You Are Not Alone

Season 1 Episode S

Why did I come out of the womb
to see only struggle and sorrow,
to end my life in shame? Jeremiah 20:18 CSB

Did you know many of God's people experienced depression? I was reading Jeremiah this week and he said something that really stuck with me...mainly because many of us have said it before: "Why did I come out of the womb to see only struggle and sorrow?"

Why Is There So Much Senseless Violence?

One would be right in challenging the title of this post on the basis that all violence is senseless—whether violence is an act of defense from someone else's senselessness or the violence itself is senseless, something senseless has to occur for violence to be involved. Last week, when I saw that yet another mass shooting had occurred, I didn't have any words. I haven't said anything because I don't know what words to use. While people have been praising New Zealand's response to the crime, I can't get past the fact that someone entered a mosque and just started shooting. 50 people are dead. Why?

Photocredit: Unsplash.com/Kyle Johnson

Some mass shootings and terror attacks seem to have no rationale, except that the person felt like killing people. Yet others can be characterized as hate crimes:

• The mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand (March 15, 2019)
• Pulse Night Club in Orlando, FL (June 12, 2016)
• Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC (June 17, 2015)
• 16th St. Church Bombing in Birmingham, AL (September 15, 1963)

But, no matter how it's explained, I can't get passed this question: How can you hate someone you don't know?

My dad once told me that when crazy stuff starts making sense, it means you're crazy too, so I'm quite content not being able to understand how you can pick one thing about some—something that probably doesn't even tell you a lot about them—and suddenly hate them. What I'm not content with, is seeing this play out over and over. I don't care what you believe, you should know that we were not created for this.

People were claiming we live in a post racial society, that racism was over because we elected a black president, and now, here we are. White supremacy is on the rise and endorsing the President of the United States. This senselessness is spreading from our borders. We don't need a wall to keep people from getting in, we need a wall to imprison the hatred that is seeping out.

It breaks my heart to know that people operate in such a manner, to know that level of hatred can exist. The people who died last week didn't do anything to this murderer. There was absolutely no reason to kill them. Yet here we are, watching people bury their loved ones.

The debate for gun control can be had. You can argue yourselves blue in the face about it. But what I want to get to is a world where given then chance, no one would even think of doing something like this. I want to live in a world where just the thought of killing people because they're different from you, just the thought of killing people because you're angry and don't know who to take your frustrations out on, just the thought of this kind of terror is unfathomable.

References

1. Ben Westcott, Jenni Marsh, Helen Regan, Meg Wagner, Brian Ries, Veronica Rocha, Aimee Lewis, Rob Picheta, and Harmeet Kaur. "Dozens killed in Christchurch mosque attack". CNN. March 16, 2019
2. CNN Library. "1963 Birmingham Church Bombing Fast Facts". CNN. September 7, 2018
3. Ralph Ellis, Ashley Fantz, Faith Karimi and Eliott C. McLaughlin. "Orlando shooting: 49 killed, shooter pledged ISIS allegiance". CNN. June 13, 2016
4. Jason Horowitz, Nick Corasaniti, and Ashley Southall. "Nine Killed in Shooting at Black Church in Charleston". New York Times. June 17, 2015

Goodbye

It's time to say goodbye to 2018, and hello to 2019. So here's to my annual New Year's Day poem.

Clear skies and twinkling stars,
as a year of goodbyes comes to a close...
To my twenties, it was fun, now adios—
Au revoir to the friends and family
Now sleeping til that final day,
The people who have shaped me in every way.
Adieu creepy neighbor, addio broken apartment,
Adeus blank, empty, hollow walls...
The mirror lies—sayonara deceiving eyes.
Aloha 2018, a new year calls;
Aloha 2019, the new year calls

The Year of Change

This has been a year to remember. There have been really high highs, and really low lows... I think it's time we talk about it.

Today in church, I cried. The praise team was singing for KING & COUNTRY's "Shoulders" and I think everything from this year finally hit me.

This year has been a year of change, for better or for worse.

