Daybreak in Alabama

In the days and weeks to come, I will have a more measured response to the tragedies of the last week. From the utter destruction in my home state of Alabama to the grievous celebrations surrounding the assassination of Osama bin Laden; it is truly a time for reflection and mourning. There are many conversations that must happen regarding faith and disaster, justice and murder, “good” and “evil”.

Yet while we respond as individuals, as a nation, and as a world to the death of bin Laden, I must admit that my own mind and heart are still focused on the path of destruction left in the wake of last Wednesday’s tornado outbreak. And so, in lieu of a position paper (or in this case, a blog-rant) on death and tragedy, I leave you with a poem by one of my favorite wordsmiths, Langston Hughes, in honor of those who woke up on Thursday and began picking up the pieces of their lives:

“Daybreak in Alabama”

When I get to be a composer

I'm gonna write me some music about

Daybreak in Alabama

And I'm gonna put the purtiest songs in it

Rising out of the ground like a swamp mist

And falling out of heaven like soft dew.

I'm gonna put some tall tall trees in it

And the scent of pine needles

And the smell of red clay after rain

And long red necks

And poppy colored faces

And big brown arms

And the field daisy eyes

Of black and white black white black people

And I'm gonna put white hands

And black hands and brown and yellow hands

And red clay earth hands in it

Touching everybody with kind fingers

And touching each other natural as dew

In that dawn of music when I

Get to be a composer

And write about daybreak

In Alabama.