They didn’t plan to bring
With them
A legion of
Trouble.
They only wished
To find,
For their
Loved ones,
A measure of
Escape.
A new home where
They could
Be safe.
For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Legion in 32 words
They didn’t plan to bring
With them
A legion of
Trouble.
They only wished
To find,
For their
Loved ones,
A measure of
Escape.
A new home where
They could
Be safe.
For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Legion in 32 words
She checked the items off the list.
One by one by one by one.
She’d learned to not look too far down. Better to not confront endlessness. To not have to face it that today, too, there will not be a moment when the job is done. When she is free.
Only another task.
Another chore.
Mistress claimed she was “indispensable.”
Praise or curse for why she could not get a few days off to see her ailing mother. To rest. To marry.
“We’re your family,” Mistress had said. “We need you. It is a requisite you stay.”
For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Challenge: Requisite in 98 words
There had to be a way
To be heard,
Without becoming
What they fought
Against.
They refused to condone
Violence,
Hate,
Or putting others down
To make a point.
Instead,
They turned up
A crescendo
Of truths.
For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Crescendo in 37 words
You are not welcome.
Here.
Or anyplace that we hold
Dear.
You are unwelcome
Here.
Because you lack
The right color
Or veneer
Or gender
Or conviction,
And because you have far too much
Proclivity toward
Fear.
You are not welcome.
Here.
Though if you come,
Subservient,
Kowtowing
To us
Year by lingering
Year,
We might allow you
To remain
As long as you
Humbly
Adhere,
To our need to aggrandize
Our wrongs,
And as long as you
Declare you will
Never rise
Above a state that
Holds us as
Premier.
Note: Dedicated to all who fight ingrained injustice, racism, hate, brutality, and the historical realities of too many who bolster themselves by believing they are somehow ‘premier.’ For the record, there is nothing ‘supreme’ about anyone who claims ‘supremacy.’ There never was.
For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Unwelcome in 91 words
No humdrum moment.
No silent pause
Or rest.
The tempo of the chanting
Rises
As crowds flow
And crest.
They march to call
The winds
Of change
To come,
And heed the soul
As hearts’ pain
Hums
And drums
The need for
Better times.
For the dVerse quadrille poetry challenge: drum
From the hollows of despair, they fled.
The shirts on their backs and the children
In their arms, all they could manage to
Take.
Even the abysmal shelters they had recently
Been made to call
Home,
No longer gave any protection or
A chance at repair or
Reform.
They left, dodging death and finding
Further fright to
Flee,
And in their hearts they held on
Tightly
To the slowly fraying
Memory,
Of days when life was softer
And beds were warm,
And babies slept
Well kept
Safe from war and hate and
Harm.
For Sammi’s Weekend Writing Prompt: Abysmal in 93 words
Note: Dedicated to all displaced, terrorized, pressed, oppressed, persecuted persons everywhere, and to the many millions who had, throughout history and in recent memory and in today’s times, been forced to further risk their lives by leaving what had once been home and safety behind, for the unknown.
Evidently,
There are those who think the will of men should rule over the will of women.
Evidently,
There are those who’d see a rapist as less deserving of punishment than the one who stopped the ongoing impact of that rape.
Evidently,
There are many who claim that their own interpretation of God should be forced onto all others, regardless.
Evidently,
There are those who do not see how that endangers the very premise of religious freedom, and with it, their own access to choice.
Evidently,
There are those who hark for days when girls and women were a property that men could do whatever they desired with, regardless of whether girls and women had agreed.
Evidently,
There are those who push their personal beliefs as science, while ignoring and denying facts that do not fit the narrative they’d allow as acceptable to perceive.
Evidently,
There are those who’d abandon, ignore, punish, and vilify already living children while pretending to cherish those who aren’t yet born.
Evidently,
There are those who value power over choice and silencing over voice.
Evidently,
There are those who’d put people to death even as they claim all life is precious.
Evidently,
There are still many who do not see and many who refuse to even try.
And so … evidently,
There’s much still needed to be done in this time of religious extremism in its push to diminish rights, undo progress, and force radicalization.
Much to do:
To keep theocracy from overtaking true religious and personal freedom;
To liberate distortions of what some claim is pro-life but is in fact just anti-choice;
To help the lost see that support of life respects and encompasses the living and does not, selectively, ‘defend’ only the unborn;
To dispel outdated views of women as unable or unworthy of autonomy over their own bodies, health, and futures;
To protect the lives of women and girls from the intrusion, disrespect, disregard, and dismissal of value, that criminalizing of choice does.
Because …
Evidently,
There is much still needong to be done.
To ensure choice is protected
So lives, too, can.
For Linda’s SoCS prompt: Adverb
How will I know
The taste of freedom
If I am locked
Inside a cage?
How will I find
A true horizon
When I am of
Tender age?
Where will my parents be
Tomorrow?
Will army men
Lock them away?
How will I know
If I will get to see them
Once again
One day?
Allow persons in power
To amortize the legitimacy of those
They term ‘others,’
And the weak will fall behind them,
Eager to believe themselves
More worthy
Than most.
They’d be wrong, of course, for
They are not.
Because none who are truly strong
And deserving of honor
Would ever devalue others
Nor would they sit back as
Inhumanity
Takes hold.
This post continues the blogging challenge in which Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day, serves as inspiration a-la the “Daily Prompt.”
Want to join me? Feel free to link to this post on your blog, and/or post a link to your blogpost in the comment section below so others can enjoy it, too. Poetry, photography, short stories, anecdotes: Go for it!
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