Tag Archives: civil rights

A Poem Called “A Serene Beautiful Path”

A Serene Beautiful Path,

(A poem inspired by many readings I have read all throughout my life. I started writing this poem when I read Merri Johnson’s Girl in need of a Tourniquet and Bram Stoker’s Dracula this semester at CUNY SPS.)

by theamazinJ

My humanity is there,
I set off to the goal,
I pain, I hurt, I erode
through sudden Goethe,
I deserve the ending,
I sacrifice the beginning,
I figure my mind.
I liberate my flamboyance,
I continue to the
connotation of trials,
of tribulations of
the non-binary world
which is really binary,
of everyone in motion,
love is darkness,
love is spiritual,
love flips houses
to go, to out, to live,
I sacrifice my mind,
I feel the inner monster,
I live the outer inner body
of humanity,
monstrous,
man,
woman,
person,
person?
Person!
I am a person,
being virtuous, being good,
being a good guy,
being a good gal,
being a good person,
being the body of dense creation,
my creator made me,
he made everyone,
I am not understood,
my good intentions of bad moods and emotions.
I love animals,
I love my love,
Is there really a normal?
What is normal?
Compulsions of normal,
acting on you,
disliking on me,
fairly with justice.
Deviating toward death,
WHAT IS DEATH?
WHAT IS LIFE?
Death, Violence, Deviant, or NOT,
disgust or whack,
Dracula,
Dracula,
Dracula,
Beetle BeetLe BEETLE
JUICE JUICE JUICE,
Everywhere I go,
Everywhere I look,
I see my future,
I find myself in the present,
I walk through the curtain,
I rise from my chest,
and I have a past in the background.
Everywhere I go,
Everywhere I see,
Everywhere I want to be,
It really is the light approaching from the darkness
in the distance,
and everywhere I go, everywhere I look,
AND EVERYWHERE I HIDE,
I SEE my dreams becoming REALITY,
I SEE my life BECOMING A THING!
I SEE that NOTHING WILL STOP ME!!!!
BECAUSE I am going to SUCCEED,
I AM GOING TO do what I WANT,
I AM GOING TO WORK ON MY OWN,
building my CAREER,
building my CREATIVITY,
BUDDING my LIFE into reality,
AND LIVE THE LIFE I WAS MEANT TO LIVE.
Forget about darkness,
forget about what you think,
forget about your thoughts,
BECAUSE the only thoughts that matter
are the thoughts IN MY HEAD,
and support ME from that.
It’s probably what Bram Stoker meant,
or even the Girl in need of Tourniquet needed,
or what Audre Lorde needed,
or even what Ron Kovic needed as Born on the Fourth of July,
It’s all about living until our last breath,
and it’s all about living and ENJOYING every minute of it
with EVERYONE supporting each other WITHOUT telling or saying anything,
because we all have our OPINIONS,
WE all have our SEPARATE BELIEFS,
AND WE ALL HAVE WHAT IT TAKES
to do what we WANT and NOT what OTHERS say.
Nothing about us, without US,
I say, I say.

A Poem Called “Society Meets the Activist”

Society Meets the Activist,

by theamazinJ

One day,
a long time ago,
in a far off place,
society met an Activist,
the first of their kind.
The Activist spoke out against everything society stood for,
I mean, everything, literally everything,
Talking about society’s social construction,
talking about society’s discrimination,
even talking about society’s lack of accommodation,
and when the shit hit the fan even more,
society’s idea of passing rather than being true to ourselves.
The Activist turns 20, then 30, then 40 and so on,
and every time the Activist says something,
they are bullied into silence,
they are told they are fake,
they are told to be quiet and let society just be,
they are told to not be loud and proud,
they are told to take a vacation or just leave society for good,
everywhere the Activist goes,
he wants to make a difference,
to show the society what Human dignity means,
what Human respect means,
and the ways everyone needs accommodating,
the way society can be accessible if they even try,
A long time ago before the first of the month,
society jumped in to vote for a sloth,
a man who would fight Activists,
a man who would say the work Activists have done was fake,
a man who created the term Fake News,
a man who marked war against the world,
a man who created fights between himself and every minority group
including the disability minority group,
especially those people who think and play and move and live differently than him,
a man who is a supremacist,
a man who hates Activists, but then calls himself an Activist for doing what he does,
Activists have gotten criticism for the work they do
and even from the very first Activist a long time ago
in a galaxy far far away,
because being an Activist is tough,
being an Activist is one of the hardest things anyone can do,
Activists make societies uncomfortable,
Activists make the leader of any society go crazy,
Activists speak out and then get hashed by society,
Activists ignore society’s words,
until the Activist actually passes on,
then everyone praises the Activist who spoke out,
and a day or memorial becomes real for the Activist who passed on
to one day everyone quoting them
even when everyone fought against the Activist while alive,
even when everyone took a stand that they would never do it,
however, the Activist took a stand, and now everyone listens,
and now, everyone sees what they said,
finally in the end,
The Activist looks down upon the society from the heavens above,
noticing this change, noticing this new embodiment,
and says to oneself with all smiles and chuckling:
“Now, they listen, really, now they really are listening
really, I am astonished, I am a star up here in the heavens,
shining down on them at night, and
when I could speak, no one wanted to listen to me,
thanks a lot to all thou, thanks to all thou”
As society takes on more and more giving and less trash talk
for what the Activist said, for every action the Activist conveyed,
and for every time the Activist fought them to be heard
exactly how they Activist wanted to heard,
So, continue what you are doing,
if you believe it,
someday it will happen.
Someday they will all listen,
even if it takes a lifetime.
Believe.
And Move forward.

