Comes the Revolution…
(For Riley)

Comes the revolution,
I want you in my trench.

Comes the day we say “No more!”
I want you at my side.

I schooled you on our rights;
you’re steeped in the shameful history

of slavery, of suffrage, of civil rights denied,
of how it’s always someone else’s turn

to be not white enough, not male enough,
not straight enough, not American enough;

to be trod upon, to be spat upon
especially via metaphor and the airwaves.

You, a Jew raised in the U.C.C.
(Upfront, Confrontational Christians!)

In your blood, remnants of the Holocaust;
in your training, social justice for all.

That pedigree makes for speaking truth to power,
for passion, for radical, unconditional love.

This revolution will be
one of words, not weapons

Only the undereducated run out of words,
falling back on hate speech and violence.

Though their sound bytes nip at our heels,
we will not run. We will turn and debate.

Comes the revolution, our trench will be
filled with books, journals, and understanding.

So keep sharp your mind, daughter mine
because the revolution is at our door:

The War on Women – our rights,
our bodies, our station, our future.

What we do now is “not for ourselves alone,”
but for all females in generations to come.

We claim our right as citizens of the world
to be who we are, love who we may, and

figure out for our selves what is best
when put to the test of The Pink Stick Follies.

© 2012 Amy Barlow Liberatore/Sharp Little Pencil

For Sunday Scribblings, Revolution – and for dverse Open Mic Night. Also “in the margin” on Poets United. Also for Trifecta: Radical.

The quote “Not For Ourselves Alone” is usually attributed to Elizabeth Cady Stanton, but its first usage came from a man, Marcus Tullius Cicero: “Non nobis solum nati sumus. (Not for ourselves alone are we born.)”

NOTE: When Riley was a senior in high school, I wrote a piece for her yearbook, as did many parents. Mine included the phrase, “Comes the revolution, I want you in my trench.” Since then, she has come out, moved West, entered an art institute, and continues to blossom. Happy birthday, beba.

It seems quite ironic that we are indeed on the verge of an actual revolution, and the stakes could not be higher. We are lucky to have so many enlightened men alongside us in the fight. Let’s hope that the “White is Right and Women Should Shut the Hell Up” militias disband… due to pressure from their mothers!


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