We Had Him
Maya Angelou
Now that our bright and shining star can slip away from our fingertips like a puff of summer wind
Without notice, our dear love can escape our doting embrace
Sing our songs among the stars and and walk our dances across the face of the moon
In the instant we learn that Michael is gone we know nothing
No clocks can tell our time and no oceans can rush our tides
With the abrupt absence of our treasure
Though we our many, each of us is achingly alone
Piercingly alone
Only when we confess our confusion can we remember that he was a gift to us and we did have him
He came to us from the Creator, trailing creativity in abundance
Despite the anguish of life he was sheathed in mother love and family love and survived and did more than that
He thrived with passion and compassion, humor and style
We had him
Whether we knew who he was or did not know, he was ours and we were his
We had him
Beautiful, delighting our eyes
He raked his hat slant over his brow and took a pose on his toes for all of us and we laughed and stomped our feet for him
We were enchanted with his passion because he held nothing
He gave us all he had been given
Today in Tokyo, beneath the Eiffel Tower, in Ghana's Blackstar Square, in Johannesburg, in Pittsburgh, in Birmingham, Alabama and Birmingham England, we are missing Michael Jackson
But we do know that we had him
And we are the world.
It has the usual (and expected) hyperbole, but there are some good moments in here. I think the allusion to the moonwalk is pretty successful, and the repeated refrain is effective, too. All in all, it could have been a good deal more embarrassing for everyone involved than it turned out to be.
And if this post's title is confusing, here's a video.
And the lyrics for this:
Political Song for Michael Jackson to Sing
The Minutemen
list monitors arrive with petition
iron-fisted philosophy
is your life worth a painting?
is this girl vs. boy with different symbols?
being born is power
scout leader nazi tagged as big sin
your risk chains me hostage
me i'm fighting with my head, am not ambiguous
i must look like a dork
me naked with textbook poems
spout fountain against the nazis
with weird kinds of sex symbols
in speeches that are big dance thumps
if we heard mortar shells
we'd cuss more in our songs and cut down the guitar solos (guitar solo)
so dig this big crux
organizing the boy scouts for murder is wrong
ten years beyond the big sweat point
man it was still there, ever without you coming back around, look! coming together, for just a second, a peek, a guess at the wholeness that's way too big
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