Archive for the ‘justice’ Category
The Sadness Of Leaving Paradise
Posted in depression, empowerment, freedom, gaza, grief, hope, israel, justice, life, nakba, palestine, personal growth, poetry, politics, refugees, tagged apartheid, asylum, despair, exile, freedom, hope, hopelessness, israel, life, Literature, my work, my writing, pain, palestine, Palestinian people, peace, poems, poetry, poets on wordpress, refugees, sorrow, the earth, violence, Writing on July 31, 2017| Leave a Comment »
“Perhaps like me you have no address” Mahmoud Darwish
And we will go, again and again
Down roads unwanted and unmapped.
Thrust out of our past and present,
We go slowly from, but never towards.
Away, it seems, always away.
You, I, our families,
The disconsolate unwanted,
In mournful unison, go
To where the nightingale flies over sky-less lands,
Circling in silent arcs past our
Rainbows of no color, the solemn hues
Matching the smile
We’ve forgotten to show and
The eyes we’ve left behind
Like an empty wine bottle and
An unmentionable promise of return.
Leaving is now in our bosom,
The uncultivable feed of our soul,
The cold in our summers.
The sense of loss removes our fingerprints
From the al-mahmas and the al-houn.
We express our losses in silence as
Our soul bears its’ grief
Like an olive tree without roots.
Upon our next inevitable leaving,
I will change my name
To as yet unknown letters
In a non-existent language,
Denying what we leave behind,
Drawing the letters from what we have
On our backs,
Forged from yet
Another star-less sky
And burned into our souls here,
Times own cryptography.
All we were is spilled from the carts that
We draw silently away,
Along the streets with no sun.
Hope, (A Lament From The Trail Of The Refugee)
Posted in depression, dreams, empowerment, freedom, gaza, grief, Homs, hope, inequality, israel, justice, life, loss, MENA, Mohammed, nakba, palestine, personal growth, poetry, refugee camp, refugees, regret, writing, tagged apartheid, asylum, despair, exile, faith, famine, fraternity, friends, gaza, Gaza Strip, home, hope, hopelessness, hunger, illegal settlements, kibbutz, love poetry, Nakba, pain, palestine, peace, poems, poetry, refugees, sadness, sorrow, Syria, the earth, violence, Writing on April 29, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Thoughts On Listening To *This Land Is Your Land”
Posted in Bruce Springsteen, civil war, crimes against humanity, depression, Donald Trump, dreams, earth, empowerment, end hunger, equality, family, Fascisim, feminisim, freedom, gender equality, growth, hope, inequality, jim crow, justice, leadership, life, Neo-nazis, personal growth, poetry, politics, politics, racisim, reconciliation, slave auctions, slave trade, slavery, truth, Vote, war, women, womens' rights, writing, tagged beauty, Bruce Springsteen, children, Donald Trump, equality for all, equality for girls and women, facism, freedom, Gender equality, nature, not my president, persistance, prejudice, religious freedom, resistance, singing, songs of freedom, this land is your land, woody guthrie on February 10, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Thoughts On Listening To *This Land Is Your Land”
I had a dream today, got me thinking,
On the bus on the way home from work,
A dream I’ve had before,
A dream many have probably had
I was on television, talking and singing,
The whole world was a’ watchin’
Woody Guthrie was a’ watchin’
Pete Seeger, he was a ’watchin’
Bruce Springsteen, he was a ’watchin’
And old orange face, Mr. Trump, he was a ’watchin’ too
Kept droppin’ the big TV remote outta his small hands, poor thing,
Anyways, like I said, I was on TV,
Had a guitar in my hands,
Strapped over my favorite flannel shirt,
And my favorite pair of Levis
And my bestest boots. I was a’ wearing all of that
And the song I was gonna sing,
This Land Is Your Land,
Well it weren’t no regular song, sir,
It was, I reckon, one of the most beautiful songs
I ever heard, I was telling people about it,
It was all about this country of ours,
And all its’ natural beauty,
And how it was built for you,
And built for me
And how it was built for him,
And him,
And her
And her
And the preacher
And the doctor
And the lawman
And the bus driver
And the children playing in the schoolyard,
Sir it was built for them too,
It didn’t make no mention of names
Nor what school they went to,
Nor even if they didn’t go to school, well it didn’t mention that neither
Nor what church they go to, who they pray to, iffn they pray at all,
No, sir, not even where they come from,
Not which part of town, not which coast,
Not which country,
Cuz everybody here comes from someplace else in the long run, don’t they?
