Identity & belonging

In the month of May 2020, the world watched
as buildings became a Target, an unsolicited offering
for the uniformed lack of justice, the world watched
fire imitate the gluttony
of an abuse of power, the world watched
buildings overshadow a black man’s death
in the minds of some, even for a moment.
Which is to say, we all watched
the identification of people and buildings
become synonymous, as some calculated loss
so differently, so insidiously, the world witnessed
the built environment as a compound
of biases, of policing perception, the world watched,
is still watching
as buildings— people—
end up identifying their homes, towns and cities
as a landscape where buildings— police
—overlook injustice as though above
the law of the land. Knowing once
a people were perceived as real estate,
as property, it is hard to identify where we
—the people— belong
when this road, this earth’s sky line
is a line up of decisions— buildings
who will not stand for us, will not stand up for us,
but will stand for an identity we do not belong to.
Refuse to belong to.
Revolts become architecture for justice,
and our identity will not need planning permission
for our belonging. Buildings will burn and fall
before we fall for your decisions again.