This Is America

“This isn't America!" they said, when the teenagers brought guns to schools & murdered children & classmates & strangers, by the hundreds now. 

"This isn't America!" they said, when they stole thousands of children from their parents who were fleeing for their lives & they failed to pretend to care enough to even track who they stole & where they sent them. 

"This isn't America!" they said, when a terrorist brought guns to the mosque, to the synagogue, to the churches, to the workplaces, to the concerts, to the neighborhoods. 

"This isn't America!" they said, when innocent people of color were gunned down in the streets by law enforcement, the color of their skin their only visible weapon, the guilty getting off scot-free. 

"This isn't America!" they said, when peaceful, unarmed water protectors were tear gassed, had water canons turned on them in freezing temperatures, had LRADs used on them, were fired upon w rubber bullets, had dogs sent after them, on American soil. 

"This isn't America!" they said, when the Indigenous girl went missing & no one listened & no one helped & no one believed them & then the volunteers who listened, who helped, who believed, found her lifeless body. 

"This isn't America!" they said, when the politicians & the powerful were silent in the face of hatred, terrorism, racism, human rights violations & when those same politicians & the powerful were the ones spewing hatred, supporting terrorism, enacting human rights violations. 

"This isn't America!" said those who can't see the daily continuing onslaught against the vulnerable, the people of color, the faithful, the poor, the invisible, the ordinary, you, me. 

"This isn't America!" they said, sending their empty thoughts & meaningless prayers, & ultimately really only shouting their refusals to act & their refusals to see & their refusals to sacrifice anything for a better life for someone else or even for themselves. 

"This isn't America!" said those who never learned the history of this country, this continent, this world, & those who can't see it's the worst of history on repeat.

"This isn't America!" they said, again & again & again & again, repeating an empty mantra as if trying to make it so, wishing it were true.

“This is America,” whispered the broken, the hurting, the desperate, the hopeful, the survivors, through unstoppable tears & unending outrage & unbelievable pain.

Cat Stoothoff