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I was in a dark mood when I composed this poem.
I was thinking about events in our history that have not exactly covered
our nation with glory: slavery, Jim Crow laws, Salem witch trials,
Wounded Knee, internment of ethnic Japanese, UpStairs Lounge, Pulse
Nightclub, among others. I began
thinking about liberty and the tenuousness it seems to have acquired in
the wake of the Supreme Court’s decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s
Health Organization. I was thinking particularly about abortion
rights, but there are many reasons to fear for other freedoms as well.
Justice Thomas’s
concurring opinion in Dobbs has intensified that fear.
The poem was written shortly after Independence
Day 2022. My friend Lisa Keppeler helped me edit my initial draft.
— LED,
4/6/2023 |
