At the edge of a new year, there is little optimism. Indeed there is cynicism, bitterness and divide..
Divide and conquer -- the master's tools
Unresolved economic crises, a state of limbo on health-care reform, wars and more wars...
Yet there is - yes still always is -- hope
"So now, as in the past, we prisoners of hope in desperate times must try to speak our fallible truths, expose the vicious lies, and bear our imperfect witness."
Cornel West 2004
I am no dreamy idealist, but a pragmatist, a radical realist who is rooted in praxis...
And I am a prisoner of hope..
Barack Obama canpaigned on the audacity of hope. I supported that then - I support that now...
And despite the disappointments and the harsh reality of brutal partisan politics, he still represents that hope to many..
In the new year, let us help Barack Obama and progressive Democrats by modeling the change we wish to see by working together in true coalition
We have a chance now that we haven't had in nearly 40 years..
There is lots of represssive policy to be undone and it takes time to do it..
Change is never big enough or fast enough but it will come..
We must not give in to despair and division -- "the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice..."
We must remain prisoners of hope....
West would put it into eloquent prose --
This hope is not the same as optimism. Optimism adopts the role of the spectator who surveys the evidence in order to infer that things are going to get better. Yet we know that the evidence does not look good. The dominant tendencies of our day are unregulated global capitalism, racial balkanization, social breakdown, and individual depression. Hope enacts the stance of the participant who actively struggles against the evidence in order to change the deadly tides of wealth inequality, group xenophobia, and personal despair. Only a new wave of vision, courage, and hope can keep us sane-and preserve the decency and dignity requisite to revitalize our organizational energy for the work to be done. To live is to wrestle with despair yet never to allow despair to have the last word.
My one and only brother would say it with a song -
Elizabeth Alexander, would say it with a poem...
January 20, 2009
Text
Inaugural Poem
"Praise Song for the Day," written and recited by Elizabeth Alexander, as provided by Graywolf Press.
Each day we go about our business,
walking past each other, catching each other’s
eyes or not, about to speak or speaking.
All about us is noise. All about us is
noise and bramble, thorn and din, each
one of our ancestors on our tongues.
Someone is stitching up a hem, darning
a hole in a uniform, patching a tire,
repairing the things in need of repair.
Someone is trying to make music somewhere,
with a pair of wooden spoons on an oil drum,
with cello, boom box, harmonica, voice.
A woman and her son wait for the bus.
A farmer considers the changing sky.
A teacher says, Take out your pencils. Begin.
We encounter each other in words, words
spiny or smooth, whispered or declaimed,
words to consider, reconsider.
We cross dirt roads and highways that mark
the will of some one and then others, who said
I need to see what’s on the other side.
I know there’s something better down the road.
We need to find a place where we are safe.
We walk into that which we cannot yet see.
Say it plain: that many have died for this day.
Sing the names of the dead who brought us here,
who laid the train tracks, raised the bridges,
picked the cotton and the lettuce, built
brick by brick the glittering edifices
they would then keep clean and work inside of.
Praise song for struggle, praise song for the day.
Praise song for every hand-lettered sign,
the figuring-it-out at kitchen tables.
Some live by love thy neighbor as thyself,
others by first do no harm or take no more
than you need. What if the mightiest word is love?
Love beyond marital, filial, national,
love that casts a widening pool of light,
love with no need to pre-empt grievance.
In today’s sharp sparkle, this winter air,
any thing can be made, any sentence begun.
On the brink, on the brim, on the cusp,
praise song for walking forward in that light.
Yes -- Praise song for a new decade, a new year, a new day..
Praise Song for the prisoners of hope..
YES WE CAN!!!
All the best in 2010