A Poem Called “It’s My Life, It’s my Choices”

It’s My Life, It’s my Choices,

by theamazinJ

Choices matter,
choices are personal,
choices make sense,
people may be concerned,
people may not understand,
people feel obligated to personal choices,
a personal choice is a personal choice
and nothing more and nothing less.
Personal choices help growth
whether we like it or not,
personal choices are sedimental,
personal choices are not your choices,
personal choices are the choices of the individual who makes them,
personal choices help with self-care,
personal choices help with setting and maintaining boundaries,
personal choices give everyone their own dignity and pride,
deciding on things on our own and learning
is everyone’s right and everyone’s distinctions
from another individual,
because everyone matters,
because everyone chooses their destiny,
because everyone has their own way of doing things
to decide what they feel is right at the time,
everyone makes mistakes or chooses based on their own feelings.
To be an activist,
one must know what they want,
know what they don’t want,
and fight for everything they do want.
An activist is strong willed,
an activist fights for what they believe in,
an activist uses evidence to base on their beliefs,
an activist is not influenced by others,
an activist learns everyday what works and what doesn’t,
an activist grows with the people they respect
disregarding the people that hurt them,
an activist’s life can be tough
especially when people hate what we say or do,
an activist’s life can be even tougher
when what we say or do is often put down or shut down,
but an activist must stick to their mission,
must stick to their beliefs,
and continue to support evidence for their beliefs
gaining more and more support from others.
An activist makes hard choices.
Sometimes those choices can hurt others,
and sometimes those choices can eventually change the world for the better.
Martin Luther King,Jr made choices as an activist in this manner,
Rosa Parks as part of that too,
Malcolm X made choices in similar fashion,
Ed Roberts the same,
The Black Panthers even more,
Harvey Milk too,
and yes, even Susan B. Anthony and Harriet Tubman as well.
The list goes on and on all throughout history,
finally, its the choices we make that matter to what we believe,
its’ the choices we make that make us who we are,
and it’s the choices we make that allows our activism to succeed or not,
if there is no evidence and support, our activism failed,
however if we continue to push through and learn from what we know about ourselves,
We become part of the greatest activists who ever lived before.
It’s our choices to forgive ourselves and others that matter
to understand and learn from the past,
sometimes the choices we make is everything no matter what.
An activism moves forward without looking back.

A Poem Called “Silence”

Silence,

by theamazinJ

It’s a quiet day,
a day of silence,
a day of mourning,
a day before the fight,
a day before the revolutionary war,
a day before civil unrest,
a day before civil disobedience,
a day to rest,
a day to boycott,
a day to protest,
a day to preserve spoons,
a day to preserve our energy,
a day to preserve the way we react,
a day to think logically,
a day to think rationally,
a day to not think emotionally.
One person cannot change everything,
everyone needs to agree to change,
It’s not I, the people,
It’s We, the People,
the people have spoken,
the people’s voices were silenced,
the voices were not enough against it
because we the people were ungrateful.
We took things for granted,
we allowed a man to push us around instead,
we allowed our hearts to melt,
we did not protect ourselves and our rights,
we became too argumentative and polarized
allowing our emotions to build up against each other,
by allowing a man to blind us with his thinking
allowing some to eventually vote for him
even with being blindfolded.
Some will never understand each other,
some will never understand what led to
the end of our voices being heard,
some will never understand this
and treat the rest of us as non-compliant
to the man who begins his power today.
The man who is named Donald Trump,
the man who set up his clones to
assist him to run the country,
a man who will never learn,
a man who will always think irrationally,
a man who could start a world war,
a man we all need to overthrow,
a man named Donald Trump who angers so many,
a man named Donald Trump who is too selfish,
and a man who is too similar
to too many past evil men in history.
Let’s fight, let’s not be complacent,
let’s begin the revolt,
and let’s begin to speak our voices
until that man is overthrown,
until the government finally listens,
and until we have what we want.
Nothing happens without a war sometimes,
Nothing about us, without us!

