After the Revolution

for D.P.

I’ll write for you
not of familiar revolutions
or emptying liquor bottles
laced with full gun barrels
in dizzying cahoots over which won’t take your life next…

InsteadI’ll write of after…
when hot showers
make the revolutionary blood stains
on your skin
more than wet

as healing Mother drops
wash away the stench of white devils
in deft swirls
racing down the drain…

and how given a choice?
you’d do the same again
and again and again

Just so the children will sleep at night
just so the women
will find their way
from darkness into the light…

But me?
I’ll write for you
of after…

as you sit in meditation
clearing your mind for the next days work
charting your path through
dense jungle
corporate bullshit
and
new world births…

my words will capture your pause
as you take your meal
served in deep rounded bowls
humbly
just like the girls
who you saved and handed them back their souls…

I’ll write about the chaos that explodes
behind your closed doors
the traumatic night sweats
that wake you fully bearing arms

the quiet moments when nothing makes sense
but the raging storm within
that fuels your passion
to rip down the front door
and keep going till
every injustice comes
to an end…

But Me? I’ll write for you
always of after…when no one’s around
when the door is locked the phones’ off the hook
and the rage has subsided …

for that one moment
whenever it is
that the tears come
sadness speaks
or despair threatens to break …

I want to be looking in your eyes
to let you know
that in all this fighting…

you
are
not
alone.

© 2004 Sandra JP