I want to make it through the mazes in my heart w/o hitting a wall
Graffiti my insecurities in the pavement
It should be a crime to not feel beautiful
Like Enough
To doubt
I keep trying to write something perfect
Perfection hides the truth
Suppresses the depression
Living a divided life
I hate it when my feelings don’t reflect my actions
I want to say something without meaning something different
Why am I told,
Write poetry, Write poetry,
Write something?
Why am I commanded to Write?
It is so much more sacred than that.
Poetry must flow.
It cannot be induced,
But must be felt,
Must be born,
As of all writing,
And all things.
Write, write, write!
It is a process, unstructured,
And is based on living, not
Doing.
We the scribes and writers,
We must deflect or words
To our hearts,
And our souls must fly and
float, simultaneously –
For any true literature to be Born.
Write, write, write!
It is a process, unstructured,
And one cannot rush birth –
It must be loved,
And cultivated gently,
And then, like a flower, like a soul,
It blooms.
Write, write, write.
In the calm, in the
pulse,
Write.
I feel like this sometimes when something is blocking my mind and heart and there feels like there is no time to sit and write because it is being forced out of me.
by Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.,
Morehouse College Student Paper, The Maroon Tiger, in 1947
As I engage in the so-called "bull sessions" around and about the school, I too often find that most college men have a misconception of the purpose of education. Most of the "brethren" think that education should equip them with the proper instruments of exploitation so that they can forever trample over the masses. Still others think that education should furnish them with noble ends rather than means to an end.
It seems to me that education has a two-fold function to perform in the life of man and in society: the one is utility and the other is culture. Education must enable a man to become more efficient, to achieve with increasing facility the ligitimate goals of his life.
Education must also train one for quick, resolute and effective thinking. To think incisively and to think for one's self is very difficult. We are prone to let our mental life become invaded by legions of half truths, prejudices, and propaganda. At this point, I often wonder whether or not education is fulfilling its purpose. A great majority of the so-called educated people do not think logically and scientifically. Even the press, the classroom, the platform, and the pulpit in many instances do not give us objective and unbiased truths. To save man from the morass of propaganda, in my opinion, is one of the chief aims of education. Education must enable one to sift and weigh evidence, to discern the true from the false, the real from the unreal, and the facts from the fiction.
The function of education, therefore, is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. But education which stops with efficiency may prove the greatest menace to society. The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason, but with no morals.
The late Eugene Talmadge, in my opinion, possessed one of the better minds of Georgia, or even America. Moreover, he wore the Phi Beta Kappa key. By all measuring rods, Mr. Talmadge could think critically and intensively; yet he contends that I am an inferior being. Are those the types of men we call educated?
We must remember that intelligence is not enough. Intelligence plus character--that is the goal of true education. The complete education gives one not only power of concentration, but worthy objectives upon which to concentrate. The broad education will, therefore, transmit to one not only the accumulated knowledge of the race but also the accumulated experience of social living.
If we are not careful, our colleges will produce a group of close-minded, unscientific, illogical propagandists, consumed with immoral acts. Be careful, "brethren!" Be careful, teachers!
