Poem -- Everyman

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Everyman




9-10 Dec 2014 @WANPoetry, AvantGarden, Houston TX




 Epigraph: From 15th Century English play Everyman

“Now we go together, lovingly,
To Confession, that cleansing river”


 I … am not black,
But my brother is.
When someone looks at us, askance,
They don’t see what I see,
They may feel something I have unlearned -- through the miles we have walked together --
Unlearned that his hair and my hair mean nothing. For his heart is my heart,
And our journey to the river is long.

I … am not brown,
But my brother is.
When someone listens to us,
They often hear the language of conquest.
But I hear the words of the heart,
Garnished with the accent
Of ancient empires still vibrant in
The lives and limbs of their sons.
My brother’s “si, se puede” is my language,
That voice of courage, of demeaning, life-risking,
World-changing journeys to al otro lado.
For his heart is my heart, and we walk
To Atzlan -- or Houston -- together,
Though our journey to the river is long.

I … am not Woman,
But my sister is.
And when some dismiss her
Body, her ideas, her will, her strength,
I feel they have yet to unlearn
What I unlearned --
Her Other more than compliment,
But mirror spirit.
She strengthens me not because of her
“Womanly qualities,” but her own purposes.
And when you hurt my sister,
You hurt me.
I find it hard to forgive, harder to forget.
Her heart may speak a different language than mine,
But we become one, and
Our journey to the river is long.

I am not a Muslim,
But my brother is.
And -- in she’ Allah -- I look forward
To the day when his heart, his courage, his reverence and submission,
His weaknesses and failures
Will be seen universally as the journey
Of a righteous man, favored by his god and mine.
When others curse him, they curse me.
When others lie about his faith and family,
They lie about mine.
His heart beats like my heart --
Fears and falterings, hopes and visions.
And so we walk together,
For our journey is long, As-salam Alaykum

I am not gay,
But my brother is.
The snickers, the avoidance, the signs and yells
Remind me of my learning and unlearning.
But when today we walk together, shoulder to shoulder,
His courage and empathy strengthen
Our brotherhood and our manhood
And his pride makes me proud for him.
Honestly, I don’t know where our journey will lead,
For the walk to the river is long, yet I choose to walk with him.

I am not poor,
But my sister is.
And when she shows to her college class,
Hungry, lacking sleep, thinking about her
Child at home and his safety, about his
Teacher’s voice message, about his poor eyesight,
I recall the endless meals of cornbread and pinto beans
In my childhood -- cornbread and beans, cornbread and beans, cornbread.
When my sister looks down, not knowing
How she’ll pay for her college books,
I listen and we talk. Sometimes
We cheat the system that cheats and cheapens her.
She is still poor and likely will forever be. So I walk with her,
And our journey to the river is long.

My name is not Eric Garner or Jose Torres or Matthew Shepherd or Marissa Alexander.
But I am Everyman
I am a white, working-now-middle class, straight, WASP Canadian-American man.
I change space as I walk on the street and into a room.
My body, my words, my degrees, my status
Make new history and remake all histories.
Yet I am Everyman
My brothers and sisters give to me
Their spirit and bodies in signs and wonders,
In deed and words, in the thunder of silences,
Every man and every woman remakes me.
We approach and conjoin, argue and reconcile,
Embrace and tread a single path,
Walked  by generations before and innumerable to come.
I am Everyman, and
Together, we journey, lovingly
To that cleansing river.


Be strong, and courageous.
Dixi et salvavi animam meam
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