The Dawning of This New Day

© January 20, 2013 Rev Deborah L. Johnson

 “A rededication of our purpose

from one Inauguration to the next”

Upon the dawning of this new day,

with eyes purified, we see through the lies that have denied

the divinity of our humanity

giving cause to pause the full granting of our liberty.

On the dawning of this new day – in the different ways we pray –

we are all able to say  “Thank you, God,

for having brought us from such a mighty long way.”

The road has not been easy – bittersweet its song.

Yet this rugged journey has made us strong,

convinced us that we belong standing here together

against systems enabling wrong,

marveling at the miracle that we are standing . . .together. . . . at all.

We are part of the dream King inspired into imagination,

standing here together in unification for the diversification of our nation

full of colors and textures, no more conjectures of

cookie cutters that cut away everything that doesn’t fit within its margins.

Standing on the brink of a new dawning we open to new realities, courageous enough to create the world we want to see.

No more acquiescence, no more looking for a hero to bring us justice for always it has been – Just Us!

The Goodness forever in our hands.

Yet, we must expand this “us” to include the ones we exclude because they intrude upon our privileges which we, heretofore, have never had to share.

Do I dare to care enough to let you into my comfort zone knowing that it shatters the moment I concede that you matter?

And what is a comfort zone anyway but a self-induced sandbox to be transcended as it is blended with new awareness, new understanding, new experiences that dissipate the leariness, the weariness of the burden of carrying generations of shame, guilt, and plain ol’ ignorance.

We declare on the dawn of this day, a new way, a better way.

Decreeing that Yes, freedom shall reign from every mountainside

AND freedom shall reign from every barrio and ghetto –

from Motown to Chinatown,

suburban valleys to skid road alleys,

from factories to the Ivy Leagues,

prisons to painted deserts,

in cities from sea to shining sea.

We will retrieve the promise of our creed that all are created equal and

endowed by our creator with the inalienable right to pursue happiness,

liberty, and Life.

And pursue we do – not by chance or pre-ordained selectivity,

nor by legislation, or through internally oppressed anonymity.

Ohhhhhh No!!!  We will live and we will love boldly, LOUDLY

by divine design and our own audacious incline.

We will not decline our fierce future by rolling on rewind.

We will build bridges over gullies of greed,

tunnel through roadblocks of poverty.

The frigidity of apathy melts into hot springs of hope.

Frozen access thaws into clear open paths that greet down trodden feet,

where no bellies could ever be empty in a land

full of fruited plains.

Our children will grow with the freedom to know

that they are safe and provided for.

And that any door that they have the chutzpah to knock on

will open unto them by the purity and intensity of their authenticity.

We won’t wait one more minute for the senate

or the congress to get us out of our mess

for we possess the strength and the drive to revive our deepest intent,

which we will no longer sell to the highest bidder to rent.

Each of us is a winner, an inheritor of the riches of the soul.

Endowments untold, as we unfold into this new dawning

no longer longing, but living out our creed.

The seed of “liberty and justice for all” finally finding some fertile ground

beyond noble ideas, or lofty sound.

Finally some fertile ground,

a new foundation, for all a solid rock –

not a single island like an Ellis,

upon which some were permitted to dock.

I am talking about a new foundation, upon which we all can stand

as sisters and brothers of a nation who collectively demand that

together we rise, catching all who fall,

letting none slip through clasped fingers, no matter how small.

On the dawning of this new day

we drive away the divisiveness of the otherness that blinds us to our togetherness as we bear witness to this collective change of heart –

not as voyeurs of history in the making,

but architects of destiny, here for the taking.

From the Mother of Pure Light within the soul of our souls,

may the wholeness in this new boldness transform

the essence of our US presence into a blessing wherever we go.

Where there is no need to fear that we are near.

And all over the planet, the only thing left behind by our US footprint

is an imprint of empowerment!

Let the heavens rejoice in this day.

When we, by the determination of our spirit,

redeem our checkered past.

And from this day forward leave a new legacy,

a lineage of compassion and prosperity.

The austerity to begin again with a new lens which,

like the arc of the moral universe bends towards justice.

On the dawning of this new day,

let it be said that we did not shirk our responsibility

to make possibility a reality.

When the history books are read,

let it be said that we, a multiply-colored people,

with a braveness of heart,

had the audacity to start a new kind of revolution –

where the solution is not one up over one down but a resounding

Yes WE Can

YES We Can

Yes We CAN

Sí se puede

Sí se puede

Sí se puede

Yes We Can,   Yes we Will,    Yes we Must,    Yes we Are

YES, IT IS

Now!!!

As move from dawning no longer longing,

and step unto this brand new day!!!!