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Amos is a Shepherd of suffering sheep;
A pastor preaching in the depths of Alabama
Preaching social justice to the Southland
Preaching to the poor a new gospel of love
With the words of a god and the dreams of a man
Amos is our loving Shepherd of the sheep
Crying out to the stricken land
“You have sold the righteous for silver
And the poor for a pair of shoes.
My God is a mighty avenger
And He shall come with His rod in His hand.”
Preaching to the persecuted and the disinherited millions
Preaching love and justice to the solid southern land
Amos is a Prophet with a vision of brotherly love
With a vision and a dream of the red hills of Georgia
“When Justice shall roll down like water
And righteousness like a mighty stream.”
Amos is our Shepherd standing in the Shadow of our God
Tending his flocks all over the hills of Albany
And the seething streets of Selma and of bitter Birmingham.
From Montgomery to Memphis he marches
He stands on the threshold of tomorrow
He breaks the bars of iron and they remove the signs
He opens the gates of our prisons.
He speaks to the captive hearts of America
He bares raw their conscience
He is a man of peace for the people
Amos is a Prophet of the Lord
Amos speaks through Eternity
The glorious Word of the Lord!
when static folds over static
when breath swells
& collapses in a tin can transmission
when sound is an echo before it is a voice,
before it is a song, before it is a body
who hears the cry when it loops back on itself,
the wail of the Plantation,
a green plastic soldier, mouth open, fixed in time,
shouting into an ear somewhere,
somewhere,
a ship rocks against an unbroken tide.
somewhere, a hand picks more than a harmonica,
The sky cracks open,
and the rivers choke on what we poured into them,
the air thickens with a prayer drawn in & out like a lung,
where will we run?
who hears the cry when it loops back on itself,
like the sound of waiting.
who set the metronome to misery?
who wrote a waltz for the whip’s descent?
who told the violin to sing above the burning?
where does it go -
the voice caught between radio transmissions,
the breath bent into a blues scale,
the history locked in teeth & tongue?
where does it go,
& where will it land,
if we refuse to let it fall?
who among us still walks like the earth was made for our feet?
who still wears crowns heavy with old names, old deeds, old sins?
who still counts gold with hands too clean to till the land?
when the caves hold only echoes
the mountains crumble to dust
the wind knows our names & it does not bow.
i have seen the mighty pull their coats tighter
as if linen can hide them from reckoning.
i have seen princes bend their knees to dirt,
taste the earth & call it bitter.
they hid yourselves among the rocks
holding us between them and a hard place
as if they did not carve them so,
as if they do not know their hands and the blood of their crimes
but tell me, tell me -
where will we run? where will we run
when the dust swallows the sun?
that silent friend who listens even when you are wrong –
before pulling you away from the noise. A bridge across
the chasms. That act of magic that finds you when least expected.
A door, a portal painted in a shade of the colour of all things constant –
grass, sky, sunshine. All things good like trees, rain, and ocean.
The small breeze that lifts the leaves from their branches.
Do not reserve your deepest breaths only for those you know
for it lives amongst us – that silent friend who listens.
That act of magic that finds you when least expected, that holds
this world together with nothing but its fingertips. Its lines,
a portal, a door where the only way out is the way you came in.
Ask the cracked, dry land what breath can sound like.
Is it a grand symphony or the echo of a loud clap? In these times
of beeping machines, speeding cars and rains that haven’t come
for more than a decade. Breath is a magical act like hand holding,
palm in palm. A magical act whose sound demands the freedom
to breathe its song across the cracked dry land till the soil
is no longer parched. The land said breath is picking up the ruins
of shattered trust, piling them brick by brick into a fortress. It is born
from the land which feeds you even when it’s been stripped down
by careless hands. Listen closely to the cries of earth, longing for breath,
longing for a rebirth. In these droughts of empathy, these storms of fear,
breath emerges, crystal clear.
It's in the solidarity of a protest march, a gentle touch in a hospital's arch,
in the faces of strangers lending aid, it blossoms, unafraid. Breath –
a freedom song that lives amongst us – that silent friend who listens,
an act of magic, a bridge across the chasms, that act of magic that finds you
when least expected - like a door, a portal where the only way out
is the way you came in. Breath for strangers, for trees, for the land
that holds us every day. A door, a portal, slightly ajar – a thread of light
calling you to step inside. An invite to look back so as to know
where you are going. Breath is that thread of light, winking through
the chaos. It's not just a fleeting sound, or a gesture but a force.
A magical act, an opening, wide, calling us all to step inside.
For those of us who live at the shoreline
standing upon the constant edges of decision
crucial and alone
for those of us who cannot indulge
the passing dreams of choice
who love in doorways coming and going
in the hours between dawns
looking inward and outward
at once before and after
seeking a now that can breed
futures
like bread in our children’s mouths
so their dreams will not reflect
the death of ours;
For those of us
who were imprinted with fear
like a faint line in the center of our foreheads
learning to be afraid with our mother’s milk
for by this weapon
this illusion of some safety to be found
the heavy-footed hoped to silence us
For all of us
this instant and this triumph
We were never meant to survive.
And when the sun rises we are afraid
it might not remain
when the sun sets we are afraid
it might not rise in the morning
when our stomachs are full we are afraid
of indigestion
when our stomachs are empty we are afraid
we may never eat again
when we are loved we are afraid
love will vanish
when we are alone we are afraid
love will never return
and when we speak we are afraid
our words will not be heard
nor welcomed
but when we are silent
we are still afraid
So it is better to speak
remembering
we were never meant to survive.
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