Morning Song & Evening Walk

Morning Song and Evening Walk

For Martin Luther King, Jr.

And on the occasion of:

Senator Ted Kennedy

Receiving the:

Realizing the Dream Award

And

Representative John Lewis

Receiving the:

Drum Major Award

On January 18, 2009

Washington, D.C.

________________

1.

Tonite in need of you

and God

I move imperfect

through this ancient city.

Quiet. No one hears

No one feels the tears

of multitudes.

The silence thickens

I have lost the shore

of your kind seasons

who will hear my voice

nasal against distinguished 

actors.

O I am tired

of voices without sound

I will rest on this ground

full of mass hymns.

2.

You have been here since I can remember Martin

from Selma to Montgomery from Watts to Chicago

from Nobel Peace Prize to Memphis, Tennessee.

Unmoved among the angles and corners 

of aristocratic confusion.

It was a time to be born

forced forward a time

to wander inside drums

the good times with eyes like stars

and soldiers without medals or weapons

but honor, yes.

And you told us: the storm is rising against the

privileged minority of the earth, from which there is no

shelter in isolation or armament

and you told us: the storm will

not abate until a just distribution of the fruits of

the earth enables men (and women) everywhere to live

in dignity and human decency.

3.

All summerlong it has rained 

and the water rises in our throats 

and all that we sing is rumored 

forgotten.

Whom shall we call when this song comes of age?

And they came into the city carrying their fastings 

in their eyes and the young 9-year old Sudanese

boy said, “I want something to eat at nite a

place to sleep.”

And they came into the city hands salivating guns,

and the young 9-year old words snapped red 

with vowels:

Mama mama Auntie auntie I dead I dead I deaddddd.

4.

In our city of lost alphabets 

where only our eyes strengthen the children

you spoke like Peter like John

you fishermen of tongues

untangling our wings

you inaugurated iron for our masks

exiled no one with your touch

and we felt the thunder in your hands.

We are soldiers in the army

we have to fight, although we have to cry.

We have to hold up the freedom banners

we have to hold it up until we die.

And you said we keep going and we became

small miracles, pushed the wind down, entered

the slow bloodstream of America

surrounded streets and “reconcentradas,” tuned

our legs against the Olympic politicians elaborate cadavers

growing fat underneath western hats.

And we scraped the rust from old laws

went floor by floor window by window 

and clean faces rose from the dust

became new bridges and bridgegrooms among change

men and women coming for their inheritance.

And you challenged us to catch up with our

own breaths to breathe in Latinos Asians Native Americans

White Blacks Gays Lesbians Muslims and Jews, to gather

up our rainbow-colored skins in peace and racial justice

as we try to answer your long-ago question: Is there

a nonviolent peacemaking army that can shut down

the Pentagon?

And you challenged us to breathe in Bernard Haring’s words:

the materialistic growth—mania for

more and more production and more

and more markets for selling unnecessary

and even damaging products is a

sin against the generation to come 

what shall we leave to them:

rubbish, atomic weapons numerous

enough to make the earth

uninhabitable, a poisoned 

atmosphere, polluted water?

5.

“Love in practice is a harsh and dreadful

thing compared to love in dreams,” said a Russian writer.

Now I know at great cost Martin that as we burn

something moves out of the flames

(call it spirit or apparition)

till no fire or body or ash remain

we breathe out and smell the world again

Aye-Aye-Aye-Ayo-Ayo-Ayo Ayeee-Ayeee-Ayeee

Amen men men men A woman woman woman woman

Men men men Woman woman woman

Men men Woman woman

Men Woman

Womanmen.

6. (Postscript)

The earth has tilted dear Martin

as we awaken each morning to an

eternal alarm clock called hope.

I count the morning stars

the air so sweet anointed the day.

Hope comes on morning sails,

and we fold ourselves in the

middle of morning, as we turn

away from a landscape of greed.

We carry the sun on our backs

and remember you Martin, 

remember the thirst in your eyes,

your hands confessing peace

and racial and social justice.

We are the now

the history and herstory you tried

to make on dishonored walkways.

This day has the precision

of your dream.

In the four corners of this country,

we live inside your breath and love

try to answer the most important

question of the 21st century:

What does it mean to be human?

So we inaugurate across the 

sound of your words

not symbols and serums,

not peepholes and posturing,

not lesions and lechery,

with this new president

dear Martin,

We inaugurate a new day.

A time for all Americans.

We inaugurate like new

men and women should

coming out of themselves

toward peace and justice

and freedom.

So come with yourselves

singing life, life, lifeeee

singing eyes, singing hands

alarming the death singers

that we have come to celebrate

life, until we become seeing

men and women again.

Come inaugurate

a new way of breathing

peace and justice in the world.

And it will get better

EBE YIYE,

EBE YIYE,

EBE YIYE!*

*it’ll get better