Counterpart

Self Portrait | Kyla Chapman | Mixed Media

Counterpart by Madison Bicking

We all hope that the harm

We cause isn’t enough to alarm our counterpart, 

But how much do we counter each other, really,

When it is from the same veins we bleed,

The same heart we feel, the same air we need?

But when that air is stopped from the pushing down of a knee,

When the man of a different creed says, “I can’t breathe”

Is it too much to see 

That this is much like the lynching of our ancestors?

Victimized relentlessly as we put our hands up in surrender