In January, I started cutting down on soda. I had a bit of a struggle with it in mid-April, so I committed to fasting completely from it for the whole summer. Shortly after that, I ended up with a lymph node swollen so big, I could actually see it protruding from my neck. When I went to the doctor, I found out I had lost weight inexplicably, which is not a good thing, and I was extremely iron deficient. I closed on my first house the same day. A maternal uncle died around the same time. About 2 weeks later, a paternal uncle died. A couple days passed and my great-aunt died. I became the sole developer on a major subproject at my job and have been very successful coming up to speed and developing the feature. I turned 30 in June. Then in July, conditions worsened for a friend I've known so long I can't remember where or how I met her. By mid August, doctors had given her a few weeks to live. I was blessed to be able to visit her on a trip home. She died Monday.

As I said, it's been an eventful year...

I feel like God has allowed such high peaks and low valleys back to back that I haven't really been processing anything. I've just been moving from one event to another with my mood shifting very little. As such, I've been neglecting the blog a little and I've been neglecting the testimony section a lot. When I woke up this morning, I had every intention of finishing a blog post I started on forgiveness, but in that moment, I realized I needed to shout the praises and glory of God. So let's take a walk through this year of change.

Fasting from Soda

I've talked about journey cutting out soda from my diet on the blog. I shared the beginning of this journey in "The Water Challenge," where I talked about how I wanted to increase my water intake. I followed up touching on the psychological difficulties in "The Tragedy of Addiction." What I haven't talked about is why on the blog called PSALMS to God, there's a whole (heavily neglected) section on food and health.

The first time I made a major shift in my diet was in 2010, when I stopped eating pork. I was in the midst of studying the Old Testament for a class and realized I couldn't articulate why we ignore the laws on clean and unclean foods in Leviticus. So, I began fasting from pork (all unclean foods, really, but pork is the only one I ate on a regular basis) and searching for the why. To be honest, my first year in grad school totally derailed my goal to study this topic. However, after I got used to putting veggies on my pizza instead of pepperoni or sausage,—a plain cheese pizza just isn't my thing—this fast was a cake walk. By the time I started studying, I didn't actually have any desire for these unclean foods. Perhaps that helped me be unbiased in the study. When I couldn't find a single verse that validated eating unclean meat, I made the change permanent. (References to and explanations of the verses people usually cite on this topic are discussed in "The Christian Diet.")

But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. Matthew 4:4 KJV

That first change, drastically changed my relationship with God. The combination of heavily studying the Word and denying yourself foods you usually wouldn't, is a life changing experience. I learned so much during that time. I would argue that this is when I went from being a baby Christian to whatever the next phase in spiritual growth is.

If you've been following my blog from the beginning, you might notice that the first major change in the blog coincides with the second major health choice I made in life: going vegetarian. The year I created In God I Trust, and separated it from my poetry blog (both of which were merged/revamped into this blog), is the same year I became vegetarian.

Disclaimer: I don't think there's anything wrong with eating clean meat in general.

The major shift in my diet caused me to research nutrition and healthy eating habits. Eating healthy changed everything. While I may struggle with iron deficiency, I haven't had as much trouble with my skin (I used to have extremely sensitive skin, anything would irritate it and cause rashes), my menstrual woes are less frequent, and my body just feels better. With all that extra energy I was able to focus better, which not only helped me graduate, it helped me study the Word.

The Bible tells us that our bodies are temples; the Holy Spirit dwells within us (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). If you read the verses on the Temple in the books of Moses, you will see how big of a deal that is. God wants to make us clean, not just spiritually but physically as well. These two things are connected. The healthier I am physically, the better I am at nurturing my spiritual life, and the more I nurture my spiritual relationship with God, the more I realize how He wants me to take care of myself, which nurtures my physical health.

Giving up soda completely has been the hardest of these challenges. I'm not sure if it's the timing (with this year being so eventful), or the iron deficiency, or the lack of caffeine, but I haven't felt any boosts in energy or real benefits from drinking water instead. My fast ended on September 1, but I still haven't gone back to soda.

