All My Favorite Colors

I don’t know,
I’ve never particularly 
Had a problem
Integrating the world.

But that’s the problem
That so often happens 
For others,
And I think
It’s the biggest problem.

It’s great to know
How things are different 
But to keep them
Locked up in little boxes,
Separate,
Apart,
Deliberately,
Defiantly,
Angrily,
Defensively,
As if something will be lost...

And I get it,
Sometimes 
There have been efforts
To lose identity 
By force,
To integrate
By eliminating 
A minority’s features,
And that was always wrong.

But it’s also wrong
To repudiate
The melting pot.

It’s wrong
To rob yourself
Of the ability
To embrace unfamiliar things
Because you think 
It might threaten 
The integrity
Of what you’ve got.

But listen,
You have no integrity
If you fear such a world.

You lose far more
Than you retain
If you hide from
The possibilities.

If all you experience 
Is an echo chamber
Then eventually 
You go deaf.

So this is a message
For all my sisters and my brothers.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Twenty Years

Twenty years later and this is still the only day in American history like this. (Except the burning of the White House, War of 1812, 8/24/14, a response to York.) That is what  we felt in those days. In WWII this is what Europe looked like, a continent. This is what it looks like when war happens. This is what traumatized  a nation. In twenty years  many things have happened since. Incredibly, it took no time at all to forget how that day felt. No time at all, and there were people who argued it was staged. That’s the world we live in. No time at all and politicians started thinking, “We will lose power if this remains the narrative.” No time at all and the reality of a war became a preamble to twenty years  of claiming it was America that turned aggressor. Twenty years and they still work to identify  the bodies. Twenty years of victims. Twenty years, a lifetime  for a new generation  born after and growing up in the shadow of fallen towers. Twenty years after a morning in which I wa
Read more

A Field Guide to French Peoples 3

The French have been Reliably Catholic For many years. The French Who arrived In the New World Kept the tradition Alive. In fact,  On my mother’s side We have an actual saint, André Bessette, Who humbly held doors open For the world. In a French quarter Of an English-speaking world, These were people Who faced Persistent  Persecution. So they migrated To the United States. They established communities That fostered Catholics, Filled with parishes, Where the French language Was kept alive. By my generation, French was no longer Passed down And the parishes Were aging. Like many younger Catholics Ours was vanishing From the pews. And a heritage Fades into history, But not from memory. No, Not from that. There Will be At least  One more To know  Of these things. And perhaps, Just perhaps, Many more. And the doors Remain open.
Read more