"When Israel came out of Egypt—
when the house of Jacob came out
from a people who spoke a different language.."
Psalm 114: 1
"A different language..."
Sometimes we speak a different language than our neighbour speaks - they may speak Spanish, Russian, Mandarin...and we may speak English.
Sometimes we speak a different language than our neighbour speaks - we both speak English, but how we talk about something, the words we use, we might as well be speaking a different language.
This happens a lot where I am from. When someone asks me the question, "Where did you grow up?" I often respond "Oh, across the ocean, just north of Belfast." Because, the land I grew up on is known by a variety of names - each of them with their own loadedness. Some say, Ireland. Others say, Northern Ireland. Some say, the north of Ireland.
May this poem about my homeland cause you to pause on this day and ask how it is that we go forward in the United States in these days? How do we "take this troubled beauty forward?"
And as you ponder these questions, let us pause and remember the people of Louisville, KY in particular the family of Breonna Taylor. Black Lives Matter.
“[the] north[ern] [of] ireland”
It is both a dignity and
a difficulty
to live between these
names,
perceiving politics
in the syntax of
the state.
And at the end of the day,
the reality is
that whether we
change
or whether we stay
the same
these questions will
remain.
Who are we
to be
with one
another?
and
How are we
to be
with one
another?
and
What to do
with all those memories
of all of those funerals?
and
What about those present
whose past was blasted
far beyond their
future?
I wake.
You wake.
She wakes.
He wakes.
They wake.
We Wake
and take
this troubled beauty forward.