you cannot try to silence
a collective pain for so long and not
expect a collective rage to eventually come.
– butterflies rising
Read More →the reckoning…
Tag: Kindness
a little softer here…
my soft heart…
how soft
my heart is…
it just isn’t made for how
flawed humans love
– butterflies rising
Read More →angels and earth…
some of us just aren’t made
for how hard the edges are here,
for how slow pain moves,
or how lost light can get,
and how heavy it all can weigh…
we’re surely not made for how flawed humans love.
but while we’re here…
we can try to love a little deeper, and burn
a little brighter, and maybe, just maybe,
we make it a little softer
here for someone.
– angels and earth
– butterflies rising
Read More →human sunshine…
the spaces we’ve called love…
the spaces we’ve called love…
it’s heartbreaking
how many of us have felt in love
with people who were not even kind
to us…
how many of us weren’t taught that
love can’t exist in a space without kindness.
or without respect. or in a space that
doesn’t honor us and cherish us.
so many of us are learning that the spaces
we’ve called being in love, weren’t
spaces of love at all
– butterflies rising
Read More →solidarity…
It was the way he just stood there and wore
a badge next to Mr. Carlos and Mr. Smith
as they raised their fists.
Support, but, a quiet and humble support.
He wasn’t “allowing” them to be equal, or “giving” them
some sort of power, he was simply saying…
You are already equal, and I support you as you
step into your own power.
And that felt right to me. Genuine. Pure. Like an
acknowledgment that oppression of others is really just an
illusion of “betterness” built up from some mix of arrogance,
ignorance, internal lack… unconsciousness. And it’s such
a condescending thing, the idea that we “let” other people be
worthy… as if it’s ours to decide.
And it wasn’t just in that moment, he stayed convicted to
what he believed was right and good for the rest of his life,
And he was rejected for it, for the rest of his life.
But he stayed convicted to what was right and good.
So if in my life I have that same kind of privilege
because of something as surface as my skin,
then I hope I carry that same kind of courage and
conviction and humility in the depths of my being.
– Peter Norman / Solidarity
– butterflies rising
Read More →broken wide open…
revival…
hatred feels thick,
and noisy,
as if it imposes and takes up space.
but i have to believe it’s just the absence of things…
like an emptiness raging against itself.
that it’s no substance of power.
that it doesn’t get to make a permanent home here.
and that those who harbor it are surely not powerful,
and that they don’t control this space.
that love can always fill the air.
and if those who are hellbent on hate
won’t grow, or change,
that awakened voices will bring revival
to this place.
no matter how loud or heavy that
hatred can rage, i have to believe it hasn’t won…
and that love will always
outnumber, overshadow, and overcome.
– butterflies rising
Read More →color blind…
we’re not
meant to be
color blind…
we’re meant to see
all this beauty,
all this texture,
all this life,
in every color,
and every kind
– butterflies rising
Read More →woman to woman…
woman to woman,
may we allow each other
the freedom to explore
all of the depths and variations
of our own femininity
and not judge or condemn each other
for the layers and directions
of womanhood
we each choose to pass by or take on.
we will not all find and define ourselves
in the same way,
but as we find and define ourselves
let us not stand in each other’s way.
– butterflies rising
Read More →