Two different birds have hovered outside the window today, looking in at me for a while before flying off–a hummingbird and a bluejay. In considering this, I hear in my head “I Know Why” as in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, and I think of this because, with the wildlife out there looking in at me, I wonder, who’s in the cage?
And then, come with me, I’m immediately in the memory of Walter Scott, and one more life too easily, too brutally, too-familiarly expended. I look up I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou, for a refresher, and I read on Wiki: “In the course of Caged Bird, Maya transforms from a victim of racism with an inferiority complex into a self-possessed, dignified young woman capable of responding to prejudice.”
What started out as love letter to nature–SGR’s current theme–evolves into a cry for human nature, to drop the guise of us-and-them, the separation of earth and flesh, brown skin and white, to breathe out the jagged, held breath of fear, force, un-fulfillment, power, prejudice, willful blindness, and to breathe in recognition that the imbalance is killing us. Fear meets peace. Constriction meets safety for all. Earth justice meets social justice. Breathe in, breathe out.
[bctt tweet=”Earth justice meets social justice. Breathe in, breathe out.”]
