Freedom

Honor and respect principles of love and freedom. Condemn hatred and violence.

Duh.

Watch as this devolves into rage.

I try to buoy my heart. Gotta appreciate the work, sacrifices, moral principles, and journeys made for freedom. We engage communal dreams in overlapping loops of hope. 

The mask of narcissism is mirrored on the inside. You think you see out, but you only see yourself. You think we can't see you, but the mask is not a good one. We can see you're not for real. Maybe over time the mask absorbs, a parasite, harder to remove.

Maybe the American dream is a fantasy we tell children so they can feel possibility while they can, before terror and discrimination foreclose their dreams.

The American dream is a mask, not America's true face. It's the decoy of patriarchy, meant to suggest oppression is not systemic, so they can point to the disenfranchised and say "it's your fault you didn't succeed"; meanwhile, they have systemic and personal privilege and the support of ignorant, self-serving, hateful people who want to tell everybody else what to be, how to be.

Are we free? No. Is the promise real for anyone who works hard? No. It's a mask called justice to explain away the backbone, which is really injustice. It's the department of peace waging war.

I am sick of entitled white men controlling our bodies and telling us we will like it. Acting like we should thank them. No. 

I am sick of white men telling me what I should feel. I know what I should feel. I'm going to feel whatever the fuck I want.  

I am sick of feeling colonized. I am sick of white men believing they know what's best for others and taking control, with their ignorance and self-righteous bullshit.

I dream that America will remember and uphold its mission of justice, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all. 

I remember it. I'm still going for it.