Last week, the new associate pastor at my church was telling her story about how she went through so much to be where she is now, only to have her husband almost die right before she graduated from seminary. She brought up the question that she asked herself at the time: "if God were to take [her] husband, would she still worship and serve God?" It resonated with this situation for me: will I stop doing something I know is bad for me (re: drinking soda) even if God doesn't reward me?

Home Sweet Home

Most little girls plan their wedding; I planned my house instead. I've wanted to buy a house and decorate it since I was a tiny thing following my dad in Lowe's. By the time I graduated, I was resigned to the fact that I needed to move buying a house off my 30 before 30 list.

Unfortunately, the apartment complex I moved into just after my 29th birthday was a hot mess. The maintenance staff was horrible, the management was rude, and my neighbor smoked all the time, so I couldn't use the outdoor space (he was also very creepy).

My parents are actually the ones who encouraged me to start looking to buy. I started looking in November, and by March, I was convinced it wasn't going to happen. I got a notice that I had to renew my lease to get the best rate by a particular date in March, and I knew it wasn't going to happen. I had two weeks to find a place.

On a Monday I prayed and surrendered the situation to God. Tuesday I found a potential listing. Wednesday I found 3 more. My parents drove down to go with me and that Sunday I viewed the place I would eventually call home. After months of only seeing things I couldn't afford, there was a place in my budget that had every single thing I wanted. My offer was accepted almost immediately, the inspection went without a hitch, and the negotiation process got me the home for significantly less than the asking price. Nobody but God could pull off such a miracle.

Not only did God make my dream come true, He gave me a safe place to stay. The more I live, the more I see homeless people, the more I realize how much I take for granted. I was so annoyed in my old apartment, but I had a roof over my head and food in the fridge. There are people sleeping on side walks every night, huddling under bridges under the rain, and depending on the kindness of total strangers for food. God has blessed me above and beyond what I deserve. When I surrendered the question of where I would live after my lease expired to Him, I did so because I realized that even if I never was able to buy my own place, the fact that He kept any roof over my head was a reason to praise Him and be happy.

Deaths in the Family

I've always read posts of people complaining about posting death notices on Facebook before the family has been notified, and I could imagine how that would feel, but I found out first hand in May. The Tuesday before I closed on my house I logged onto Facebook and was greeted by a post from my maternal aunt grieving the loss of her twin brother (re: my uncle). I had just hung up the phone with my mom who hadn't mentioned a thing. I called her to see if anyone had called her and luckily my grandfather had just told her (she never hung up the phone switching calls between him and me).

I didn't know this uncle well because he wasn't around much when I was kid, but I felt immensely for his daughter and the rest of my aunts/uncles. I also realized that even though his death wasn't because of age, that generation in my family is getting up there in age. This was the first time I really processed the fact that a day will come when many of my other aunts and uncles won't be here any more.

About 2 weeks later, an uncle by marriage on my dad's side of the family was rushed to the hospital. He also died. This uncle lived across the street from me. He used to help my dad out around the farm. I remember him sitting under the shade of a tree in his yard reading the paper—that seemed to be his favorite spot. I remember him and the other men in my family watching football at thanksgiving dinner. And then I remember my dad, who just turned 68, is the baby in his family.

Four days later, I got a call from my mom telling me that my great aunt (maternal) had also passed away. My mom was extremely close to her, so I grew up hearing stories about her when I was a child. However, since she lived in Maryland, I had never met her. When I was 20, I did an internship in Maryland and decided I wanted to meet her. I called her up and she invited me to her home. She invited her kids, their kids, and any family in the area she could get a hold of. She cooked—some delicious food at that!—and basically put on an impromptu family reunion. I kept in touch with her through letters and on Facebook (yep, she was tech savvy). I have never felt so loved by someone I'd only met once.

I was blessed with a big family even though I was raised as an only child (my sister is significantly older than me). God allowed me to grow up surrounded by my family and I have been blessed to have this love and support my whole life. This of course means that days like this will continue to come. The price for having a large, loving family, is that there is a long list of people to miss when they're gone. It's a price God knew I was willing to pay, so I thank Him for giving me this blessing.

