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| Photo Credit: Adam Anderson |
If you have not yet read about Bree Newsome's beautiful act of civil disobedience, you need to read this story. We often think of nonviolent protest as a thing of the past, something that Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King Jr, and Gandhi did, but not something that happens anymore. But of course it does. Racism is not a relic of the past, and neither is protest against it.
I was inspired by Newsome's courage, as well as by the many pieces of art that have sprung up around her action, to write this poem.
Now is the Time for True Courage
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| Art Credit: Rebecca Cohen |
Do you see her
standing atop that flagpole?
Bree Newsome
scaled 400 years of oppression
to strike down a symbol of hate.
Do you see her?
Avenging angel of Justice
armed not the sword but with
the word of God.
Her cape flutters in the wind
where a flag once flew.
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| Art Credit: Eric Orr |
She, beacon of hope
standing atop that flagpole,
denounces a heritage of violence.
Justice was on her side
the day Bree Newsome
scaled 400 years of oppression
to strike down a symbol of hate.
Do you see her?
Beautiful Black woman,
warrior of power and truth,
no mask hides her face.
Standing atop that flagpole
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| Art Credit: @Niall_JayDubb |
she can see the
mothers who went before her
to sit on that bus,
to cross that bridge,
to walk into that school,
to register for that vote,
to worship in that church.
And they were with her the day Bree Newsome
scaled 400 years of oppression
to strike down a symbol of hate.
And I know no one woman can
fly faster than all the bullets speeding into black bodies
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| Art Credit: Legends Press Comics |
in churches,
on playgrounds,
on streets,
in homes.
But when I see Bree Newsome
scale 400 years of oppression
to strike down a symbol of hate,
I believe in courage.
I believe in hope.
I believe that we can change.
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