EMELLE KAYDAY

There was a Picnic, Put-together or Party
In the East End of Ojai on Sunday.
It was a neighborhood get-together
Held almost incidentally on the day
Before Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

Nevertheless, it was a penumbral event:
Darkened by the juxtaposition that much of
The wealth evident in Ojai’s oaken enclaves
Collaterally descended from enslaved labor…
The weekend’s celebrant from slaves.

I spoke with a woman from Mozambique
And vacuously asked her, ‘How’s the surf?’
The country was long an entrepôt for slaves
When it was colonized by the Portuguese
Who maintained their hegemony for 470 years.

After a decade of the Mozambican Civil War
The Marxist FREMILO party rose to power
And established Independence in June, 1975. 
In a matter of days she said, 300,000 colonials
Most of Portuguese descent, fled the country.

The white man arrived in N.E. America
In 1620, and has since colonized the territory
Now known as the United States. This year
The U.S. has deported 500,000 ‘illegals’
Many have some plausible claim to indigeneity. 

I still have a dream. I have a dream that one day 
This nation will rise up, and live out the true meaning
Of its creed, ‘that all men are created equal’…
I will not be satisfied until justice rolls down
Like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.

MLK, 1963