Turning 30

Not where I was, but beautiful nonetheless
Photocredit: Unsplash.com/Simon Migaj

I celebrated my 30th birthday this year, which is supposed to be a milestone, I guess. It's really only as eventful as you make it. I was confused for a high schooler a few days after, so I don't think it's fully hit me yet. What I can say is that when I was growing up, I thought the characters in Living Single were in their 30's and that's what I thought life would look like. As I settled into my mid twenties and realized all my college friends were quite a distance away, I started to realize what "adulting" really looked like: having to plan a month in advance just to grab lunch with friends you've known your whole life. God did bring me a great group of friends locally, though. The young adult group at my church has been a blessing and many of them were there to help me celebrate my 30th. God gave me the best birthday present ever: a clear night sky and a beautiful place where I could actually see the stars. (Yes, I'm obsessed with looking at the stars.)

Professional Success

It's only been a year since I graduated with my PhD and the imposter syndrome has been strong. There have been days where I felt like I didn't know what I was doing at all. There's this feeling that everyone is in the break room laughing at how incompetent you are, when really, they're just as confused as you are. God has blessed me with a great work environment. The people I've been working with are extremely supportive and helpful. Earlier this year, after I asked to work on a project closer to the hardware, my manager obliged by placing me on the feature of the project I'm working on that ties everything together. If this feature doesn't work, none of the other features will work either. The senior developer on the project ended up leaving the company and I became the primary developer for the feature almost as soon as we started implementing it. No pressure...

I've implemented 90% of the feature and it's been amazing. Due to the nature of the project, I get to work with many different teams, so I've been able to meet more people than usual. There have been one or two hiccups, but the feature is completely functional and I've gotten the privilege of demoing it's progress at monthly meetings. This week, the functionality of the feature was challenged by someone outside of the development team and I was able to successfully (and calmly) defend it.

Apparently management approves of my progress at work because last Friday I was assigned to mentor the latest addition to our team!

The Death of a Friend

A friend I've known since probably elementary school has been living in spite of cancer for 5 years. During this time she kept friends updated through Facebook posts. Every single one of those posts was positive and full of faith. Her faith was so inspirational. Her health took a turn for the worse in July and in August the doctors said she had only a few weeks left to live. I was already thinking about going home the last week in August, and decided I would go to see her.

I was terrified. I had no idea what to say.

She was the same cheerful, easy going, and funny person she had been in high school. Talking to her that last time was just like I remembered our senior year in high school. She was brave. She was strong. I'm so glad I got to witness her faith and had the chance to be friends with her. I've never seen my graduating class so united in thought as when people shared the news of her passing. There's no doubt that she claimed victory in spreading God's light.

Her best friend promised to honor her memory by encouraging donations to sarcoma research: you can donate here.

³I thank my God upon every remembrance of you,
⁴Always in every prayer of mine for you all making request with joy,
⁵For your fellowship in the gospel from the first day until now;Philippians 1:3-5 KJV

Today

So that brings us to today... I may have shed a few more tears writing all of this (sorry for the length), but I thought you should know: God is good and I trust Him with the rest of this year.


*I know I was listening to "Shoulders" when I decided to share all this,
but I want to leave you with "Broken Praise" for some reason

References

1. for KING & COUNTRY. "Shoulders". YouTube. March 20, 2015
2. Ree Hughes. "The Water Challenge". PSALMS to God. February 28, 2018
3. Ree Hughes. "The Tragedy of Addiction". PSALMS to God. August 4, 2018
4. "Victor Gaines". Gaston Gazette. May 2018
5. "Raymond Colbert". Myrtle Beach Online. May 2018
6. Jacqueline Y. 'Jacci' Keyes". Herald-Mail Media. June 2018
7. Local woman stresses importance of faith, humor in cancer fight". My Horry News. August 28, 2018
8. "Sarcoma Foundation of America"

Homesick

I was ripped from my mother's womb—
Or maybe she gave me up...

