Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - iPoem 11: Is It a New Day Today?

For better or for worse, my brother, Adeshina, it's the dawn of a new day. Let us take solace in the sacred words of our late matriarch, the poet Laureate, Maya Angelou, which she uttered exactly 24 years ago TODAY. In spite of everything, we shall take the pulse of our morning and say to each other, difficult as it may sound, "Good Morning."

ON THE PULSE OF MORNING

A Rock, A River, A Tree

Hosts to species long since departed,
Mark the mastodon.
The dinosaur, who left dry tokens
Of their sojourn here
On our planet floor,
Any broad alarm of their of their hastening doom
Is lost in the gloom of dust and ages.
But today, the Rock cries out to us, clearly, forcefully,
Come, you may stand upon my
Back and face your distant destiny,
But seek no haven in my shadow.
I will give you no hiding place down here.
You, created only a little lower than
The angels, have crouched too long in
The bruising darkness,
Have lain too long
Face down in ignorance.
Your mouths spelling words
Armed for slaughter.
The rock cries out today, you may stand on me,
But do not hide your face.
Across the wall of the world,
A river sings a beautiful song,
Come rest here by my side.
Each of you a bordered country,
Delicate and strangely made proud,
Yet thrusting perpetually under siege.
Your armed struggles for profit
Have left collars of waste upon
My shore, currents of debris upon my breast.
Yet, today I call you to my riverside,
If you will study war no more.
Come, clad in peace and I will sing the songs
The Creator gave to me when I
And the tree and stone were one.
Before cynicism was a bloody sear across your brow
And when you yet knew you still knew nothing.
The river sings and sings on.
There is a true yearning to respond to
The singing river and the wise rock.
So say the Asian, the Hispanic, the Jew,
The African and Native American, the Sioux,
The Catholic, the Muslim, the French, the Greek,
The Irish, the Rabbi, the Priest, the Sheikh,
The Gay, the Straight, the Preacher,
The privileged, the homeless, the teacher.
They hear. They all hear
The speaking of the tree.
Today, the first and last of every tree
Speaks to humankind. Come to me, here beside the river.
Plant yourself beside me, here beside the river.
Each of you, descendant of some passed on
Traveller, has been paid for.
You, who gave me my first name,
You Pawnee, Apache and Seneca,
You Cherokee Nation, who rested with me,
Then forced on bloody feet,
Left me to the employment of other seekers-
Desperate for gain, starving for gold.
You, the Turk, the Swede, the German, the Scot...
You the Ashanti, the Yoruba, the Kru,
Bought, sold, stolen, arriving on a nightmare
Praying for a dream.
Here, root yourselves beside me.
I am the tree planted by the river,
Which will not be moved.
I, the rock, I the river, I the tree
I am yours- your passages have been paid.
Lift up your faces, you have a piercing need
For this bright morning dawning for you.
History, despite its wrenching pain,
Cannot be unlived, and if faced with courage,
Need not be lived again.
Lift up your eyes upon
The day breaking for you.
Give birth again
To the dream.
Women, children, men,
Take it into the palms of your hands.
Mold it into the shape of your most
Private need. Sculpt it into
The image of your most public self.
Lift up your hearts.
Each new hour holds new chances
For new beginnings.
Do not be wedded forever
To fear, yoked eternally
To brutishness.
The horizon leans forward,
Offering you space to place new steps of change.
Here, on the pulse of this fine day
You may have the courage
To look up and out upon me,
The rock, the river, the tree, your country.
No less to Midas than the mendicant.
No less to you now than the mastodon then.
Here on the pulse of this new day
You may have the grace to look up and out
And into your sister's eyes,
Into your brother's face, your country
And say simply
Very simply
With hope

Good morning.   

Maya Angelou

On the Pulse of Morning

((https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=59xGmHzxtZ4)

===

Michael O. Afolayan

Quietly and soberly watching from the Land of Lincoln                       

On Friday, January 20, 2017 2:08 AM, Awosika Itunu <bridy.4real@gmail.com> wrote:

Great words there. Is someone in the White House listening? Will people ponder over this and get our faculty awakened? Else, the future gets gloomy and posterity?..........

On 20 Jan 2017 12:51 am, "'Adeshina Afolayan' via USA Africa Dialogue Series" <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> wrote:

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Is It a New Day Today?

Is it a new day today

in Trump's America?

 

I was told the "people"

have spoken, with

Democracy's permission

but have we been heard?

What happens to all the votes

of those other people?

What about all the acrimonies,

bigotry and racial slurs?

 

Is this a new day today,

that stirs my simmering fear

and the naive questions

from those children whose

innocence time is about

to rupture?

 

What message should we

send back to King, Jr.?

Well...bigotry won Georgia

and Mississippi is still sweltering!

 

How do we interpret

the white stares that isolate

me immediately I step

into Walmart?

Or the special treatment

Any time I'm at the airport?

 

Is it a new day today

in God's own land,

or even God himself is afraid?

Have we finally crossed the

boundary that separates

dream from nightmare?

Is the cock crowing a new day

to correct the blasphemous

darkening of the White House?

 

Is it a new day today

in the migrant's land

where audacity dares?

Does Liberty still hold the beacon

to yonder lands of the hopeful

and the scared?

 

Divided we stand:

racism's logic reigns!

Fear is now inaugurated

White has triumphed

All things non-white cower

 

Black, White, Brown

We all are humanity!

 

We will all earnestly

stand together, heart to heart

in all our broken places

we will climb the walls and

scale the bigoted breaches

we will breach nightmare's

ramparts, and overthrow fear!

 

We all are humanity!

 

Adeshina Afolayan, PhD
Department of Philosophy
University of Ibadan

+23480-3928-8429

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