When women march... young trees grow in their footprints

Trouble Is Not Our Middle Name

(After Liz Lochead)

Trouble is not our middle name, That is not who we are - But we were born for this: We were born to be the storm To be the song that marches in every heart, Where each footstep is a million strong.

We are the hope that takes to the public square,

We are the mob who holds your hand – can you Listen, listen longer than today…? Listen to what we do as well as what we say.

For we gave the first breath, This much is true; And we will give the next and last And we will bleed for us as well as you.

It is hard to untangle this, This politic of a weeping age But I cannot tell you plainer, I cannot keep the quiet Of unmarked graves for anyone – through all the wind Real hope is there, on the streets outside your home, Walking in the public square.

https://www.icantkeepquiet.org/thesong/

The Original, by Liz Lochead:

Trouble is not my middle name

Trouble is not my middle name.

It is not what I am.

I was not born for this.

Trouble is not a place

though I am in it deeper than the deepest wood

and I’d get out of it (who wouldn’t?) if I could.

Hope is what I do not have in hell –

not without good help, now. Could you

listen, listen hard and well

to what I cannot say except by what I do?

And when you say I do it for badness

this much is true:

I do it for badness done to me before

any badness that I do to you.

Hard to unfankle this.

But you can help me. Loosen

all these knots and really listen.

I cannot plainly tell you this, but, if you care,

then — beyond all harm and hurt

- real hope is there.