A great speaker,

with words like an amplifier

reverberating over cold hearts,

bringing change as sure as

the warm wind pushes against our backs.

He says we are afraid.

We live in fear of what we do not understand;

always fighting against the sand

with grit in our eyes.

We would rather turn to salt

than face unfamiliar lands.

The stories that the past has taught us

settle like another layer of sediment,

forgotten and unseen.

And we do not see because we do not reach out

farther than our door.

A familiar story

of monsters and heroes turns strange

when we realize that the valiant and the malignant

will always believe their cause is most just.

There are two sides to every

coin, story, fence and heart.

Until we listen and empathize and

calm the seas that are so quick to swell,

we will go no farther than we reach.

The change we need is the change that

comes when we suffer together.