Listen. I write about writing. But–I’m also a student of the world. A mother. A teacher. A women’s rights activist. A human rights activist. A believer that we all deserve to be safe, loved, respected, and honored.

I’m not going to lie. This recent world has left me so–fucking hollow and angry, and sad, and despondent. We are sick. We are dying. We are killing each other and hating each other, and judging each other. I have kids, for christssake. Beautiful little beings that I brought into this quagmire of hatred and corruption. I kick myself every day for the world we’re giving them.

If you aren’t angry. You should be. If you aren’t melted into a pool of helpless and hopelessness; you should be. Every day I fight to get up and DO something.

Today I did this.

And if you don’t like it, stop following me. If it offends you, go sit down and examine why. Chances are it has to do with your own conscience.

Conscience

Peel back the antiquity

The antebellum haze over your eyes

The veil of American greatness

And look at what we’ve done.

A body lies face down

Slaughtered in her own home

Life cut short,

Weightless in blood loss

And all the things

She will never do.

She will never again

Be.

Someone’s child.

Someone’s baby.

Someone’s daughter,

Someone’s only heart.

Stop looking away…

Stop justifying

The unjustifiable.

Stop making excuses

Pale, white excuses.

Justifying your hatred

Through the fabric of a flag

Or a bible

Or whatever misguided armaments

You deny the worth

Of another human life with.

Stop denying

That the slave owner still owns.

That the shackles still bind

Stop denying

That the rules don’t apply

Stop denying

That the seething pool of hatred

That puts the small brained

And fearful men in power

Isn’t a sickening, disease,

Worsening this land

Butchering its people.

In the middle of the night

In their own homes.

Stop putting power into

Hands that hold no compassion

Stop putting power

into fear-filled hearts

Into anger-filled heads

Stop putting bullets

Into black skin

Peel back the white washed history

Look to the truth

See it.

The sun shining on

The dark, sweat slicked backs

that built this country

The lives that paid its dues,

Built its land

Its commerce

Its industry.

See how we still manage,

To. This. Day.

To put them up on blocks

Bloodied

On streets

Bullet holes in backs

Children watching

Their fathers cut down

Crosses burned and

Bodies dragged

Churches riddled with metal

And hate.

Six gaping holes

In the pajamas of an EMT.

How many more lives would she have saved?

That’s how many murders you deserved to answer for.

Add in the life of her mother.

Her family.

Everyone who loved her.

Because you killed them too.

Not free.

I hope your conscious is never free.

I hope it shackles you.

I hope it whips tight, thick lashes

into your back

And puts you on the blocks

To weigh your worth.

I hope it steals your children

I hope it guns them down in the street

I hope it corners you, every night

I hope it kneels on your throat

I hope you suffocate in your shame.

Shame on you.

Shame on all of us.