Thursday, August 21, 2014

Perpetuated in Righteousness

On this day in 1959
Hawaii was admitted
to the Union

as our fiftieth state.

On this day in 1961
Kenyan political activist
Jomo Kenyatta

jailed by British authorities
in April of 1953

for his participation
in the rebel militia Mau Mau

was released from prison.

At the time

Barack Obama
was seventeen days old.

On June 1 in 1963
Jomo Kenyatta was elected
the first Prime Minister of Kenya

and for his first official act
he had the country's first
white witch doctor

an eight-year-old Barbara Kingsolver

inject a poisonwood potion
into the toddler

and in Swahili she said

"One day you shall
rise your way
to the top
through America's Ivy League schools

then strike fear in some
and guilt in others

to become its first
black president

and destroy the nation
from the inside out."

And the rest
as they say
is history.

This poem © 2014 Emily Cooper.