The People’s Inauguration

Beginning in early November 2016, and with increasing intensity through to the weekend of Martin Luther King Day, 2017, students and teachers at Kresge and Porter Colleges worked toward a common goal: a People’s Inauguration. More than 150 spontaneous acts of writing, and many hours of organizing, critique, and love, led to this four-part poem, which we read together on January 20, 2017.

In this writing, we express our sense of where we stand, in the legacy of King’s August 1963 “I have a dream” speech at the Lincoln Memorial … and we declare the steps our communities wish to take, into a new chapter in the dream of democracy, liberty, and justice in the United States and in the World.

First Movement: the Kresge Tower

Now is the time for critical compassion:

I want to live in a world where we view each other not as “others” but as extensions of ourselves

I believe in the power of writing and reading and thinking

I believe in the power of education, calm dialogue and forums, the freedom to express beliefs without fear

It is essential that we start to talk to each other

Now is the time for communal discourse

We must start to think as a society, not only as individuals

Now is the time to use our lives for kindness toward all people

Now is the time for love.

I believe in the power of numbers, freedom of speech and press, and the freedom to be who you are

I believe in the power of people united to help one another

We must start to listen to the other side about the economy, security, and the future of our community

I believe in research, attention, and education

I am hopeful that the voices that grew stronger and louder in the civil rights movements will continue to use their strength to oppose injustice.

I want a system that allows for everyone’s voice to be heard.

I worry about the normalization of racism and sexism.

I believe in the power of the people through empathy and compassion.

We must speak out and share our opinions.

Now is the time for action.

Let us start to organize, to resist the madness that is sure to come.

Let us begin to accept that we are a diverse country with an array of backgrounds

Let us reflect before acting, then take action for the common good.

Now is the time for resistance.

Second Movement: Kresge Piazzetta

It is essential that we voice our concerns and not just give in to passivity.

I want to live in a world where human rights are valued

I am concerned about the future of the people I love

I am scared that privilege of all kinds will be revered and unquestioned in our society, allowing it to metastasize, taking more and more for its own growth

I am terrified that discrimination and hatred will once again become normal and accepted

I want to live in a world where I am not afraid when I see the police

I want to live in a world where hatred and discrimination do not exist

I believe in the power of compassionate listening joined with committed action.

I believe in the power of the oppressed, the poor, the marginalized, the forgotten, and the ignored

I want to live in a world where my son will not bask in the sallow light of white privilege

I want to live in a world where we approach each other with a humble awareness of the differences in our experiences and a reverence for the values that unite us.

Now is the time to speak with those who are being silenced

Now is the time to cash out our privilege to secure social justice.

How will we rise when we are threatened?

How will we break a cycle of anxiety and self-consciousness?

How will we give power to our differences instead of to hatred?

We may be broken, and yet not beyond repair

We may lose our way, but not be lost.

Make more, not less, of our differences

Make truth the object of our struggles

Make good on the promise of freedom

I believe in powerful rebellion

I believe in the power of consensus and dissent.

My need of care does not justify my poverty

My need to fight does not make me a criminal

And I am not to be hated for who I love.

Now is the time for local politics

Now is the time to share and to invite sharing

Now is the time to find power in our common dreams

Now is the time to make ourselves heard.

Third Movement: Porter Quad

I don’t understand how it happened

I am concerned that it will happen more

I don’t understand blatant hatred

I am concerned that we will get used to this fear.

Who will stop the ice from melting?

There is no war but the class war

Now is the time for now

I don’t understand how anti-immigrant, anti-Islam, racist, sexist rhetoric and actions can be normalized

I want to live in a world where people can debate without hate.

I fear manipulative persuasion

I am concerned that people aren’t informed

It is essential that we start to speak up, even in places we’ve been told we aren’t welcome

We must recognize our capacity for love.

We must demand more together, to think and act collectively

It is essential that not just white rich straight males are treated as whole individuals

Let us start to treat all people like people.

I believe in the power of unity and coming together

I believe in the power of collectivity

Now is the time for action

Now is the time to crush the corporate democrats

Now is the time for racists to be afraid

Now is the time for misogynists to be ashamed

Now is the time for the rich to fear the poor, for the oppressors to know oppression, for the disempowered to feel empowerment.

Why, when we are ever more connected, are nations and borders on the rise?

Why, when we need understanding, are the multitudes of voices put down?

I am afraid of republicans and democrats alike

I don’t feel safe in America

I am concerned for our communities, that have worked and fought and bled for equality

I want to live in a world where nobody has to fight to live

Now is the time to occupy everything

I want to live in a world where education is free and workers are paid a living wage

I want revolution, communism, the end of capitalism, and nothing short

It is essential that we start to change things

We must embrace creative new modes of thought.

Fourth Movement: Porter Squiggle

How did we get here?

I am angry

I am concerned that families will be separated

I am concerned about a rise in hate crime

I am concerned for my mother who was told to go back to her country for wearing a headscarf

I want to live in a world where I feel safe

Now is the time to live boldly

How did we get here?

I wonder what made you vote for him

I am concerned we don’t understand each other

I am concerned that we believe that we do

I am concerned about the rise in hatred, bigotry, white supremacy

I want to live in a world where politics is driven by the common good, not profits

Now is the time for compassion, sympathy, and love

How could people I love have been swept up by a rhetoric of hate?

I am worried that we’re becoming distant from each other

I am concerned about the legitimization of rape

I fear that the wealth of our natural world will be expended for the enrichment of a few

I am concerned about my safety as a queer woman of color and survivor of violence and abuse

I want to live in a world where people share their experience, and invite others into it

Now is the time for radical hospitality, the risk of welcoming all

Who will protect the right to love anyone?

I want people to come together

We are all one in the face of a new struggle

I want change and revolution

I want a country of solidarity

I want a public sphere for everyone

Now is the time to come together

How do I not be complicit?

I want a future with mutual aid, feminism, anti-racism, in which you can love who you want to love, so long it is not about hate

I believe in the power of social movements, community, imagination, desperation, compassion

I believe in the power of forgiveness

I believe in people uniting

I want to live in a world where white people stop speaking over people of color

Now is the time to speak up and take action.

What is meant by “America”?

Now is the time for dialogue

We cannot give up on voicing our concerns

We cannot give up on teaching and staying teachable

I fear things becoming so much worse for so many people I don’t even know, but for whom I feel love

We must fight back.

The time is now.