Hope Is Italicized

I went last nite to witness the Obama rally in Philadelphia.  The truth of it is that I didn’t even get to hear him because he showed up a tad bit later than advertised.  But I did stand outside in Independence Mall and for one of the first times in my life experience being part of the democratic process.  It was absolutely awesome.  I saw any and every kind of people on the streets waiting in line, behind metal fences and barricades, standing like sardines packed into a tiny area, oftentimes completely out of eyesight of the platform from which Obama spoke.  I saw people wearing buttons with Obama’s face and a word, hope.  I saw people ready to erupt in chants of “Obama” every chance they had.

While I didn’t get to hear his actual speech, I took some time just now to listen to it on youtube.  Without passing judgment on those who aren’t voting for Obama, it absolutely baffles me how people can listen to his speeches and not be as swept up as I am when he preaches about the evils of corporate America and the corruption in American politics that he desires to bring an end to.  Admittedly, it’s childish and innocent to think that one man can reform our political process, and yet, someone remind me of the last president or politician that even cared to care about such a thing.  Since when did a presidential candidate care about the hopelessness, the beaten-down-ness of the people… the cynicism and apathy that has become our pathetic democratic process where the rich still rule and the rich continue to rob the foods straight out of the poor people’s mouths.  Whether Obama can change this country in four years is one thing, I’m just thrilled, excited, overjoyed, in amazement, in wonder, that somebody who has enough clout and fame and knowledge and education would actually care, and would take a potential backseat in this political race because he believes that the people of this country are smart enough to know that he is the only candidate feeding them truth with knowledge in a show of respect — that he respects all Americans as people who think and deserve better.

I took pictures while I was at the rally — clearly way before the reported 35,000 all shwoed up.  I’ve been told that I have a slight preference for black and white.  There was no occasion where black and white could have been more appropriate.  All around me I saw people and the lives that they were living and the reality of the hardships they endure and their unmistakeable starving for somebody who cares and who dares to give them hope.  That is black and white; that is without the sugar; that is without the color to distract you from what’s really at issue.

Seeing Blind

Completely unrelated pictures, and completely unrelated to the pictures.

If Obama does not win this election, the American people will indict themselves of perpetuating dirty politics.  Re-watch last night’s debate in Philadelphia and disagree with me.

I Know Where I’m Going Even When It’s Dark

I tend to cycle through genres of music.  Hiphop is one of my loves that after every so often gets a bit tired and I drop it for a while… until it brings itself back to me by some new hot joint that I manage to find either on okayplayer, hiphopsite, or some other source.  In recent memory, that’s been like Common’s most recent album (forget the name), Brother Ali, Atmosphere’s Strictly Leakage, and most recently the Root’s leaked/not-leaked tracks off their upcoming album, Rising Down (Rising Up, 75 Bars, Rising Down).

Ish is hawt.  Search ‘em at the Roots’ blog that I have linked.

Good hiphop makes me think of gritty, contrasty black and white pictures.  And fat car grilles.

Totally Serious.

1.  One of my favorite shots from Easter Sunday.  They’re kind of, but not really serious.  Hm.  He might be tryna be serious.

2.  On another note, how awesome is Sixers basketball right now.

I appreciate…

1. People who want to be in my pictures.

2. Charles Barkley on TNT’s Inside The NBA.

DSC_0038

A Step Towards Now

I havn’t blogged in ages.  I stayed with xanga because certain people never die on xanga and it felt hard to give up something that had been connected me with so many people before.  But the more I look at it (or not look at it) the more I realize it’s time to move on.  Blogging today is lightyears from what it was when I started xanga in ‘02.  So all that not saying much to say, I’m trying something new with wordpress (despite the fact that I’ve had this site for ages).  Maybe it’ll get me to write more.

“Again” as performed at Temple’s “Come and See” Coffeehouse on 02.09.08

He speaks to the girl who…
   Knows not why she was dealt her lot
He speaks where no one can tell her
   Why scars and pains must be so deep and persistent
   Why joy must be sought out amidst troubled waters
   Why her rose is rooted in the concrete, forced to bloom where water and love are scarce
   Why salvation and blessings are not found in comfort
   Why life is not as everyone else lives it
   Why love knos better than she does and can that love exist, be real, and be hers?

This life is meaning increasingly less to me as I see this world’s pains and ills
The Sick and the Poor, the Mistreated and those robbed of opportunities
   By their fellowhuman beings
   In this world where the masses are fleeced by the few
      Where the few have the most to lose and are the most confused

This life is my pursuit of happiness but effort does not translate to joy
   I try and I cry, I sweat and eventually die
      To the work of my own hands
      That cannot save me or redeem my existence or satisfy my need for affirmation
   I try where I cannot succeed.
My life’s song is in diminished minor and its theme is negativity.

