My heart hurts...

I was standing at the end of a reflection pool. I am looking at the graves of MLK Jr. and Coretta Scott King. I had tears in my eyes and a heaviness in my heart. i looked at the grave of a man who lost his life so that equality could prevail. I looked at a man who didn't know he was destined to carry a nation on his back. A man who didn't grow up knowing that he would be looked up to for years. A man who, not without fear, slowly but surely blurred the lines of separation and segregation.



I was in Atlanta, at the MLK Jr. center, and my heart was heavy looking at a grave of a man who fought to prevent what happened just a few hundred miles south of where he body laid to rest. Trayvon Martin. The name brings goosebumps to my arms. A 17 year old boy visiting his father with a hoody on and skittles in his hand. Deemed a "threat". The man who took his life didn't see a young boy. He saw a threat. You know what I see when I look at Trayvon Martin?



I see a life
a son,
a friend,
a boyfriend,
a football player,
a student,
a future president,
a future husband,
a future father,
my brothers,
THE FUTURE PERIOD,

A future that will never get to be brought forth because someone saw a little black boy eating some candy as a threat instead of potential. Lord knows I am not a black activist or even the most socially aware. Its not something I'm proud of but i am to going to lie to y'all and be fake. However my soul bleeds every time I hear this story. How this innocent CHILD laid lifeless in a morgue unclaimed because police could not believe that he was visiting someone in the complex. Tears form in my eyes as i think about the parents, who had to bury their innocent child, knowing his killers feet are walking the very earth that they are now putting their son in. I think of my brothers, my godsons, my cousins, my friends sons, I think of black men. Why was his life not wrath living? I know the Lord has a plan, and I don't question it. However, It bothers me that so many people died to stop an injustice, that the trigger of a gun almost makes that null and void.

Then I look at the sea of faces and hoodies. Black, White, Hispanic, Asians… and i realize they didn't die in vain. They died in awareness. They say it takes weddings and funerals to bring families together. And Trayvon's death brought together a family who didn't even know they were related. Bonded for their desire to fight the injustice. Bonded by their hurt because the see their sons in Trayvon. The disgust they feel that a blatant murder happened with no consequences. So I looked at the graves and wiped my tears and realized, like Jesus, they didn't die in vain, they died in hope. In hope that one day, someone like me would stand here and realize that action needs to be taken, and they would be my inspiration. They did not die in vain at all.


I can't possible see someone looking at this pic of my heart and seeing a threat