I Wrote Those Poems For Myself, As

Freedom Is Indivisible, And Either We Are Working For Freedom Or You Are Working For The Sake Of Your Self-interests And I Am Working For Mine.

When That Devil's Bullet Lodged Itself Inside The Body Of Martin Luther King, He Had Already Begun An Astonishing Mobilization Of Poor, Black, White, Latino Americans Who Had Nothing To Lose. They Would Challenge Our Government To Eliminate Exploitative, Merciless, And War-mongering Policies, Nationwide, Or Else "tie Up The Country" Through "means Of Civil Disobedience." Dr. King Intended To Organize Those Legions Into "coercive Direct Actions" That Would Make Of Babylon A Dysfunctional Behemoth Begging For Relief. Is It Any Wonder He Was Killed?

When We Heard About The Hippies, The Barely More Than Boys And Girls Who Decided To Try Something Different ... We Laughed At Them. We Condemned Them, Our Children, For Seeking A Different Future. We Hated Them For Their Flowers, For Their Love, And For Their Unmistakable Rejection Of Every Hideous, Mistaken Compromise That We Had Made Throughout Our Hollow, Money-bitten, Frightened, Adult Lives

... If Your Heart And Your Honest Body Can Be Controlled By The State, Or Controlled By Community Taboo, Are You Not Then, And In That Case, No More Than A Slave Ruled By Outside Force? What Tyranny Could Exceed A Tyranny That Dictates To The Human Heart, And That Attempts To Dictate The Public Career Of An Honest Human Body?

South Africa Used To Seem So Far Away. Then It Came Home To Me. It Began To Signify The Meaning Of White Hatred Here. That Was What The Sheets And The Suits And The Ties Covered Up, Not Very Well. That Was What The Cowardly Guys Calling Me Names From Their Speeding Truck Wanted To Happen To Me, To All Of Me: To My People. That Was What Would Happen To Me If I Walked Around The Corner Into The Wrong Neighborhood. That Was Birmingham. That Was Brooklyn. That Was Reagan. That Was The End Of Reason. South Africa Was How I Came To Understand That I Am Not Against War; I Am Against Losing The War.