I need a different tune in a different key.
Oh, sing me a song of life
Sing me positivity!
Sing at this weary and burdened soul of mine
Because again, I need to hear and remember
Again I need to believe
Again I need to listen

To the sound of His people in song,
   Expressing beauty beyond words
And see in my mind’s eye His power pulsating
   In the cracking of dawn over African plains
   In the booming of thunder anticipating torrential rains
   In the rumblings and shakings of earthquakes
   In the beating of each man and woman’s heart
Again I need to feel the radiance and heat of His glory

This is the music, the sound, the beat, the experience
   Of God, of Jehovah Jireh, of King of the Cosmos
   Of nature’s rage, of all circumstances of people’s hearts…
He is Lord over unforeseeable happenings and unexplainable tragedies
And devastating pain, and out-of-this-world miracles and speech-arresting joy
And tear-provoking gratitude and hands-to-the-sky peace

Again.
Despite the road that faces me now, I will praise You, again.
The ground beneath me will cave, again.
Again, you will lift me out on the palm of Your hands.
Again I will dive into deeper waters and sink as I try to swim.
You will part the waters and I will walk on dry land, again.

Tell me again that my God sits enthroned above.
Tell me again that I have a perfect high priest who has saved me from my sins.
Tell me again I stand before the throne of Supreme, God Himself.
And that He hears my perfect plea

Again I can’t, and again He does
Again I fall and again He loves
Before the throne of God I come again
Again Jesus, son of God has died for me.

Live, Fight and Die.

We fight for what we live for.
Are you willing to die for what you fight for?
We live for when we are willing to die for.
When we die for that is truly to fight for.
We live for.
We die for.
We fight for.
We live to fight and die for.

There is something about a good war flick
   That reminds me of what I’d die for –
      What I’d charge into the fray for,
      Eat dirt and put myself in harms way for,
      What I’d sweat and bleed for,
      What I’d watch my brothers die for,
      What I’d sacrifice all the joys and privileges in this life for,

There is something about seeing soldiers march
   Into certain bloodshed and death that brings tears to my eyes
      And tightens my fists’ grip because there’s nothing more
      To this life for me than something to live, fight and die for.

When I am lost and consumed by
   Mind-numbing and de-sensitizing pursuit of material things,
When my passion has becoming work a job
   To make more money so that I can spend more
   And add more to my possessions for the sake of having more
   Because having more is my passion –
May I remember that life is living for something
   That is worth fighting and dying for.

Life is charging into the fray fearlessly
   Because I live and die for,
Life is marching and enduring,
   Steadily pushing forward, sustaining a pace,
   Not fearing falling down, always fighting body, mind and spirit,
   Transcending what is seen for what I know
And what I know is that I live to fight and die for.

After life is reduced to the basics,
After all color fades to shades of black and white –
   The glamour, the luxury, the plush, the extravagance,
After all sound is silenced until all that can be heard is my own heartbeat…
After the senses are dulled and life becomes about nothing else
   but something…
   That something needs to be worth dying for
   Or else this life is not worth living.

I am inspired by husband and wives,
   Who live to serve one another in health or sickness, in welath or poverty,
I am inspired by fathers and mothers,
   Who work long hours to raise and support their children,
   To teach them to become young men and women
   To give to them all good things within their means,
I am inspired by school teachers,
   Who have a passion to educate the children of this generation
      Who are so deprived of truth and knowledge.
I am inspired by men and women who understand what they live for
   Who are living for those things as they are ready to die forthem
   Because they only live for something that they’d die for
   And for it they’ll endure the fight knowing that they live to die for.

Live, fight and die for.
Live to fight and die for.
Die for that which is worth living and fighting for,
   Because living is fighting and fighting is dying.
Live for, fight for, and die for.
I live so that I can fight so that I can die for.

Power in The Name

I was raised in the church, to the tune of choirs and hymns,
Hearing countless times the names of Adam and Eve,
Abraham and Isaac, Moses and Joshua, Elijah and Samson,
David and Solomon… Jesus and His disciples.

I was raised in the church, to the sounds of spiritual talk,
Words like grace, forgiveness, sin, love, patience,
Compassion, perserverance, prayer and worship.

In church, I saw wooden crosses in the sanctuary and on the Bibles.
I was raised to understand the cross and Jesus who died upon one.

But I open up the pages of Holy Scriptures for myself
And I read of stories about this man, Jesus.

Pastors that I’ve known and preachers that I’ve heard,
   Say that this man gives hope to the hopeless.
Believers of Jesus and his power claim witness
   To His healing of their pains and relieving of their burdens.
Believers of this Jesus have traded lives pursuing dreams
   And ambitions of fame, fortune and love,
   Social status, wealth and assets,
   Even the wamrth and comfort of family and friends
Because they call Him teacher, they call Him prophet,
   They call Him God.

