Harlem
The poem that has been coming to my mind most frequently of late is Langston Hughes’ “Harlem.” Its brief, spare construction holds so much emotion and describes in profound and simple ways the tumult after the grand jury decisions in Ferguson and Staten Island.
Not everyone understands why these decisions have elicited such an outcry, such protests, such violence. But Hughes does, as he asks, What happens when a dream is deferred? “What happens when justice is delayed?” We might add, what happens when you fear for your children’s safety because of the color of their skin? What happens when those who protect and those who want protection share little trust? What happens….?
There is another question we need to ask as well. Yes, what happens…. But also, what do we do now?
A week ago I asked whether our congregations can be the kinds of places where we talk about difficult things. Where we talk not imagining that we’ll necessarily solve everything, and certainly hoping to “win over” those with whom we disagree, but rather we talk with each other in order to come to greater understanding.
I’m grateful for a colleague of mine here at LTSP, Prof. Jon Pahl, who is seeking to foster jut that kind of conversation. This coming Tuesday evening, December 16, Jon is taking the last of his scheduled classes this semester to have a “teach-in” on “Moving From Fear to Flourishing After Furgeson.” What is a teach-in? Think of it as a public a conversation with multiple voices that invites a deeper probing of the events around Ferguson and Staten Island and, just as importantly, how we move forward from them together. If you are anywhere near Philly, you can join the conversation from 7-9 p.m. in Benbow Hall on the campus of LTSP. (You can find more information here.) If you’re not able to come, give some thought to how you might help further similar conversations where you are.
In the meantime, read Langston Hughes’ stirring poem and ask yourself the question he puts before us, the question that is now before all of us once again.
“Harlem”
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
Langston Hughes, from The Collected Poems of Langston Hughes.
Poetry has been working for me in a way that commentary has not, because it’s been getting at the complexity and the confusion and the gut-level inchoate emotion of it all, the deep-rooted history of sin and pain and complicity I can’t even begin to name.
Here’s a Langston Hughes poem I found recently that’s really hit me.
Prayer
I ask you this:
Which way to go?
I ask you this:
Which sin to bear?
Which crown to put
upon my hair?
I do not know,
Lord God,
I do not know.