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| Pic by Hiranya Malwatta |
Freedom is a name
of many syllables
places and people,
a leap of faith that defies
constitutional edict
executive directive
judicial verdict,
it takes restrictive arm
as dancer takes partner
takes rule and bends with smile
takes book and scrambles
chapter and verse
reconfigures flag-color
re-mixes anthem
without proclamation
without anger or regret;
freedom is another name
left out
of the Dictionary of Being
to stop definer
to stump purchaser
to trip destroyer.
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There are walled cities
I am told,
marshalled by regimen
where minds open
and doors close
at appointed hour;
where life ebbs
as in other cities
as splendid and poor
as structured and free,
moment to moment
task to task,
where custom rules
and custom-break
subverts unyielding earth
for root to seek
and leaf to upturn
decree’s hard unsanctioned soil,
but here
the apparitions of the forgotten
recovered corporeal form
flattened barbed wire,
rose above wall
to ask
‘who among you is free
and who among us is not?’
Not king-made
but king-envisioned,
speaks of eyes
that drew from contour
drew for lay-of-land
and lay-of-life
that saw land that would grain
people who would sow
and reap
from century to century
and today we stand
on history’s shores
and are stilled by the blues
and so standing draw
from the tap root
of heritage
resolution and magnitude
humility and pride
as we cross the hour-to-hour
in the vessels of choice
and fashion a next moment
as wholesome, as tender.
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