All of Us (Sasha Massey - Lafayette, LA)

We have so few days to be good to people. No matter how hard they work against an established pattern or what little good they acknowledge in themselves. What remains is that while we live and learn we have to keep teaching. The choice to help the poor or shame them can be taught. Aside from biases set up to defeat black and brown people we have what seem to be the same chances as anyone. It’s a bitter thing to live every day with the stress of fear and exclusion, but when we choose good it makes the world better. People folding up like lawn chairs for a lie they were sold are just as likely to turn away and accomplish true good in the world. Hate, poverty, and the violence and limitation of rights of women are not ‘us or them’ problems. They are Human problems. We can solve them. We can heal the world if we work together for good. To protect children. To grant every access to a full education of their home, our world which further enriches and improves the future they will grow up in. Woman can have full rights over their bodies, their skills and their families. Males can be taught true respect of all people. No matter their age, skin color, where they come from or what genitals they have. Homeless people can be taken care of just as well as terminally ill and elderly people. They can be reintegrated into society and have proper homes, food and care. These are just a few things we can do, but for this to work and last…it’s going to require everyone striving together for a common good. Not just one social group or religious sect. Not just poor people pooling all their money. Not just rich people and corporations finally paying their fair share taxes.

All of us.

Comments

Come Hither (Annette Redmond Walters - Lafayette, LA)

I meant it not this way but the tears just flow and my makeup smearing all the more, leaving behind that familiar filthy residue. I may have begun to drive myself away, dragging you down as well. But it's done, I've flipped the switch and now it's dark once more. How painful is the music to my ears, I can't stand to be alone in it, yet here I am again. I pray you fly back and safely and warmly to me, though I fear I've dug the grave too deeply. As the dirt shifts within my soul, I choke on those loving words I'd meant for you. All the fragments of light I see becoming smaller and I wish to be near you in your embrace that might make me feel the warmth I'm missing. And in reality, I doubt I'd breathe another breath without you. So come hither and quickly soothe my dying heart, you are the only cure I know. I cry and cry again, come hither to heal and love me. Come hither and help me dry my tears.

Let That Fucker Burn (John Chenvert - Napoleonville, LA)

Let that fucker burn. Let the fire crackle like the whips once did— like bone meeting leather, like screams swallowed by the trees. Let the white columns crumble to ash. Not as tragedy— but as truth, unearthing itself from beneath generations of silence. Nottoway is not a mansion. It’s a mausoleum. A lie carved in stone to honor the hands that held the whip, not the backs that bore it. They called it the “White Castle.” A place of beauty. A place for weddings, for photo ops, for pretending that horror can be made elegant if the curtains match the guilt. But no paint can cover what happened there. Blood doesn’t wash out with white linens. And pain doesn’t forget just because you renamed it history. I’m not Black. And I won’t pretend to carry that weight. But I also won’t ignore it. My people—the Guanches—were taken too. Our language silenced. Our land stolen. Our names nearly erased. So yes, I know colonization. Yes, I know what it means to be disappeared. But I also know this— my skin ...

Lunatic (Lily Lechler - New Orleans, LA)

“Lunacy” comes from the moon, Who cycles through brilliance and darkness Bipolarity’s patterns are not so easily assumed Opposites not so well harnessed Who cycles through brilliance and darkness? The girl who sits in bed, wrestling with Opposites. Not so well harnessed As she thought, her brain gives reason the slip The girl who sits in bed, wrestling with Her body, depressed, her thoughts manic. As she thought, her brain gave reason the slip And gives the gift of life in a dreamlike panic. Her body depressed her thoughts. Manic Lunacy comes from the moon And gives the gift of life in a dreamlike panic Bipolarity’s patterns are not so easily assumed

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