Category: George Floyd

Role Reversal

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To you I have never existed
But here I am just the same
Being who I know I am
Though called by another name
A screen for your projections
You see me as you are
And if I dare to set the record straight
You say that you’re the one with scars
But from the very beginning
You have tried to tell our story
But I refuse to read your script
You can deny but can’t ignore me
Because the day I was unborn
Was the day I began emerging
Knowing myself as I am known
Moved on by the Spirit’s urging
Let’s call it a role reversal
By returning I’m going faster
Undoing what could never be
Until Love’s the only master

Image by Ian Ransley

For 28 Days

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For 28 days
More people pay attention
To stories less told
Or that hardly get mentioned
Some get repeated
Just as before
About bridges and buses
And who’s here no more
For 28 days
We acknowledge the challenge
That healing can’t happen
If we ignore the damage
And for 28 days
We try to do better
By telling ourselves
That we’re in this together
But on the 29th day
Or on a leap year it’s thirty
Some forget once again
And stop getting hands dirty
Then for 337 days
Their memories fade
Until a tragedy happens
And we go into rage
Then we’re back to day one
Wondering how did this happen
Repeating the stories
We’re perpetually trapped in

New Me #BLM Cut – Pedro Silva (featuring the Voices of the Movement)

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New Me #BLM Cut – Pedro Silva (featuring the Voices of the Movement)

They can’t kill me
Holla if you feel me
Who I am was never born
So you never getting near me

Here’s the Truth
We don’t need your proof (approval)
Mustard seed of juice
And the mountains will go poof

To be the new me
I had to kill the old me
To wake up from this lie bruh,
This is what they told me

Wake up from the dream
Death ain’t nothing but a bee sting
Hallelujah’s what we sing
From the moment we see that real thing

In loving memory of:

#ChristianCooper
#AhmaudArbery
#BothamJean
#AtatianaJefferson
#JonathanFerrell
#RenishaMcBride
#StephonClark
#JordanEdwards
#JordanDavis
#AltonSterling
#AiyanaJones
#MikeBrown
#TamirRice
#Charleston9
#TrayvonMartin
#SeanBell
#OscarGrant
#SandraBland
#PhilandoCastile
#CoreyJones
#JohnCrawford
#TerrenceCrutcher
#KeithScott
#CliffordGlover
#ClaudeReese
#RandyEvans
#YvonneSmallwood
#AmadouDiallo
#WalterScott
#EricGarner
#FreddieGray
#BreonnaTaylor
#GeorgeFloyd

And all those lost to the silence.

#RestinPower
#BlackLivesMatter

The song is available for download an all major digital platforms like iTunes, Amazon Music, Spotify etc.

Video produced by Katrina Dawn Miller https://www.blackatvideoproductions.com/

Song mixed by Prasanna Bishop
https://akashicrecording.com/

What Will You Say? (A Poem in Response to George Floyd’s Martyrdom)

therooflesschurch6 Comments

What will you say,
If you found out that they got me?
Knee to the neck
Or they shot me?
You knew me;
Now you forgot me?
What will you say?
“I thought he was so different.”?
“He shouldn’t have been on that hit list.”?
“There will be justice.
God is my witness”?
“I swear I’ll never forget this.”?
What would you say,
If I told you this was my family?
When they’re damning them,
Then they damn me.
Saying where we can
And we can’t be.
From the beginning,
I know that they stamped me.
What would you say,
If I told you daily I’m dying?
That this is the world that I’m in.
They want your soul,
For a buy in.
The Truth hurts,
When they’re lying.
What would you say
If George Floyd
Was suddenly me?
It was Pedro under that knee?
Let’s pray one day we don’t see.

© Copyright 2020 Pedro S. Silva II

Whenever my two year old cries for me not to leave her as I walk out the door, I wonder if somehow she knows that this might be the last she sees me–that I might make a mistake and run a red light or go to the store or go for a walk on the trail just outside our neighborhood and never come back. Then immediately after thinking those thoughts, I rebuke them. I tell myself that it is not fair for me to project my anxieties onto my toddler. I remind myself that I have a family, a ministry, and a life that matters. I tell myself that I cannot let these ideas that I live with like a permanent limp, dictate how I live. So I pray, get up, and go about the business of living. And then…

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Check out Stamped From the Beginning by Ibram X. Kendi