One week since he uttered his last words. One week since I saw him
Breathe.
One week.
I -have no words-
and know I will have to find them over and over again
as I continue on The Way toward the beloved community.
Indeed, I have a lot of words.
What good are they?
I’ve been writing and writing and writing.
So now I’m trying to break some of it down into manageable speech.
Meaningful words.
Words with power to transform.
Words to give life and hope.
I have but one word.
One seemingly very meager word
In such a time as this.
I apologize.
Because I turned my gaze too often. I see you. I see myself.
I see you, too.
And your sons and daughters and beloved children and cousins
and aunts and uncles and mothers and fathers.
I apologize because I closed my eyes too easily.
I see you on my great-grandparents’ land laboring under the sun.
A small family farm—no plantation, no landed gentry,
just a country homestead in a southern state,
with a house he built for himself and his own,
and no remaining slave cabin if there ever was one.
No one to tell me now if they had a shelter on his land.
But I see you there.
I apologize for once thinking this was
a proud history of a self-made man
and shutting away the truth of the tragedy that is the southern farmer
–slave-owner, soldier, slave-master.
For the sins of my family,
and for my own,
3 generations down from emancipation,
but still not caught up to freedom and equality,
I apologize.
What a meager word—apologize for owning your ancestors,
for buying and selling them like the cows in the field.
What a meager sentiment—apology
for the enduring injustice of centuries of dehumanization.
What a meager offering—apology.
It is all I have to begin with.
The truth that I descend from those who began
this horror that is American racism.
I stand on their shoulders.
I eat at their tables.
I drink from their fountains of wealth.
My fountain, my table, my shoulders, my racism.
And I say meagerly–I’m sorry.
I won’t ask forgiveness, not yet, maybe never,
for to me, to ask makes the apology even more meager,
more likely to be an easing of conscience,
and thus a too easy way of losing my consciousness of
this day, this week, this year, this generation,
and all the faults of mine.
All the times I played along and knew no different, knew nothing to be wrong.
Ignorance is no excuse.
All the times I celebrated “southern heritage,” without knowledge, then without understanding,
but ultimately, without truth.
Ignorance, willful and otherwise, is no excuse.
All the times knowing, but silent.
No excuse.
All the times speaking, but then moving on.
No excuse.
All the moving on, but changing,
Or not.
All the times of changing, but not apologizing.
I’m sorry.
No excuses.
Just, I’m sorry.
Apology.
From the root words ap- and logos.
An apology is an acknowledgement that one is apart from the word.
How apt for a Christian like me that the word for “I’m sorry,” is an
Acknowledgement that I am separated from the Word,
Who is truth.
Maybe it’s not as meager as I thought.
I apologize.
For imagining and living as if I can be apart from my kin,
The children of God,
Whose skin is darker, whose history in America is one of subjugation
To my white kin
And me, with my white skin,
In all the ways I’ve come to know, to understand.
I’m sorry.
I am speaking, but I am also silent so I can hear.
I am listening so I will know
Truth, so I will understand,
And never again be without knowledge, or play along as if
my southern heritage was just something of a long ago Historical
Pride with prejudice.
I apologize
though I suspect you’ll wait to see if I, if
I’m changing and challenging
the status quo of 400 years and generations.
For now I’m sorry, and
I see you.
standing here, speaking, naming, living, and breathing and whole
In spite of me and mine.
I see you.
And I apologize.
And I say his name.
George Floyd.
bevfriedlander 