When the levees broke...
When the levees broke...
When the levees broke...
The world awoke
From a submerged reality
Flowing beneath the bridge
Over troubled waters.
The copious tears
From the domed encapment
Could not wipe away fears
Nor cleanse the mind of lost hope
Floating in the mist of the mockery
I see:
This water.
This land.
Thios America!
Shame is a dark cloud
Reflected from the white side
Of a bleeding moon---
Guilt seeks its own level
"Vengeance is Mine."
Said the Lord.
Indeed,
To err is human;
To forgive,
Devine.
No mercy
For mere mortals!
When the levees broke...
When the levees broke...
When the levees broke...
The stiches that bound the veil of justice
Were ripped ath the seams; and
It seemed that the bowels of hell loosened
Their pregnant flow of terror; and
Unseen evil released its self on
An intoxicating world drunk with deceptions.
No receding waters can wash away the pain;
The level line of grief remains;
Like a wrinkle in time,
Minds of survivors wrap around
Middle Passage memories...
Deferred dreams fester
In bloatted bodies of floating dreamers...
Dreamers in new diasporas;
Drifting on the rafts of new leanings.
But we shall rise again
From the depths of hell's water;
Sail on the tides of new beginnings;
And no political anchor
Neither the barges of tilme
Can hold us in check; nor prohibit us rising.
And at this wake, let us keep a ripen vigil---
The shadowed veil will be removed;
All shall be naked before the world;
Truth will reveal its self like a burning bush;
And we shall overcome into a new dwelling:
And city not made by hands of corruption and greed.
And the Orleans of our beginning here
Shall not fade from these memories:
When the levees broke...
When the levees broke...
When the levees broke...