I didn’t mind my tongue
The heavy guilt is a ghost that lives in the marrow,
forcing my chin to my chest,counting the cracks
on the broken side of the cold sidewalk
a place where
worth was once
measured in soul
instead of silver.
I turned to my friend, my good friend,
and asked what fever had taken my mouth,
what vile spirit had climbed into my throat
to make me speak out like that,
raw and unhallowed.
But then, the air shifted,
smelling of salt and mercy.
Stepping around the corner,
I heard through the glass
Tethered light beams singing a fragile melody
breaking against the night,
a beacon of light blooming
in my darkness.
Outside, the planter boxes
were not just wood and soil; they were altars.
Each flower was a song, each petal a stroke of art
calling me by my secret name.
It came to me then, like a sudden migration of birds:
Make Music, not War.
Sing songs, not Insult.
I stepped inside the familiar
breath of the Unurban Cafe,
a home that remembers the shape of my shadow.
My friends were there,
their arms an open country,
their smiles made of starlight and old stories.
They embraced me until the
guilt evaporated,
handing me a warm cup of coffee
that tasted like a prayer.
We sat in the glow,
learning how to make music,
never war.
Some may tell you to drink from jade,
let the wine
stain your throat until you forget the
direction of the border.
The sign on the bridge is a prayer
written in the pleading language of people
who still believe their skin is a
safe place to live.
Make music, they say,
as if the harmony could wash the salt
from the eyes of the mothers waiting at the gate.
We are just trying to find a rhythm that
doesn’t sound like a heartbeat
stopping in the dark.
Because you know the truth, even if you’ve never seen the fire
…war is a mouth that never gets full.
Come and join us to sing and love,
come help us to lift up our hearts
above the chaotic noise that is not…
Music
3301 Pico Blvd, Santa Monica
1:30 to 3:30 Tomorrow
Sunday Songbirds 
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