A Poem Called “The Institution of ‘Trump'”

Trigger Warning: Please read with caution. Trump is created bad ideas and this poem may trigger many. Do please read with caution.

The Institution of ‘Trump’,

by theamazinJ

Trump, Trumponian Era is beginning soon,
the dark ages is beginning way too soon once again,
the ages of ignorance, the ages of backwards history,
an ages of no civil rights laws for everyone
is the beginning of Trumponian Era.
A scary time for me, a scary time for you,
and a scary time for everyone.
It’s going to be scary because
a age of ableism,
a age of racism,
a age of misogyny,
a age of heterosexism,
a age of transphobia,
a age of binary gender,
a age of anti-semitism,
a age of islamophobia,
a age of institutional thinking
for any one who is different than the status quo,
re-creating institutions for disabled people
from cognitive to learning to psychiatric to physical disabilities
to segregation without inclusion,
without The Americans with Disabilities Act and Universal Design
for everyone to live their life however they want to live,
a age of conversion therapies
to change everyone’s brains from the way an individual citizen thinks and feels
regardless how the person think and feel,
a age of creating clones of people,
a age of no creative thinking or inventive thought,
an age of being afraid to express ourselves the way we feel,
an age of black and white thinking and polarization.
we are about to enter an age of searching to create the perfect human being once again
who are white, anglo-saxon, heterosexual, non-disabled males,
where we are leaving behind an age where Susan B. Anthony, Martin Luther King Jr, Malcolm X, the Black Panthers, Ed Roberts,
and many other activists fought hard for women’s rights, the Civil Rights Acts of the 1960’s,
the Section 504 of Rehabilitation Act, where Free Appropriate Public Education Act for All was passed,
where the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act was passed, where De-Institutionalization began over 40 years ago,
where the Sexual and Gender revolutions happened, where the Early Intervention Laws of the 1980’s began,
where the independent living movement got started,
where The Americans with Disabilities Act was signed,
where the Autism CARES Act was signed and passed,
and now Trumponian Era will try to erase all that and the history behind it,
Instead we need to support getting the Disability Integration Act started,
we need to ensure everyone is respected
regardless of gender, sexuality, disability, race, and religion.
We need to ensure human rights for all,
and we need to do this before it is too late.
We need to remember eugenics did not work,
we need to remember the word ‘genetics’ is similar to ‘eu-gen-i-(ti)cs’,
we need to remember what science means to all of us,
We need to remember to be open to everyone,
away from another age of binary thought,
away from a President-Elect who is too ignorant and too emotional
to think everything through as our soon to be President.
We need to pop the bubble Trumponian Era is trying to create,
we need to cure ourselves from the institution of Trump
who does not want to support disability and difference,
we cannot build walls around anyone,
we need to build bridges around the world,
to ensure we create the justice everyone always wanted,
to ensure everyone can live together,
to ensure everyone is included,
to ensure public education is free and appropriate for every child,
to keep the Affordable Care Act Obama signed,
to build supported decision-making for everyone,
to secure our minds to think the way we feel about inclusion,
to feel about whoever we love in this world,
to communicate our thoughts however we express ourselves
through our physical voice or through sign language or through assistative technology.
To ensure that human rights means disability is respected part of the human experience
because disability is a part of the human experience.
We need to secure self-determination and the choices everyone gets to make every day.
Everyone deserves the right to follow their hearts and follow whatever dreams they have,
because in the end,
we need to all march this week.
We need to march for our revolution,
we need to march for our freedoms that many past civil rights leaders and our founders created
with many of the current civil rights leaders in all of us,
and we need to march for justice!
That is all from a activist fighting with everyone!