Let Freedom ring.
Let freedom ring from the hilltops to the slums
To the grandmother alone with her gospel hums
As she sits and she rocks
Back and forth on her rocking chair with her quilt and her music box
The same woman who need not speak
But elevate her moans
Yet WE groan
Over the fact that their names are our own?

We forget they were the ones who kept the tempo
Made sure the right date was time to crescendo
Staccato the words that needed to be heard over the playing of Nintendo.
And I have a confession to make
I had a crush on the conductor.
Coretta Scott King. The conductor of “The Movement”
She had a million men moving to the beat of one drum
Making sure the harmony was not the same typical Negro hum.
Different voices, blended together making a Social Justice Symphony
She made sure that her husband got the big solo that could be heard above the world’s cacophony.
But she left herself in the shadows
Man… if only she could be contagious
Woman… if only THAT can be contagious
A Woman among men,
A woman who will make it known that Democrats and Republicans are the ones who she has to fend
A woman who can make it known that her life is more than “yes dear” “no dear”
A woman who can say “me gusta tus ideas que da los chicos esperanza”
I can only hope that this woman would be more contagious than influenza
More widespread than AIDS
And affecting more cultures than the Middle East crusades



But this woman stays behind the scenes, being the stage hands
Her work is only to be continued by the woman who started “Yes We Can”
And she holds out the fermata controlling the B major chord to the band
Asking for more and more
So that Barak can have a solo riff that is heard from Dubai to the Jersey Shore
And at the end, I can see it now
She stands, then bows, and raises her hand to her choir of millions
The silence will fall within the room reaching the heart of trillions
Letting the husband step so that the roar can resume
And she too leaves herself to the shadows
Only to keep the pace going for the next symphony to be written by a woman who can stop going “Mad low”
Below the belt to get her, “Cash flow”
Which seems to happen in the “Last row”
Saying “Haz lo”
But it’s a “No go”
For this conductor has her work on “pianissimo”
And it’s a shame that it’s never appreciated
So I’m giving credit where credit is due
Appreciate the work
Appreciate the selflessness
See this diminishing number of people who chose to persist in his dream because sometimes it seems like helplessness
To change the not by shaking hands but touching fists
Because until we appreciate this
Until we notice and realize
Appreciate, realize, and see with our own ignorant eyes
This cyst in our vision of culture will keep growing.
These women’s credits will be anything but all knowing.


And we will let freedom ring
From the city tops, to the ghetto slums
To the woman sitting in her chair waiting until the spirit comes
She will do exactly that before everything will come undone
She will wait until her spirit comes.