I grew up
a few homes from the tracks.
Tracks loud with hustle
and bustle
And movement.
Tracks that delineated
And divided
Here from there
Us from them.
Noisy tracks
Kickin’ up dirt
Racing and marching
Screaming and screeching
Striving to move forward
While I barely noticed.
Unfazed on this side
My side
Among my own
My neighbors
My friends
So much the same.
Same boundaries
Same perceptions
Same faces
Same colors
Same us
Away
From the same
Them.
Safe.
Sound.
The tracks rumbled on
Loud with movement
Racing onward
Most of my life
Spent on this side
Defaulting to sameness
Blissfully unaware
Of life
Over there.
Their side…
When we had need
to venture over
Felt awkward
uncomfortable
Lacking the safety
Of sameness.
Over there
I was on alert
Standing out
Uncovered
Eager to hurry back
To the safety
Of our side
To the comfort
Of being unfazed
Unburdened
Inconspicuous.
Year after year
Generation after generation
Those noisy tracks
Rumbled on
Racing forward
And I grew
Without growing
Sheltered
In sameness
Unfazed by the noise
Unaware of inequity
Unburdened by race
Insulated
And
inured.
Those in-between moments
When the train wasn’t marching
And the tracks weren’t rumbling
The noise from the other side
Drifted over
From them.
Sometimes filled with laughter
Sometimes filled with song
Sometimes loud and angry
Shouts and cries
Bouncing off the walls
Mostly unheard
Here.
All the noise
Became background
Redundant
Rather than responsibility
Just the way things were
You learned to accept it
Expect it
To not name it
To not rock it
Lest you lose it
And the comfort of sameness
Fills with suspicion
Corroded with judgment
And fear of mixing
Us
With
Them.
That was the bubble
I grew up in
Like many of us
In the good old days
But I’ve grown to realize
That I hadn’t grown at all
And those good ol’ days
Weren’t so great
After all
For all.
I’ve grown to see
Those tracks were designed
To deliver cargo
Of entitlement
And privilege
To one side
And to deliver freight
Of suppression
And mislabeled inferiority
To the other.
The tracks were designed
As an intricate system
To divide
And delineate
And distribute
According the deliberate will
And benefit
of the builders
To build more wealth
And more tracks
And more walls.
I’m learning to question
Rather than remain
Clueless
Inured to their injury.
I’m learning to listen
Rather than remain
Deaf
Inured to the injustice.
I’m learning to look
Rather than remain
Blind
Inured to institutionalized privilege.
They want what I have,
But why do I have it
Automatically?
Why do they have to ask for it?
Beg for it?
Kneel for it?
March for it?
Cry for it?
Die for it?
The train is in motion
Gathering forces
from both sides
Marching
Together for justice
The tracks have been overrun
by a movement
Moving beyond monuments
Organizing
Demanding
Creating a new system
That delivers on the ideals
We professed long ago
A system of liberty
And justice
for all.
Dash - Life Between the Numbers 