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This writing was accepted for publication in the 108 page perfect-bound ISSN# / ISBN# issue/book “the Captive and the Dead” cc&d (v258) (the October 2015 issue) You can also order this 6"x9" issue as a paperback book:

Order this writing in the book from Smoke the cc&d July - Dec. 2015 collection book		get the 318 page July - Dec. 2015 cc&d magazine issue collection 6" x 9" ISBN# paperback book:

An Ode to the Dream

Chen Okafor

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day is today
The man who fought hard for civil rights
My rights
Your rights
Our right to coexist

Dr. King fought for the black man
He fought for the white man
He fought for the Indian man
He fought for the Chicano man,
too
Dr. King fought for everyone
So that decades later we’d be fighting for something else

And we’d judge each other
“Not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character”

Dr. King was murdered in 1968

Since then
We claim to have made progress
We’ve passed all these laws
Yet, if Dr. King were alive today he would shake his head and say
No law can change a person’s heart
It’s the heart that needs changing more than anything else
While our laws keep getting better, we think,
The people keep getting worse

Killing each other
Looting each other
Still using the “n” word
Blaming others instead of taking responsibility
It’s a psychology more than anything else, you see

Because a black president can’t change much in my life
Or your life
If the heart’s still bleeding from the inside out
Policies can’t do me any good
If I don’t know HOW to be good

So what would Dr. King really say 47 years later, then?
I’ll tell you what he’d say

He’d say check yourself, people
I didn’t come to be Jesus
I didn’t come to perform miracles
I was only a man
And if I could stand up to injustice
You can stand down and change a little something about yourself
Because you don’t need to be a King to bring about change in America,
Americans

You don’t even need to be a black man

So stand down,
So the rest of America can stand up, with you

Change yourself
Your heart
Your soul
Your mindset

Help a brother in need
Help a sister in need
Help yourself

Then we can talk about that dream I once had

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