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I look beyond the horizon into the souls of a dream
Lurking within I saw, short movies of Nehemiah traveling across burning sands to build the walls of Jerusalem. Burned.
Heard, King Jr. screaming, "Violence has never been a part of the plan, so let my dreams expand without guns in their hands."
Instead, let the heartbeat of my dream catch the beat to yours, so that you'll know that I am alive.
You see, at times, the content of dreams can't be fully understood, so in order for them to play, you have to hit rewind. You have to hit rewind, it seems like time after time after time.
So, no, I didn't expect justice to come dressed in its best, didn't anticipate Maybelline makeovers overnight. I didn't expect changed attitudes and moods to catch the 9:00 flight.
Instead, snow storms caused equal opportunity to be delayed and my flight was dehumanized in several different ways.
And, as I waited for Lady Luck to catch up with me, I laid my head on a cloud and began to dream of a better reality.
I felt your ropes cutting into my flesh right before your hound dogs latched onto my left arm and breast. How could you not know that I was alive?
Eyes wide open, coughs led you to choke me down so I gasped, I'm alive, I'm just dreaming right now
Dreaming of a movement that moves the sun to a particular position in order to melt down skin pigments allowing racial boundaries to glisten one last time before they go into extinction.
I might be dead to you, but my dreams are still living, still kicking and wishing that after integration will come the cancellation of institutionalized racism
So, I ask you, am I crazy for desiring what it is that I am entitled to?
I am a king and I have a dream that after the death of Jim Crow laws will come the birth of equal jobs, better homes, higher hopes, different outcomes from the measurement of my dome and not the entanglement of my comb
Because my hair type does not define who I am. So, yes, I chose to apply here with split ends, allow fear to run free here in the wind
Allowed fear to run free in the wind. Look up 50 years later and how dare you not acknowledge my determination to win and to last and to never let opportunity pass by me again
I am a king, I am a queen, I am a Charles Edgar Blair and a Willie Mae Gillespie. Don't focus on trying to catch me, focus a little more on trying to catch up with me.
I am on the rise, forming quicker than a tumor. I am that person you hear about and wish it was a rumor. I am a Theotis Robinson Jr.
and I'll eat up your segregation laws with no salt, I am a consumer.
I am a dream so deep you can't awake. I am a Gene Mitchell Gray and be that as it may, you can't keep me enslaved for I am here to stay and to say that I am alive. I'm just dreaming right now
I'm about to dive in. I'm just thinking right now, thinking of ways that America can stand to lose some weight, like drop those stereotypical chocolate chip cookies and racial boundary brownies so I won't have to focus on racial etiquette spaghetti
and you, you can actually get to know me. So you, you can king me now or you can king me later or better yet, give me a stage and 17 minutes with the nation and I'll perform a castration on hate
Remove chains from the eyes of those who are afraid of a new day, a new way. I know my dreams are real, now help me make them reality because to play make-believe would suggest that my dreams don't really fit and my solutions don't really fit
When really the ball of a fist could never be more detrimental than a dream on fire, but you can't make the shot without the assist.
I took the stage so that African American president could make the list. I am king, I am alive, I'm just arising from a dream right now.
Thank you. (APPLAUSE)