Today in Portland

Don't bother to wash.

Don't bother to rinse.

Just repeat. And repeat. And repeat.

Yesterday, a queer widow with a six-year old

While her new partner watched

On Portland Avenue in Minneapolis 

A woman who will never write another poem 

Today, a couple in Portland, Oregon

Different Portland, but the same, you know?

And folks don't bother to look too deeply

Unless it hits home.

Unless they find something they can relate to.

Could be anything, right?

"I was born/lived/worked/stayed in that place." Or "someone I know..."

"I used to"

"They were my age"

"They had a child (or children) my children's age"

But mostly, it will come down to, the reality that "they looked like me" to feel the full force 

"they were a citizen"

"they weren't doing anything wrong"

(unlike the others before... who must have been looking, living, being, wrong.)

That's fine. That's what it took for me. 

I'm human, too.

I'm tribal, too. 

Though my tribe has always been the human race because it was too complicated to explain my name, my hair, my shade and my language. 

So, it seems I was always able to find the connection. 

But then it takes a while to be so completely connected that action must arise. 

My feet must be engaged.

I must stand somewhere.

And I must speak what moved me.

But I'm tired. Like weary, tired. Like beaten down, tired.

It has been years since the words have pulsed from my very being in any kind of way.

Even then, I showed up. Invited others to speak. 

Modeled how to speak using words that I wrote almost 20 years ago. 

It's called organizing. 

But, here I am. New words have arisen. 

Because repeating this mierda ain't a way to live.

My sons, your kin, our friends and family, neighbors and world need to do something. 

They can't shoot us all. 

(Well, they can, but let it be as we are fighting back with our presence, and conviction, arm and arm with each other.)

Let it be as we sing words and dance dances and write poems

Let it be as we build a future that washes and rinses the filth of today. 

Let it be as we repeat that 

because bullets, and bombs, and drones and jails are the weak solutions of tyrants and bullies and scared people 

(and we know what they look like)

And they may look like you (and more often, like me) 

But we will never be as scared of them as they are of us. 

Repeat that.

We will never be as scared of them

As they are of us.

- January 8, 2026

Power to the people. Power to the peaceful. Power to the pissed off and resolute. 

RSVP for January 10th at Fontana City Hall: https://mobilize.us/s/MSy5vq