the problem with us.

So... This weekend kinda really sucked.  Leaving us all.... numb.  I grieve the loss of these children and educators.  I grieve the news prying into their lives, interrupting their grief so that we can know strangers that we otherwise wouldn't have cared about.  I grieve the mental state that someone must experience to kill so many innocent lives.

But I also grieve those fleeing the conflict in Congo.  I grieve the four thousand children who die each day in Africa because a lack of access to clean water.  I grieve the women in SE Asia who are sold as sex slaves.

I grieve our indifference.

Some days, we find ourselves at a loss for words.  Others, an overabundance.  Today, I find myself so full of expression, of words, of anger and hurt.  And so I wrote... unspoken spoken word.  Which kinda sounds like poetry, but isn't.  Because I wrote it as I was mentally saying it out loud.  And I hate poetry.


The problem with America is not our gun laws
(though definitely a problem),
nor is it our mental health care--or lack there of
(also a problem).

The problem with America is...
the American Dream.
Manifest Destiny.
All for one and...
I guess we forgot the other half.

It's this idea that we deserve

It's a sense of entitlement
that forgets that, logically speaking,
our neighbor should just as entitled too..?


But who has time to think about that
when I've got some online
window shopping to do.

And if we don't get what we expect,
we fight the system to make sure that we get it.

It's the "get mine" system.
It's the fight to get what I'm due
without..
..counting the costs. 

Unless, of course, it costs us.
And then the fight becomes:
get what we want
and get it for free

It's this idea that we have ...rights. 
Unalienable rights to
life,
liberty
and the pursuit of happiness. 

Happiness?
It means being right,
having the latest and greatest gadget,
having those 2.5 kids,
and that picket fence.

Happiness?
Comes at a cost.
It costs families double-shift loneliness
and minimum wage bareness
and lithium soaked ground. ness.

It costs $1/day in the 3rd world
for our a $500 toy.
every
two
years.


The problem is..
we've forgotten that we have responsibilities, too.

The problem is...
"United We Stand"
isn't so united anymore.

United, we stand as democrats
or republicans.
But never united together.

United only counts if you're
just
like
me.

So our streets are full of
racism and anger,
sex and violence.
broken lives breaking others.

The problem with America is not those people
who own guns
who play violent games
who don't spend time with their kids

The problem with America is...us