I am (a monologue)

I am not your failures

I am not your successes

I am not your curses

I am not your blessings

I stand on my own two feet

I exist independent of you

You mis--take me for a child of

your days, one that must

therefore be also of your ways

You try to teach me lessons

for struggles I don't face

You are the decade of the

civil rights movement

You are the children of

women's rights being exercised

You are the war on drugs

the war on crime and thugs

You are my past

you are my roots

I see you when I look back

but you are not my future

I am the natural disasters

I am the Hurricane Katrina

and the tsunami

I am the 9/11 attacks

I am the first president

that happens to be black.

I am not submissive to coverture

as you were

and you don't know the

struggle of the children

We are separate

but for one aim

in one way we are the same

we are both trying to find the way

the way, the way,

to the kingdom

to the roads that are gold-paved

to the never-ending sunny days

to the ceaseless praise of the most High

and while I hope to see you there

and as much as I know you care,

you can't take me with you

If I am to make it there,

it is something I alone must resolve to do.

(June 2009)