I think the only reason I’m still alive is the thought of possibility and that thought, that hope is what keeps me going. When I was younger I had chronic pain and when you start having unimaginable unignorable pains it’s hard to what to keep going. There’s this urge to forgo life. “What am I here for!” “ I don’t what to exist in pain.” “What did I do?” The thought that life could be better could be more than my experience that thought, lead me slowly, to hope.

I wasn’t always a reader when I was first learning to read, I resented the practice, I resented my eyes for always mixing up my d’s and b’s, I resented my brain for not memorizing my sight words in the right order, spelling rain r-i-a-n. I always felt left behind so I resented my teacher, especially since she woke me up at nap time everyday to help me with my sight words. Reading became my escape after multiple tutors, four years, and hope I started to enjoy the practice. My existence became more tolerable with an out, with an escape. By the time I had undergone my second concussion books had become my constant companion, my comfort within the cause. I was shrouded without sanity my ability to escape reality became my constant crutch, without the adventure, without the beauty of new worlds, without the hope of new possibilities, There would have been zero chance of my survival. For that I understand what hope could do, how dreams can move you, I understand how poetry could call forth emotions less traveled. Because of all the passion I’ve been exposed to, I understand what information could do for us, I see what hope could make us, even as life breaks us, there’s this possibility that hope could lead us through. Hope paired with a collectivist, humanist approach to life that and the goal to make sure we’re all informed and liberated, that, that will lead us through. There’s this peace in hope a joy that it brings. It feels like spring, a shifting newness, and as the late, great, bell hooks states ”Joy is revolution”. So despite the pain, despite the frigidness of the world, despite the grief, we must keep our spirits rebellious. In our lifetimes we will see the peace revolution brings. We will see the spring.

To get to spring, there must be death. The temperature must chill, and the leaves will grow weary. The ground will be covered in ice, and the winter season will begin. In order to get to the new growth, to get to the rebirth, there must be death. To feel the hope of a revolution, things must die. We will never see growth; we will never see the spring. Hope will never prosper, if things don’t first die. Things, as in systems, things, as in how we see the world. We must change our habits. We must be critical and observant. We must keep information close to our hearts and use it with the hope of learning more. We must examine how we consume.  We must ask ourselves, “Do I want to stay trapped in the fog?”. 

 

 

Trapped by the fog

No way around it

You’re on a journey to see right through it

What are you missing?

What will surround it?

What is behind the foggy wall?

You’re trapped in despair

You feel like you’re drowning

You try to step forward

But the fogs so enamoring

What are you looking for?

stop looking so closely

You’ll see what they’re hiding

Theres fear in the fall of their castles

So blinding is the fog.

They don’t want you to remember

What they’ve actually done

They don’t want you to remember

That we can overcome

If you stay foggy

There’s no way out

If you say foggy

You’re going to drown

and they’ll die with their millions

That’ll never get to spend

You’ll die with your pennies

Surrounded by friends

Because if we say foggy

And we never agree and learn how to organize

Then, we’ll never see what we all dream

We’ll never see the fall

-Capitalisms fog

 

 

Sanai Reign

Written 11-29-23