I read His stores in the Holy Scriptures and I wonder.
I wonder, who is this man preaching
   mercy and compassion for sinners.
Who is this man claiming judgment upon unrepentant people.
Who is this man telling me that I am deserving of hell.
I read of the law and the prophets in Scriptures
   And I wonder.
Who is this man teaching in the temple courts,
   Claiming to have greater authoirty to upset established traditions.
Who is He and from where did He Come –
Speaking and healing, rebuking and forgiving,
   Giving so much and then dying so young –
His death so brutal and gut-wrenching,
Who is He, that God Himself says to listen to.

He calms raging winds and bloodthirsty men.
He strikes fear into demons and evil spirits.
He cries out in agony to Abba Father.
He sacrifices His life in obedience to something greater.

He rode on a donkey’s back into cosmic eternal glory.
On palm leaves spread before Him,
   He proceeded to His reckoning, death and judgment.
He was mocked, traded for a criminal and beat,
   Humiliated, tortured and crucified.

In the scorching heat he climbed,
   The sun exposing His flesh torn open by the whip,
With the weight of a strong tree bearing down on His back,
   On His wounds drenched
   In the salt of His sweat and tears and blood.
Then stretched out under the blazing sun
   On two criss-crossed wooden beams,
The dust rising and baptizing Him
   In the desolation of this world given over to man…

WHO KNEW that HE WAS GOD come
   To save all of humanity from eternal fire and damnation –
   He was Jesus… He IS Jesus.
Jesus.
   Jesus who answers anyone who calls His name, Jesus.
   Jesus, Son of God.
Jesus who’s murder was the absolute act of mercy and power.

There is POWER in a name when
   It represents healing and redemption.
There is POWER in a name when its utterance is spiritual,
   Stirring a soul to hope and joy.

Receive POWER in a name that knows about
   All the shame and guilt deep in the hearts of men
   But promises a claer conscience and a clean slate.

Call upon a name whose POWER is incommensurable…
   Unfathomable… Transcendant… Super-natural.

Sing of THE NAME whose POWER storms
   The gates of Hades to resurrect the dead to life.
Sing of THE NAME whose POWER cannot be diminished –
   Whose POWER fills sanctuaries and throne rooms,
   Whose POWER rises and envelopes the towering ceilings
      of church steeples and cathedrals, mosques and synagogues.

Amazing Grace [Revision]

Dear God, I live to experience Your amazing grace –
   The way it overwhelms my calloused heart
   And compels me to change.
I cannot live without Your amazing grace
   That saves me from myself –
   My lustful and prideful eyes staring at my own demise.
I am a fool and a sinner,
   Repeating the same mistakes that
   I’ve repented of every other prayer.
I am depraved and wretched –
   Turning back to old habits and attachments from a past life,
   Like a dog returning to its own vomit,
   Even when You’ve given me all things new.
I ignorantly neglect your gentle encouragements and loving rebukes.
I choose to take winding and treacherous roads that lead to death
   When you show me the straight-way to life.
I am so caught up chasing fixes until the highs are increasingly low,
   Leaving me sinking beneath waves of circumstances and emotions.

Barely clinging to life by a thread,
   Drowned in my disgrace,
      I come to You with head bowed in shame.

I come crying out to You for grace.
   Show me grace just one more time,
   Knowing that again and a again I am in need of it
      And You will continually grant it to me.
Please remove the shame and guilt looming over my heart.
Spare me the impending judgment and punishment I deserve
   For my wreckless and indifferent treatment of Your love.
With boldness and brash I defied You
   And made my own decision,
   But now the consequences are too much to bear.

HEAR ME, oh God… I need Your grace to
   Overwhelm my calloused heart and compel me to change.
SEE ME, God, desperate and downtrodden, weary and spent.

Have I told you, dear God, that I am dependent upon Your grace…
   Your amazing grace that redeems this existence
   That I have squandered and made so miserable and futile
Have I told You, dear God, that I will not awake to a day
   When I cannot bank your grace to overwhelm
      This calloused heart and compel me to change.
I eat, I sleep.  I love, I move forward, by Your amazing grace.
Never leave me to fend for or justify myself
   Without Your grace that takes salvation and redemption
      Out of my shaking hands.
Without Your grace I am frantic, fearful, failing… FREAKING OUT.

I need Your grace that overwhelms my calloused heart
   And compels me to change.
I need Your amazing grace to overwhelm my calloused heart
   And compel me to change.
Your amazing grace overwhelms my calloused heart
   And compels me to change.