(via email)
In response to recent events, I channeled this poem as a transmission of global peace:
When We Respond With Violence
A Poem by Matt Kahn
When we respond with violence
we do what we oppose
and interrupt the progress
that deeper wisdom knows.
When we respond with violence
lawmakers turn away
and label us the criminals
as pawns within a play.
When we respond with violence
the dead still rest in vain
while neighborhoods are ambushed
by wounds of buried pain.
When we respond with violence
the innocent are left
without a path of progress
to unite the right and left.
When we respond with violence
a city is set ablaze
but never burns the hardship
that injustice still portrays.
When we respond with violence
we fail to use our voice
to sing the song of freedom
created by each choice.
When we respond with violence
we harm a mother’s heart
who grieves the loss of children
that hate has torn apart.
When we respond with violence
we stain a father’s pride
who needs support to deal with loss
that anger has denied.
When we respond with violence
all issues still remain
without a bigger vision
to free us from our pain.
If you respond with violence
despite the reason why
you become a problem
corruption can deny.
If you respond with violence
just stop and think again
about the dream of heroes
who touched us way back when.
A dream of bringing people
no matter deed or creed
into peaceful action
where all our fear is freed.
I do not judge the violent
I have no shame to share
I just support the justice
that heals us of despair.
I can’t agree with violence
it can’t be justified
it’s but another headline
throughout our great divide.
Let’s not join the violence
but heal the pain within
and create a brighter world
where only love can win.
Let us end the violence
united as one light
to marry fate with destiny
as differences unite.
Let us the end the violence
and mourn the tragic cost
of broken social systems
and those whom we have lost.
Let us end the violence
and may we rise above
the instincts of our anger
that only heals through love.
May we honor the precious life of Tyre Nichols and every person whose life was ended by the corruption and hatred we must now face. May we respect the request of Tyre’s grieving mother RowVaughn Wells, who urges the world to respond in peaceful unified ways. May we address and resolve these issues while embodying the dignity stripped from the lives who have perished.
May we be present with how angry, incensed, outraged, afraid, heartbroken, and disillusioned we feel in response to abuses of power. May we remember violence, not as a resolution to injustice, but an attempt to run away from the pain we cannot escape until its healed. May we face this moment, our world, and each other as leaders and elders of evolutionary progress.
May we know and help each other as residents of our one global community where the act of being helpful extinguishes the flames of helplessness. May we have a right to vent, share, express, and support each other through our most intensely burning feelings and in a way that inspires course corrective measures for all lineages of ancestry throughout our rebirthing world.
May we allow our sadness and frustration to inspire a greater passion of community outreach that helps each person to become the change we all wish to see. It’s an invitation so boldly received — when many become WE.
All for Love,
Matt