Iffn ya trace it back far enough, I mean, we all come from immigrants
– Well, almost all of us –
Yes, sir, the song was plain and simple and beautiful, and indeed
This here land was made for you, and me, and him, and him, and her, and her
All to share equally, don’t that sound like a place you wanna live in, sir?
I know I would, if I could find it.
What say we find it together, sir?
Click the link below to listen to This Land is Your Land – Live by Bruce Springsteen
https://open.spotify.com/track/4MvJlIpDpdZi4sCXvAhrym
And The Gods Told Our Fathers
Posted in death, Fascisim, grief, growth, hope, justice, life, loss, love, poetry, politics, politics, regret, war, writing, tagged faith, Family, life, Literature, poetry, politics, religion, violence on February 2, 2017| Leave a Comment »
And the Gods told our fathers
Give us your sons
And we will trade their smiles for death.
Send us their coats of many colours
And we will change those colours to red,
Give us their sandals
And we will exchange them for boots with which
To tread upon the lives of nameless mothers.
Give us their shirts and
We will smother the children in them.
And they will hate us for it.
We will lie to them,
We will never set them free.
We will take the lives of your sons
In wars over greed and lust.
Our altars of sacrifice will bleed once more
With glorious blood.
The spilled blood of your sons
The sons of the poor, the sons of the illiterate,
The sons without hope, and the foolishly brave.
And we will teach you deception,
We will teach you loss
We will teach you sorrow and
We will desert you when you grieve
And you will thank us for it.
Racist friend
Posted in crimes against humanity, Donald Trump, dreams, empowerment, equality, family, feminisim, inequality, jim crow, justice, life, Neo-nazis, personal growth, politics, racisim, regret, relationships, slavery, Sverigedemokraterna, writing, tagged prejudice, race, Racism, racist, racist friend, racist trump on January 22, 2017| Leave a Comment »
I have a new favorite song!! The lyrics are strong but so very correct. We all know, or most of us know, or have met at least one racist in our lives, or someone who is “soft” about racism. They tell you they aren’t, but laugh at racist jokes, maybe even tell them, but they assure you, they “don’t believe this way”. I remember when I lived in NW Portland. I had just repainted and refurnished my flat. I threw a party. A boyfriend of one of my cowokers told me and my guests a racist joke, he made sure he had everyones attention. I was mortified!! I looked him right in the eye and told him that racism is forbidden in my house and my life. I asked him why he would think it was acceptable. We had never met before that night. I apologized to my coworker and tgen told him he needed to leave, immediately. He then said that he “wasn’t that way, but wanted to see my reaction”. I responded; ” Well, now you’ve seen it. I hope you hesitate the next time you want to tell such a crass joke”.
This is one of the strongest ways to help people realize just how unacceptable racism is. It hits in the head like a baseball bat and we need to stand up with all of our strength against it. The more we make it known PRECISELY how unnacceptable it is, the more uncomfortable it becomes. Education is a strong tool. Use it in positive ways. Use it with strength.
Here are the lyrics;
If you have a racist friend
Now is the time, now is the time
For your friendship to end
Be it your sister, be it your brother
Be it your cousin, or your uncle, or your lover
If you have a racist friend
Now is the time, now is the time
For your friendship to end
Be it your best friend, or any other
Is it your husband, or your father, or your mother
Either change their views
Or change your friends
If you have a racist friend
Now is the time, now is the time
For your friendship to end
So if you know a racist who thinks he is your friend
Now is the time, now is the time
For your friendship to end
Call yourself my friend
Now is the time to make up your mind
Don’t try to pretend
Be it your sister, be it your brother
Be it your cousin, or your uncle, or your lover
So if you have a racist friend
Now is the time, now is the time
For our friendship to end
#NowPlaying Racist Friend – P3 Version by Naomi Pilgrim