Cancel the Apocalypse
Out of chaos comes order
Out of chaos comes order
Out of chaos comes order
[…]
What is it that we do art for?
Metaphor. Medicine. It’s an age of healing.
Why not rhyme about what you’re feeling?
Or not be felt. Deal with the cards you’re dealt.
Calling tarot readers and sparrow feeders
to cancel the Apocalypse…
Metaphorically speaking…
Metaphorically speaking…-from “La La La” by Saul Williams
This is an open call for all artists — writers, rhymers, dreamers, thinkers, painters of pictures, sowers of seeds, actors of scenes — to imagine a world that Lennon fans failed to bring, that Lenin’s revolution failed to lead. Has the haze from our smokestacks and tailpipes clouded our dreams to the point that we can’t even imagine a clean slate or a clear sky? Can you imagine a world without pain, where we can still see the dots that connect the stars in the night’s sky to each of our lives, inextricably tied? Can you imagine?
I can, or at least I’ll try.
This is an open call for you to join me. Our society is dying from dystopian dreams, a science-fiction that has us believing that just a little more will save us from ourselves, will keep our hearts beating when we need to be beating the drum of a new dream, a utopian vision for transformation that all of us can believe in. Can you imagine?
Here, let’s try:
I come from a land called St. Louis, where tensions run high because of a deep pain that runs all through us. The courts face a decision that will make mothers weep, and have us all take to the streets if what we imagine will happen comes to be. How many times must black bodies lie in the streets at the hands of a police sworn to serve and protect? Wait, who are they sworn to? On which book did they place their hand? I know this one, it’s about the wealth of nations. They are sworn to protect the property of the citizens of this nation founded on the principle of free white persons. Never was freedom meant to ring across all stations. Can you imagine a world where police serve and protect not only the elite? Can you imagine a world without police, one where black lives matter just as much or more than the blue and white lives next door? Can you imagine a verdict that requires no marching, no military, no tear gas? A verdict with only tears of joy, shed?
I can’t, but I’d like to try:
This just in, Stockley is guilty as charged and sent to prison. The state offers an apology for the whole situation and begins an honest look into all of its institutions — on behalf of all the mothers who’ve cried, all the fathers and brothers who’ve died or been sentenced away. The thirteenth amendment shall be amended. No more loopholes, no more setup for this tragic play. Our society transformed so it isn’t founded on the backs of an-other. No longer will our institutions have to serve up pale policy recommendations that are undermined by their very foundations. The streets will be filled with song and dance, a human communion that transcends a freedom. At last. Finally truly free of all societal bondage and baggage, no longer the convicts of petty human convictions.
Can you imagine?
Can you imagine?
I can’t, but it was nice to try.
Calling all creators to cancel the apocalypse of our dreams and imagine the world that we need. It’s time we let our imaginations procreate. Our reactions only serve to perpetuate, our vision blurred by the haze of our collective heartache and anger. Clear the air.
Out of chaos comes order.
Out of chaos comes order.
