DRUM MAJOR FOR A DREAM

This is from a small collection of poems written after the death of Martin Luther King Jr. titled Drum Major for a Dream. Appropriate for the beginning of Advent. What happens to inconvenient prophets and Messiahs. 

DRUM MAJOR FOR A DREAM

Ira G Zepp, Jr.

Your dream was clear,

We understood it perfectly.

Liberty and justice for all –

But that was too costly

For us, too expensive

Too dear, as they used to say;

Have-nots having

Disinherited, inheriting.

Is that what you meant by

Lowering mountains and

Exalting valleys?

But you beat your drum

Slowly, persistently, non-violently.

Your dream was clear,

We understood it perfectly.

Heaven on earth.

But heaven can wait.

It is often unwise and untimely for color of skin

To give way to content of character: for black, white

Brown, red yellow

To live together in Shalom.
Is that what you mean by

Making rough places plain

And crooked paths straight?

But you beat your drum

Lovingly, redemptively, faithfully.

Your dream was clear.

We understood it perfectly.

Love your enemies,

But that is impractical, not

Calculating enough.

Loving those who despise you

Who speak calumny against you

Enables us to be brothers and sister

In the Beloved Community.

Is that what you meant by

Seeing the Promised Land?

We understood all of this

So perfectly, saw it so clearly

That we beat the drummer

Senselessly, violently, fatally.