Pledging Peace : Words of Wisdom To Honor Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

A man is not a machine.

He is not designed or destined to perform thousands of calculations, to-dos, or shallow salutations.

A man is a miracle.

A man is a magnificent gift … and a terrible foe for himself.

A man is not perfect or beyond his own faults.

He shakes his Creator’s hand, embraces the cracks and fissures within his soul and lets them rock the world fully, either by the weight of his own fist or the reach of his voice.

I speak to you now as a man, an imperfect being that has faced immense pain and misery but none greater than the depths of his own identity. This pain has reigned my days on Earth for far too long.

Today, I get to decide what my spirit is here on this planet for.

Am I dying to live … or living to die?

The content of every ticking hand on our clocks holds the key to this answer. Am I happy? Am I content with my contributions to humanity? Or am I watching that clock, waiting for an answer, sitting life out like God has decided to give me a time-out?

Peace is not built with hesitant hands. It does not always rest idly.

Tomorrow, we will celebrate the remembrance of a man that I have honored since I was a small child, a man I continue to honor as I look upon the world with ever-aging eyes.

Martin.

Dear Martin.

Doctor Martin Luther King Jr.

How can I speak your name without dreaming so large that the visions I have of a greater world burst from the clouds that encircle my head?

He was not just a dreamer … or a visionary … or an activist …

But a man in every sense of the word, a man of unquestionable strength, of dignity … a father for the fatherless.

A man of virtue is such that he sacrifices his years, his very life (though not in pursuit of martyrdom’s supposed immortalization), for the service of a higher purpose, becoming a leader for those that step into the same room yet leave it with renewed respect for humanity, a man who can speak a single word and incite change, never pointing fingers to get his point across.

The very presence of these particular kinds of people, be they men, women, or children, can imprint upon our daily lives forever, and thus, every once in a while, their names are stamped on treasured memorials and monuments that stand long after their bodies have returned to the soil from which they were birthed. They never build these shrines with their own hands. They never chisel their own names in stone for glory or for fame. A man of honor makes peace with Death so that all others can be rid of their demons. His followers break the chain of their own ancestral traumas by honoring the conduct which he demonstrates. By doing that, the rest of us finally discover there’s one hell of a human inside ... inside the heroes we remember and inside ourselves.

I’ll never forget what Dr. King told us.

No longer shall we utter the words: “BURN, BABY! BURN!”

If we lay our bricks down, construct a wonderful palace, invite all of God’s children, and yell “BUILD, BABY! BUILD!” an even better world will be at our fingertips.

Today, on January 20th, 2019, I send my blessings to you Dr. King so that we may all join hands and share the dream you saw years ago. It’s more real than ever now, thanks be to you. Every night we will laugh as our own bedtime stories are told, not as a means of fantasy but, instead, as a reminder of all that is worth living for and all that is possible.

We are living and breathing our greatest dreams and our greatest nightmares concurrently. And yet, there is always a second chance to live fully when we follow in the footsteps of that man, a man who skipped stones of justice across the endless rivers of time, a man who willed those things with such certainty that they will continue to skip until our hands find those precious stones in the promised land, until we finally rest our eyes and stop staring blankly at the ripples of water his stones left behind.

That legacy will never falter. Every day of my life will be spent pouring that holy river water into the palms of those who are thirsty, the palms of the yearning, burning souls of a new decade, souls defined by journeys made within and the need to answer one question, one question we all have and one question only: “what am I really made of?”.

We must share beauty and love with all things long enough to let it burst from the deepest depths of every particle in this universe, even if we must travel to unknown parts of this universe to finally reach it within ourselves. I will let them sip that holy water, so help me God.

We must feed those that are driven by altruism and those tortured by the endless pining of a starving self equally. The empty desires of greed made at our own brothers’ and sisters’ expense cannot be the downfall of suffering, though the temptations of dopamine may fool an intelligent man into believing he has achieved something big. Hydrate them all, whether they believe the glass is half-full or half-empty, and let your own souls be driven by the fullness of every cup spilt by those silver waterfalls within … and every droplet of rain gifted to us by the skies above will even replenish THAT, so help me God.

Because, ladies and gentlemen, there are some hungry lifeforms out there and it’s time we share our bread with those who dig in trash cans for scraps, dig in their pockets for pennies, and dig themselves into holes to MAKE bread, enough to afford an actual loaf of bread for their family’s dinner table.

Desperation is the source of our own expiration; no human is unworthy of the gift of true love and companionship, though they may certainly dig their holes as though it were their only profession in life.

Let’s pledge for peace on this planet. Those who do not find peace will wage wars and a man who makes enemies is but an enemy of himself.

A man that forgets brotherhood is a man that forgets the light behind his own eyes in the mirror each night.

Take a minute to stand up and peer outside. Hear the harmony of every bird around you and let their voices and your's rise together.

Let them fly beyond the highest mountaintops and the deepest valleys.

Let them reach people of all colors and classes, individuals and masses, let all of those unique voices last a thousand years and never pass or silence when you’re alone and you burst into tears.

No fears here, no seers to peer into that space and take your grace away, say you're a joke, say that you should choke, or that you're poking your nose where it doesn't belong. “You blow, dude, and your nose is long too!” NO!

Hope will last and leave the proper tracks along the way. Aspirations lead our nations and they're always here to stay, cemented by our tasks.

Let those beautiful wings carry you far, far away to a place where you can celebrate and play. Share your truths, become the sun, and brighten up each and every day. Enjoy this play, this get-away … let’s close the curtains now, and behind them, you shall always be here to stay.