Let Black Lives Live: A Lament from a Korean American
If I,
a Korean American woman,
am this weary
of
being outraged,
saying “How long, oh Lord,”
more trending hashtags,
new names to remember and say,
another precious life taken too soon,
mamas having to grieve in front of cameras,
children robbed of entire lifetimes with their parents
wondering who in my life it could have been,
the inevitable gaslighting, excuses, blame,
calls for peaceful protest,
cries of bad apples and “accidental discharge”
instead of indicting a system damned from the beginning,
I wonder how tiring it feels
to be Black in America,
to know that every single day
white supremacy is trying to kill you,
that at any moment,
it can.
Black lives should not only trend
in moments of murder by the state,
should not only be remembered
in trauma and violence,
should not only be observed
in the painstaking scrutiny of final breaths,
should not only be protected from death
when they are perfect in life,
Let them matter in every moment-
seen and unseen,
named and unnamed,
ordinary and extraordinary,
in youth and in old age.
Let every life matter
Let every moment matter
Let Black lives simply
live.
흑인의 생명은 소중하다
