Lest We Forget

Lest we forget
Lest we seek not to remember
The scourge of slavery
Haunting, taunting, everywhere
Like bold demons of the underworld
Risen from cavernous dwellings
Let us have our consciences pricked.

Lest we forget
All those laws and all those statutes
Etched now sadly with
A past that’s ever present
Let us own familial demons
Projected onto dark faces
Those with soulful stares that haunt us.

Lest we forget
Lest we might fail to remember
The scourge of slavery
Images of oppression
By legislative seal and power
Enslaving with racial epithets
Let us break those seals of hatred.

Lest we forget  
Lest we might think that we have changed
With “freedom” for all
While keeping impositions
For race, for class, for color, and creed
Know we divide and we conquer
In the name of democracy.

Lest we forget
Lest we maintain our pretensions
Jekyll masking Hyde
Masking what we would deny
The darkness of our souls projected
Onto those we would still hinder
Let us embrace wounded spirits.