This is Liberty

This is Liberty,
where once I lifted lamp beside a golden door,
there is now into darkness plunged.
Is the fire quenched by black waters?
Is this light unlit now, and forever more?

This, is Liberty,
to know the truth,
and it shall not make you flee,
to hide not the acts done in darkness
to save in darkness.
To pay in coin for those you have struck,
and avow that once means,
never again.

This is, Liberty
my friend consoled me,
this is the land as it is,
the country as it is,
the nation as it is,
but not as it was,
or will be again.
The forces of night chained millions of souls
to middle passage, denied the sanctity of rights,
to millions because of gender.
And the fights for these and against all other ills,
engenders that which was old
to be made new again. Rights, that precious gift,
must be made a new, to be given again, in turn

This is Liberty,
I am calling, amidst the despair,
and the cold spring of denial.

We are not children in this one of many lands
We must see what was done by our hands,
and when our vision is by this act made whole,
we must admit what was our role.
This, and only this, is the truth,
that will escape us this prison
of bricks made
that we, our selves, have laid.

This is liberty, I am calling.