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 31st 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.
who taught you to count bodies instead of days?
to see playgrounds as battlegrounds,
classrooms as cathedrals to the gone too soon?
they say it’s just the price of freedom,
but who told you a child’s life was for sale?
i see the headlines, taste the smoke,
another classroom stripped of its breath.
a politician with a grin like a loaded gun
says this is just how it is, how it’s always been—
but i remember a time when schools
were for dreaming, not for dodging death.
they want us numb, afraid to question,
prayers like shields against a storm of lead.
but we are more than this,
we are the fight in every mother’s scream,
the fire in every father’s fist.
no, we will not cradle their excuses,
we will not swallow their lies,
not when every bullet sings a song of what could be—
a future they want us to forget.
this ain’t the way it has to be,
not the prophecy written in our bones.
we know better, we know hope,
we know how to turn grief into gasoline,
to light a fire they can’t snuff out.
& when they say to accept the blood as fact,
to bow our heads & carry on,
we will rise, fists clenched, hearts loud,
because our children deserve better than silence,
better than the lullabies of hollow point dreams.
this country wants our babies to grow bulletproof,
but we refuse—we will be the armor,
the storm that swallows the night,
& together, we’ll write a new scripture:
one where no child dies for another’s right to kill.
©️MustafaSantiagoAli
#Poetry #GunReformNow #ProudBlue #Apalachee_High_School #EnoughlsEnough #Resister