We Must Not Forget

PEOPLE! PEOPLE! If you could stop jumping up and down sweating out your elation for a just a moment. I would like to bend your ear on behalf of our ancestors and all those who made it possible for President Obama. This moment has been a long time coming, more than 500 years to be exact. It began in the heartland of civilization, and I don't mean the midwestern states. I mean Africa. From the fields and mines of SIERRA LEONE, to the DOOR OF NO RETURN. A door through which we were both forced and misled. Divided and corraled, we carried our chains onto the ships that would be the vessels for the MIDDLE PASSAGE. From the hold in the belly of these cursed vessels we sat on top of each other in the dark, unsure of where we would arrive. We would arrive, but first on the shores of VIRULENT RACISM along the coast of HATRED and FEAR. The mantra for the next 400 years would be BLOOD, SWEAT and TEARS. Blood that drained as our backs were savaged by the hungry leather of our master's whims. Sweat that soaked the ground of the never-ending cotton fields we tended under the watchful eye of the EAGLE that was the symbol of these United States of Persecution. Tears that ran down our faces when we would look upon the horizon of freedom only to have the rays of the master's sun blind us back into despair. And then a new era was upon us. This new and changing time would be full of its' own blood, sweat and tears. It would be our blood as we were willing to die trying to advance than live regressively. Sweat that dripped from our brows onto the tools with which we were doing the work of change. Tears of pride and accomplishment as we stand together on the eve of the most colorful presidency in our, or our nation's history. Throughout this I have used the words we and our when referring to our ancestors, and I do so to establish a common identity with them. We share this identity as they are who we are. And we are who they are and what they hoped to become. This middle passage has been a difficult one, but from the door of no return we have finally arrived on the threshold of destiny. Thank you to all those who have bled, sweat and cried.