image: Martin Luther King, Jr. leading march from
Selma to Montgomery of voting rights for African Americans.
Beside King is John Lewis, Reverend Jesse Douglas,
James Forman, and Ralph Abernathy.

So
if everyone is grieving something;
Inherited grief, social
grief, private
grief, grief
for universal hope in
the point of it all.

So
if this is true, why are we surprised 
progress is slow?

The  
defensiveness of grief does not mix with 
the sorrow, the denial with 
the epiphany, the anger with 
the acceptance.

When 
sorrow meets sorrows,
epiphany lights epiphany,
acceptance embraces acceptance, {then} 
love roots love – only in these fleeting alignments 
do we eviscerate {then to}
viscerally experience progress.

So
These chance meetings, it seems,
lacks the frequency needed
to create a communal habitat.

When 
we lived in tribes of 150.
we met most “others” 
face to face on most days.

When 
we wore each others’
grief  like our single, tailored
Sunday best – we progressed.

Defensiveness:
So size matters, just not in the way our Father, 
his Son, nor our founding Fathers’ proselytizing 
pasty phallics claim.

Epiphany:
So nothing matters, but Everything does.

Acceptance:
So we’d all be better off 
if we’d each be a They,
loved with and 
           for 
           in our many colored 
           soul covers.

{here}:
Love aligns with love.

Now
we may march with the King’s Strong Love.


PUT YOUR MARCHING BOOTS ON!
Register for the June 29, 2020 Poor People’s Campaign National March


Robin Dunbar is an evolutionary psychologist. The theory of Dunbar’s Number states that 150 is the number of individuals with whom any one person can maintain stable relationships. This piece was first published in Line Rider Press