Nothing about us without us,
Always about us, you're without us.
Including the moments in history, that deserve our religious screams, our outrage and defiance,
The human rights that slip your systemic mind from time to time, because it comes with a billboard that has a painted letter of a capital D.
We own the crippled and crumpled pages,
Your oppression is our spark of history,
Flattering the pages and creating a novel,
a permenant marker of our precence.
Will you pick it up and understand?
We made our place in the palm of your hand,
This is about us, and without us you wont stand.

John Winston Ono Lennon
From Britain to Brooklyn, decked in denim
Controversial through his political and peace activism
Felled by Mark David Chapman's act of barbarism

Stiff necks turn your ears
To the approaching thunder
In the sanctuary walls,
A tremor in the civic flagstones,
Four million poster-board sentiments,
And twice as many young lungs.
They will be marching still,
When you can no longer
Answer those piercing eyes
Looking to your legacy,
Nor stand before the tender feet
Shaking the earth you leave them.

Anger is surging,
I am watching all my bridges burning.
Rhyme- I cling to the safeness the rigid structure evokes, the soothing sway of stability.
I am seeing flames,
your bigoted, misogynistic ways ebb away at my faith in humanity.
Cowardly, I bite my tongue, tasting iron, desperate not to be branded with the dreaded ‘F’ word.
Why am I ashamed? It is not a ***** word.
So do not roll your eyes when we preach equality,
we are not equal stop objectifying my body!

You were blessed with a voice,
One of power and brilliance--
Yet you still choose to sit in the silence?

You were given words upon words
& stance upon stance--
Yet I see not one sign of resistance.

Oh my dear child,
What is holding you back?

Is it fear of shame? simple diffidence?

Your speech is ammunition--
Your lips capable of deliverance more
Powerful than the rifles of wars once long fought.
Yet you still choose to sit in the silence?

Oh my dear child,
If only you knew.

In a world plagued so greatly with censorship and shame,
You’ve been blessed to speak freely as you choose.
Under this flag of red, white, and blue,
The only regulator of your speech
(or lack thereof)
Is you.

Somewhere across the pond is another--
One just as bright and capable as you.
But alas their tender head is still deemed naive
& their gifts remain invariably at rest.
Even now will you sit in the silence?

Oh my dear child,
Now do you see?

Your ability to speak up is a privilege--
One of rarity and great worth.
So cherish this blessing &
Hold it close while you can.
Because who knows?
Just one policy and it could all be stripped free.

Before the revolution,
I snuck into the capitol
with a pocket full of
Wrigley’s Doublemint
and a ski mask.

Lurking in their hallways
after hours. Hiding
in their aisles to find all their
loose pens,
I chewed gum
and covered all the tips
with Doublemint.

The ***** money in a politician’s pocket
will stick to their fingertips
from all the sugar and spit.
I stuffed the president’s inkwell
with gum stick wrappers.
Countless taxpayer dollars
will pour into the pockets
of Bic and Paper Mate
because of my vandalism.
Watch me take a bite from
the budget and chew.

While my comrades are
in the streets taking
tear gas and pepper spray
my breath smells of peppermint
and my bullets come in 35¢ packs.
Pens get capped with dextrin and aspartame
to snipe a signature from falling
on the bill that signs your life away.

I’m on the couch with my mask off
flossing and watching C-SPAN,
as the House collectively
wastes hours scraping
fountain pens and ballpoints.
Looking at a government
full of corrupt pearly whites,
my head thrown back,
I cackle like a mad criminal
with a mouth full of cavities.

I'm not sure whether you are clueless
or just deceitful
in your "hope."
You will leave us your ruined planet
and tell us you have
"hope" in us;
that you believe
we can fix your mistakes
somehow.
Like a child pasting paper cutouts
on an important project
and then scribbling on it;
that is how useful your
"hope" is.
You treat us as children
while acting like them yourselves.
Your immature "hope"
curses us.
Your tantrums
doom us to a ruined planet,
wrapped up in a pretty little bow,
signed "with hope."
Useless.
We do not want your "hope"
or your belittling stares
or your childish attitudes
or your arguments
or your optimism.
We want your action
your help,
your votes.
Lend us your strength,
not your stupid faith in us,
because by the time
we are 18
it will be too late.
We do not want your ruined planet,
we want you to act
like the adults you call yourselves.
We do not want your "hope."
We want your help.