sometimes

I lie alone on the grass

under a grey sky

in the dead heat of summer

and I see before me

the future

stretching out as far and as gloomily as the sky

and I wonder:

can one person change anything?

can I, with my thick glasses

and my inkstained hands

and my battered pen

make anything different 

make anything better

make anything change?

 

it's like a hammock

made of rope

suspended over a concrete floor -

you're swinging

and racing 

and flying

with your head in the clouds

and then the others look at you

and they see you as you are

and they don't like it

and you fall through the holes in the ropes

and land crashing on the floor

 

and you look up 

and realize

that what you took for clouds

is rain 

and smog 

and smoke

 

and the cool fresh breeze is gone

and instead you're trapped - 

trapped in the heat of their prejudice

that's harsh

and dead

and still.

 

for me,

they don't like me because

I'm not afraid to speak

I'm not afraid to tell them 

that there's right 

and wrong

and truth in this world

and that you just need to find it,

that right and wrong aren't just based

on what you feel

 

and they don't like to hear that

because they're content

with letting things be

and doing what they want

yet still holding thir prejudices.

 

and you say - 

"well, just don't speak

leave them be

keep your ideas to yourself

and you'll stay on the hammock.

maybe you're right

but if they don't want to hear,

don't tell them."

 

but I'm already on the concrete

 

and I look up at them

swinging in the hammock

laughing and agreeing

and I think,

is it worth it?

is it worth it to try to climb back up 

to try to talk to them

and make them understand?

to shatter their complacency

so that its shards go flying

over the concrete?

 

will that make them accept me?

will they then let me up?

 

do I want to go back up?

 

but I have to go back up

because I have to help them

I have to show them

show them truth and love.

 

but they won't let me back up

 

so I take out my battered pen

hold it in my inkstained hands

brush off my thick glasses

 

and I write.

 

I write so my words can go where I cannot.

 

I write to bring light 

and truth

and love

 

because if things are going to be better

if things are going to be different

if things are going to change

then I have to take up my pen and write

 

for I fight not with swords

not with guns

not with force

 

but with words.

 

sometimes

I lie alone in the grass

under a grey sky

in the dead heat of summer

and I see before me 

the future

stretching out as far and as gloomiily as the sky

dark long shadows crisscrossing

and tangling as the sky grows darker

 

and I say, 

"I will make the light

I will show the truth

I will bring the love."

 

so I take up my pen

I take out my paper

and I know what I have to do - 

 

and as the sky darkens 

as the night heats

as the shadows crisscross

 

I write

 

and I am not afraid.