde
There are so many roots to the tree of anger
that sometimes the branches shatter
before they bear.
Sitting in Nedicks
the women rally before they march
discussing the problematic girls
they hire to make them free.
An almost white counterman passes
a waiting brother to serve them first
and the ladies neither notice nor reject
the slighter pleasures of their slavery.
But I who am bound by my mirror
as well as my bed
see causes in colour
as well as sex
and sit here wondering
which me will survive
all these liberations.
And so it begins, my long slow exhale, the beginning of a release of four years of stress and tension. For the majority of the record number of Americans that voted for Biden, voted for change, his victory is one of enormous proportions. It is historic. For the 70 million plus that voted for Trump it is a disappointment. The reality of this day is not one of decisive healing in this nation, rather it is the stark chasm left from this long divisive campaign that exists as a scar in this country and it is not going to be washed away easily. Trumpism’s rejection of political norms, rejection of science, rejection of decency and his four year assault on the idea of the historical role of political leaders at the federal level to provide a leadership of care for all, rather than just your parties special interests, I fear is going to remain long after Trump leaves the White House. The map of dots of urban blue surrounded by a sea of red counties, red states, that are the homes of good people, people as convinced their vote was correct for Trump as the path to the future of America, as the people like myself that voted for Biden. I am not naïve. I know that the next four years is going to be difficult globally in terms of the health pandemic, the state of the global economy and the political turmoil and societal turmoil that will inevitably ensue. I am only glad that a professional is once again headed into the White House to help deal with this mess we find ourselves.
For today, I will be a humble victor, take a minute to relax, enjoy some poetry and remember we have a lot of work to do as a nation and as individuals to address the systemic issues of racism facing our society and the world. Presidential campaigns mark the passage of time. Whether the next four years are more or less critical than any other four in the past 40 years depends on whether we are capable as a society to actually begin to work on issues in a substantial way. If we let politics play pin the tail on the donkey once again, Republicans blocking potential solutions so that they can blame the Democrats in the next election cycle for failure, we will squander this opportunity for change. At some point we will have to work together at the federal level, just like we do in our places of business, in our schools, in our communities. And to view our parties that we vote for as having a mutual sense of obligation to do more than just obstruct the other party’s agenda on the opposite side of the aisle but to start constructing solutions together. To do that, I suspect we will need a mixture of good will, good science, good policy and bit of prayer mixed with hope to be successful.
Prayer
by Carol Ann Duffy
Some days, although we cannot pray, a prayer
utters itself. So, a woman will lift
her head from the sieve of her hands and stare
at the minims sung by a tree, a sudden gift.
Some nights, although we are faithless, the truth
enters our hearts, that small familiar pain;
then a man will stand stock-still, hearing his youth
in the distant Latin chanting of a train.
Pray for us now. Grade 1 piano scales
console the lodger looking out across
a Midlands town. Then dusk, and someone calls
a child’s name as though they named their loss.
Darkness outside. Inside, the radio’s prayer –
Rockall. Malin. Dogger. Finisterre.
Fourteen Lines 