Debut of the poem ‘Oh Say Can You Be’ by Jeff Daverman at The Beastro in Prescott, AZ on 10/12/16

This poem is dedicated to the defiant resisters…

Oh Say Can You Be

 

Oh say, can you be

Oh say, can you be

A human who knows

How to greet destiny?

Can you love so you say

You have no enemy?

By daring greatly

Well, what have you done lately?

Get up and stand up like you do it innately!

There is strength, I can see, in diversity

To all my people of color, all my LGBT

Gotta say it out loud, you’re all equal to me

I will advocate strongly for your dignity

Oh say, please don’t be another bystander

Averting your eyes and not lending a hand or

Withholding your shock or dismissing the strife

From Flint to Standing Rock

You know Water Is Life!

So, Get Up, Stand Up like Nesta Marley

Or like Kaepernick

You can straight take a knee

Oh say, can you see? (x2)

Everywhere that you look

A Revolutionary

Non-violent

Non-silent

Defiant resisters

The mothers the fathers

My brothers and sisters

Exercising the right

Through this perilous fight

From the dawn’s early light

To the twilight’s last gleaming

Direct action applying is not merely dreaming…

So gallantly streaming always conscious of these

One after the other mad atrocities

     Fueling a fire of ferocity…

Emphatic expression

A heightened sense of desperation

Another public execution

Asphalt, blood and indignation

Lean into understanding, help to bring this to a cease!

It’s up to those who live in beauty now to reconcile this beast…

O’er the ramparts we watched

As down they come a-crashing

A wall can not protect you

When the paradigms a-smashing

I know it’s not in fashion, but

Won’t you please just listen?

Instead a red glare

Yet with collaboration

Unification

The poems bursting in air

Gave proof through the night

Those who dare are still there

The folks of broad stripes

In the night these bright stars

Inspiring this choice

To recite these golden bars

To use the freedom of my voice

Let’s help to heal the scars

Through this struggle let’s rejoice

And  make this moment ours!

Now you see the light

And it’s clear what it resembles

Relationships more than anthems

People more than symbols

Freedom of expression

Direct action, keep it nimble

Stand up for your rights

What so proudly we hailed

Like the blind receiving sight

Opposed to hate so thinly veiled

Oh say, are you free in the home the brave?

History does takes sides what will your choice engrave?

Your descendents gonna know if you were free or mental slave

Where are you in these times,

What does your banner wave?

Human = Human

Nothing less will be permissible

When we pledge allegiance to each other

One conscience Indivisible