Odyssey 2nd edition

CHAPTER ONE – Something chronicled

POEM:

What of life if liberty is a joke?

What of life if liberty is a joke?

What of life if liberty choke your throat?

What of life if money talks and poverty cries?

What of life if the city institutes a Black tax, endorses White privilege, and perpetuates poverty?

What of life if economic development can’t touch lives now?

What of life if city fines, wages into obscurity?

What of life if hope is long gone?

What of life if a little girl is left at home alone?

What of life if a little boy is taught to hate his father?

What of life if a little boy’s father calls his mother ugly names?

What of life if a mother tells her children their father is a bloodsucker?

What of life if a child can’t determine if his hateful parent is a hero or a foe?

What of life if emptiness steals peace?

What of life if rotten punches the nose when the sun rises?

What of life if no one cares except the hungry dog?

What of life if weeds are taller than the flowers?

What of life if brute strength allows one to enslave another?

What of life if a crime scene is a regular childhood memory?

What of life is doping stole the cherry?

What of life is drunkenness is a daily state of mind?

What of life if one always picks a fight he/she can’t win?

What of life if watching your back floods your mental space?

What of life if you and your neighbors spend all your money in another hood?

What of life if there is no one who believes you could?

What of ‘this nation’ if we could praise the leader who freed Pine Lawn?

What of the future if our government embraced innovation?

Why is a patent so high?

Why is there so much despair?

Why is an unarmed misdemeanor suspect required to lie face down on the ground?

Did city leaders prove they cared?

Why are the fines for the uninsured so punitive?

Why does a vehicle depreciate so fast?

What of the future if the preacher kept the teens in his/her mist?

What of the future if the teacher could impart common wit?

What of the future if the housewife could make a profit off her apple pie?

What of the future if apprenticeship was valued?

What of the future if respect was instilled from birth?

What if the ‘happy song’ flooded the air wave?

What of the future if parents didn’t curse before their children got on the bus?

What of the future if love sat at the kitchen table?

What of the future if love was the law?

What of the future if Harriet wasn’t history?

What of the future if Frederick could motivate?

What of the future if love replaced pain?

What of the future if the Spirit could teach the congressman to love?

What of the future if the man at the podium cared about others?

What of the future if love was stamped on the dollar bill?

What of ‘the nation’ if love could give liberty balance?

What of the future if classism was no more?

What of the future if moral consciousness could teach judges fairness?

What of the future if donors made sure every child had a book?

What of the future if the prosecutor could endorse fairness?

What of the future if ‘the system’ could teach the public defender to defend?

What of the future if the ‘American Dream’ was real?

What of the future if the government dared to care?

The End!

By Meredith Coleman McGee