Left to fend for myself with the man who raped her
He took pleasure in breaking her,
Invaded her heart, stole the diamonds from her eyes...
Settled his debts and paid his way in her blood,
Then cast her aside to die...

He stole her from me

And I see her begin to fade...
I can't remember the sound of her laugh
The smell of her breath
The feel of her heartbeat sustaining mine...
And when I look in the mirror I see him
Because he raised me,
But to hate him is to hate me.

I have his eyes, his nose and his lips
I walk like him and talk like him
I even hate her like him...

I thought I'd lost myself, But there never was a me to lose...
I'm just a gear in a machine he'll never claim.
Set to work until my purpose runs out,
Til' my usefulness fades
And he can replace me with someone new...
Some other motherless child

I wish I could be more like her.

I wish I could dance
To the rhythm of her heartbeat
Talk, with the cadence of her walk
Smell of her favorite flowers and perfumes...
I wish I could wear those diamonds from her eyes
And look upon myself as something to pride...

I wish I could find my way home,
That is, I wish I had a home to find

It was after listening to this song that I found the words I couldn't get out.

Humanity

Wake up to the sound of hope dying,
Outrage on every side—
We're not sleeping easy tonight...
We been fighting all our existence for change

FreeImages.com/Michael Bisgaard

But each change seems to bring us back to the same
This way of life—does it make us insane?
Is everything thing we do, all in vain?
We live in a world that has this perfected,
Where 2 million votes can't get you elected,
But 1 vote can ensure you're neglected
And the issue keeps just getting deflected...
Everyone talkin' 'bout they don't see color
Pretending they got love for one another,
But got us back in the '50s before Technicolor.
Duckin' and hidin', they avoiding the question
Fueling the fire, fanning the flames of aggression
It's just a sophisticated form of oppression—
Protest or stay silent, it doesn't heal the depression.
It's a constant cycle of hurt and of pain
But people are ok with everything staying the same,
So I gave up on humans being humane.

References

1. "Mistrial declared in Michael Slager murder trial". The Week. December 5, 2016

Connecting to My Past

I used to wonder about my ancestors,
Felt so out of touch with where I came from.
Didn't know names or faces,
Couldn't fathom these far off places...

Reading these white-washed textbooks,
Got me wondering about this melanin deficiency
Is it Rape, or some type of Pocahontas idiocracy?
Another missing connection I'll never understand.

Photocredit: ShutterStock.com/Andrey_Popov

400 years, 200 years, 50 years...
A change we can believe in?
But when I turn on the news
Its all still there: every tear, every view.

Face down in the cement—
Move to the other side.
Keep your mouth closed;
Look at the ground...
Are you gonna die like a man,
Or die like a slave?

I used to wonder...
What they looked like, how they felt
How they'd made it
With the crappy hand they were dealt...

Then I looked in the mirror,
I looked on the TV,
And I saw them
Inside and around me.

The False Calm

I turn away,
But the vision is still there—
I close my eyes,
But they still see...
I try to wrap myself
In a silk cocoon
Fade away into natures arms,
But these bullets pierce
The strongest of walls
This silence breaks
The hardest of hearts...
A metaphorical calm before the storm
When the streets run red with blood
Drained from brown and black bodies
And the very last breath is a cry for help
But the ears of the masses are turned away
They expect us to wait and wait, day after day
To die and to cry, to lay souls resting in the deep
Not to wake screaming from the nightmares we keep
Only to realize we were never asleep...

#CharlestonStrong

Stained glass and mournful cries

Clapping and stomping, songs begin to rise

The bellow of the organ fills the room—

Beauty grows from sorrow and doom.

Still the body when the breath is gone

When the soul has left its Earthly home,

Sleep, be still, peace comes in the coming days

While we live on, stand strong, hold on to faith.

References

1. Melanie Eversley. "9 dead in shooting at black church in Charleston, S.C.". USA Today. June 17, 2015

Nice Girl

Try to be
A nice girl--
Sweet and supportive
Understanding...

No backstabbing,
No underhanded tricks
No Petty squabbles.

