"Unbossed, Unbought, Unstoppable”

Mustafa Santiago Ali

Dr. Mustafa Santiago Ali is the Executive Vice President of Conservation & Justice for the National Wildlife Federation (NWF), former Interim Chief of Programs at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), and Instructor at American University. He is the Founder and CEO of Revitalization Strategies. He also serves as a commissioner for The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (AAAS). He is an award-winning writer and poet focused on social justice. Dr. Ali is frequently seen on television, including appearances on MSNBC, ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, VICE, FUSE, BET, National Geographic, Full Frontal with Samantha Bee, and Democracy NOW! Mustafa is also a regular guest on Roland Martin Unfiltered, Black News Channel, Tavis Smiley Show, The Dean Obeidallah Show, and many others…

Editor's Note: This poem is the 81st in our Democracy and Hope Series. This series will highlight hopeful aspects about our Democracy using various genres including poems, interviews, short stories, and articles about political events

Shirley, you were not born to bend, not built to barter freedom for favor, nor to polish their pedestal’s edge. No, you cracked their polished floors, split their glass dreams into shards of reckoning, and stitched a quilt of purpose from the fabric of your fire.

Chisholm, you walked into rooms where your voice was an unexpected storm, where your skin, your stride, your syllables dared the air to defy you.

Unbossed. Like rivers carving stone, you did not ask to flow, you claimed the course, you defined the current.

Unbought. Like stars burning untethered, you would not barter your light for borrowed shine.

Shirley, you held the mic like it was gospel, your words weaving hymns of equity, a battle cry in every line. You showed us how to grow gardens in deserts, how to plant possibility in the bones of oppression.

The first, but never the final. Your footsteps echo through every voice that rises, through every hand that reaches, through every unshattered dream.

You taught us to build without permission, to run without chains, to dream without ceilings. Shirley, your legacy is a seed in every unbroken soul, a revolution waiting to bloom.

©️MustafaSantiagoAli

#Poetry #HappyBirthday #ShirleyChisholm #Democracy #BlackExcellence #ProudBlue #RIP