We are just stewards

without the earth we are naked

to place value on land

is to affront the sacred

and make it something to be subjugated and used

to put a price on what’s priceless and sell it on the news

If radical means root and the true seed is greed.

then regulating profits just trims the tops off a weed.

For-profit prisons just a representation

of a slave bearing system in a more profit nation

where a paycheck means payment

of the interest on a debt

that insurmountable scope

creates an un-traversable step

up the pyramid hierarchy

that “creates all men equal”

who by virtue of deeds

 can transcend their own people

who by writ of their power can command a whole nation

who by sheer ignorance

lend that power its station

in hopes that one day they’ll climb the step too

and that the promise of progress is really what’s true

it’s a lottery lie to keep you oppressed

so that rich remain rich and you remain stressed

So that those at the top remain on their stacks

and keeps us thankful for whips

striking our backs

and after the blood we shed

 and scars we receive

we’ll open our eyes and collectively heave

throw off the shackles and cast down the masters

burn all the tanks and feed all the masses

our spirits will open to an old power that’s new

if roots make the radical

the seed grows in you.

 

Shon Dhi has spent 33 years on this planet where he lives in Tacoma Washington. His writing centers around our collective human submission to the ideas of usury, hierarchy, and exploitation. The antidote to that, which he calls “The Great Work,” is the establishment of human communities based on compassion, inter-connectivity, and autonomy. It is his hope that the more we deepen our connection with one another and our planet, the more we open ourselves to the creation of a society that seeks cooperation and not control.