But the more life settles
The less you care
And all the niceties of life
     disappear--
Fade away to reveal
A petty world around you
And you don't want to be
--A nice girl.

Express your anger
Or cage it away
Stop being the soggy shoulder
Or continue to comfort?

When logic asks:
Why care for the world
     when the world doesn't care for you?
But your heart says do the right thing--
You can't hide that deep inside
A nice girl
Lives.

Waits for that final blow.

Breathing In

Every time I breathe--
There's pain in this cavity
    where my heart use to beat...
    a hologram, an empty shell--
The remnants and pieces left to tell
the memories of us, of how we fell.

And in my mind a smiling face--
A charming gentleman of poise and grace--
     the other half of this loving embrace...
     gone away, while days pass by.
The ache of distance in each sigh,
Manifests in these droplets pooling in my eye....

The world has stopped
     but the days still pass
And time creeps on
     an hour, for eternity lasts...
I wonder how this happened,
     it happened so fast.

The Perils of Negative Thoughts

Angry words of modern men fall flat
The weight of adverse thoughts plague empty minds
While the joys of life slip away from that...

Time is wasted, whittled and undefined--
Leaves trouble to brew in unattended gaps,
Devours and defines the rot of mankind.

Something about this emotion unwraps
From inside minds unstable and impure--
Takes over the soul of whom it entraps.

Ask not the soul this trouble we let lure
Why oft we fall--unconcerned unattached
Our emotions run away strong but unsure?

Frivolous and trivial be detached,
Wherefore positive thought can entertain
Free from this sorrow we've already hatched.

We stand with idle minds free from gain
Writhe at the mercy of the fear it reminds
As though we are unable to sway the brain.

We press on in spite this unsightly rut--
Frantic we argue, we try to rebut
Angry words of modern men--fall flat
While the joys of life slip away like that...

I Know Why

I know why the caged bird sings
Why the steel constricts so heavily around
And the weight of the air on delicate wings
Rubs away at their softness--tightly bound
To suppress the worry of unadorned kings
Who cage beauty because they are not crowned
And the bird's song is the gem they seek,
The treasure they possess, but cannot keep.

I know why her wings will not break,
Why in the midst of ruin she will always rise--
In fear she will not fold, she will not quake
For the strength of God is buried in her eyes
And the sound of her song soothes her wake;
Let not the coming darkness be a surprise,
When the last rays of light caress her battle scars
As the sun sets, fading between these metal bars...

I know why a brave and startling truth must come
Why it's hidden there in the notes of this bird's song
Bellowed and swallowed by vocal cords numb
From the consistent denial of right from wrong
Strained and beaten to a mournful hum
That voice keeps singing, keeps beating strong--
She will not stop, allow her soul to be reduced
For the lock must be broken, the chains loosed.

I know why a woman and bird must be the same
Why times are different but people are unchanged
In a world where everyone and no one shares the blame
Left amongst the evils of men, mad and deranged
She weeps in her song for the passing of this horrible shame
Exploited, forgotten, and in the end always shortchanged
Her song never dies, will never falters--she will always be
Proud, strong...a caged bird, a woman phenomenally.

Maya Angelou
author and poet
(April 4, 1928 - May 28, 2014)

Sickness

A thick lining
Suppresses air
And breathing slows...
The air has no where to go
Escape is impossible,
And it wanes
Seeping back into the head
From whence it came,
Suffering in it's captivity...
Waiting to be free.

When I'm Gone:

Spotlight on NC Mutual Life Insurance Company

Who will mourn me when I'm gone,
Stand over me to whisper prayers,
Forgotten memories and experiences
Depict the ripples of my existence, hear
In the words of the community I leave behind...
Adorn my casket in sweet scented flowers
Look after the family I leave behind,
Worry not at my expenses
As they lay me down to rest
But remember my worth
My words, my laugh, my smile--
Be at peace with a life lived and passed away
In the hopes of continuing on our legacy.

