The Sound of Life

I'm starting a new "Writing for Life," class in a few days, so am preparing. Sound is my first thought. Kids love the sound of language, whether their own invented speech or whatever native language their community speaks. We have rhythm like music when we write or speak or maybe we can't hear ourselves, so we loose our the sense of the sound of our words.

I'm taking some of my more recent writing and reading it out loud to myself, loudly! Which reminds me of how we have taken to being so silent in our current American culture. We do not hear ourselves yell or sing or just speak truth. During Nazi occupation of many parts of Europe, silence was required for survival. There was a saying about that time that was taken by the gay community as this part of our population tried to exist. Death was sometimes the consequence of "coming out." The saying was, "Silence is Death."

If we are to maintain life, we must not be silent. We need to gather with each other and speak hope into what looks like a hopeless void. We need to give our language in poetry, in articles, in books, in song, in conversation, in speeches, in protests in the street. We need to go together to the meetings of our government and speak, hear the sound of our own bodies, give our sound as a gift to the greater community that is dying from our silences.

Speak to friends, speak to power, but for god's sake and ours, SPEAK!