If You Are Free, You Are Not

If We Lived In A Democratic State Our Language Would Have To Hurtle, Fly, Curse, And Sing, In All The Common American Names, All The Undeniable And Representative And Participating Voices Of Everybody Here.

There Is A Man Who Exists As One Of The Most Popular Objects Of Leadership, Legislation, And Quasi-literature In The History Of All Men. . . . This Man, That Object Of Attention, Attack, And Vast Activity, Cannot Make Himself Be Heard, Let Alone Understood. He Has Never Been Listened To. . . . That Man Is Black And Alive In White America Where The Media Of Communication Do Not Allow The Delivery Of His Own Voice, His Own Desires, His Own Rage.

To Tell The Truth Is To Become Beautiful.

As A Child I Was Taught That To Tell The Truth Was Often Painful. As An Adult I Have Learned That Not To Tell The Truth Is More Painful, And That The Fear Of Telling The Truth - Whatever The Truth May Be - That Fear Is The Most Painful Sensation Of A Moral Life.

To Rescue Our Children We Will Have To Let Them Save Us From The Power We Embody: We Will Have To Trust The Very Difference That They Forever Personify. And We Will Have To Allow Them The Choice, Without Fear Of Death: That They May Come And Do Likewise Or That They May Come And That We Will Follow Them, That A Little Child Will Lead Us Back To The Child We Will Always Be, Vulnerable And Wanting And Hurting For Love And For Beauty.