In 1898, North Carolina became home to the first black owned and black serving insurance company. Founded by John Merrick and Dr. Allen McDuffie Moore, North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company is the only insurance company based in North Carolina with a founding date before 1900 and is the largest black life insurance company in the US. Merrick was a former slave and brick mason who came up with the idea based on the mutual benefit societies of the south. Dr. Moore, who was born free, attended medical school and was the first black medical practitioner in Durham, NC. He started many other enterprises such as a hospital, drug company, and library [1]. The two men pooled their own money to personally finance the company from its inception in 1898 until 1903. The company was able to expand by absorbing fallen companies and buying into Mechanics and Farmers (another black owned business). Friends with Booker T. Washington, Dr. Moore and Merrick based their company on his philosophy of self-help advocacy and adhered to the principle of mutual aid, supporting the National Negro Business League [2].  As blacks began migrating north to Chicago, Frank L. Gillespie saw the need to provide northern blacks with insurance coverage as well. In 1919 he started Liberty Life Insurance (now Supreme Life Insurance) which would become the first black owned and serving insurance company in the north. Pictured above is the Supreme Life Building in Chicago which was built in 1921 and designated a Chicago Landmark in 1998 [3].

References

1. "North Carolina Mutual". NC Mutual Life; visited February 2014
2. Rodney D. Barfield and John F. Ansley. "North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance". North Carolina Mutual Life Insurance Company. 2006
3. "Supreme Life Building". Chicago Landmarks; visited 2014
4. "African Americans in the Insurance Business: Supreme Liberty Life Insurance Co.". Black History Heroes; visited 2014
5. "Mechanics and Farmers". Mechanics and Farmers; visited February 2014
6. "Booker T. Washington". Biography; visited 2014

Stranger

a world away from me
huddled under the elements
hungry and cold
in a barren and desolate world
under the same sky
strong and brave
wishing on the same stars
crying the tears which drown my smile

Silence

I am a master of silence--
I wrapped my silence around me
Spun it around my body like silk
Until silence bestowed it's invisibility,
Granted me this strange ability
To be seen only when I choose to be
Because it's easier that way--
I'm watching the world crash and burn
Pretending I can touch the fire
Knowing no one can see scars--
Skin secretly blistered and marred
No one knows, that I am the broken strings
Strummed on a broken battered guitar
So I pretend I'm the brightest star
Simply because it's convenient...
You see the words are there,
Relaxing on the tip of my tongue
But I have no desire to be seen
Or form bonds from words I release
Why should I break this silence
Break out of my silken shadowed cocoon
And tether myself to cheap cotton?
I'm half aware of some brilliance
Hidden here in the shadows
Kept alive by unwavering resilience
No matter how the shadows may hide
This presence is my hindrance,
Fighting to be unleashed,
Testing my resistance
But I'm not ready to make my appearance.
So I swallow back the words I know--
Words that entrench my soul,
Uncomfortable, but invisible in my cloak
Mourning the words of the visible
Somewhere unbothered and alone
Using my silence as my shield.

Another

Another one,
Gone--but not forgotten
So many lives lost,
So many dreams deferred
Uncoubtable tears wept
For incalculable years left
Another day
Passes on unnoticed
immortal problems
Fighting mortal me
And the tears have dried
Surpassed the ability to cry
Another tear
Lost in a sea
Of uncried tears
A grief I cannot feel
But the pain goes on
Engraved in fire
On another life.

A Vision Deferred

A wise old woman
Born of a foolish young girl,
Battered, beaten, and broken
Risen from black ashes
She found Life.
Even ugly and bruised
Her heart reached out
Conscious and concerned
She uttered words of gold
And spun diamonds
With each burdened step--
But we reject her
In awe of distant glitter
The unreachable shimmer
Of death's forsaken isle,
We watch her treasures sink
Drifting further and further away,
Buried--
Under turbulent blue waves
And salty white foam.

Ominous

Silence cut by the ringing of the bell
A low chime lingering in the air
As the sound dissipates, another chime,
Just enough time for your mind to wander
Just enough silence for so soul to quiver
Just enough sound for you heart to warm,

Ding...

The last breath of a life stolen

Ding...

Another minute passing

Ding...