Haiku: King II

King II

Martin Luther King, 1964 — (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Preacher-turned-fighter —
stood up for his fellow Men,
dreamt equality.

This post was prompted by the Genre Haiku Challenge on this blog. Follow that link to find out more and participate!

Today is Martin Luther King Jr. day, which like other floating holidays tends to be an opportunity for some people and schools to take the day off. I grew up in Detroit, where this day and Black History Month – the month of February – were a big deal, so I recognize this holiday even if I still have to go to work. 🙂

This past August was the 50th anniversary of the I Have A Dream speech, which is not public domain but should be. I wrote about that in a post that includes a link to the full text of that speech.

Doctor King fought for equality for all people, regardless of their race or color, gender or whatever. This holiday is a good reminder that once we strip away all of one’s labels, what remains is a single essential aspect; the fact is, we’re all humans – imperfect for sure, but glorious nonetheless.

Doctor King, like Gandhi, felt that nonviolent protest was the way to go. Why?

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.

There’s something to think about.
I picked out the following links myself because I feel the articles are relevant:

3 comments

Well done, Rob.

Amongst so many people I know here, MLK day is just a day off (if you work in the federal sector– my mother does, for example) or time off school.

I want my children to understand why it’s a holiday, but I think I’m failing miserably.

Rob's Surf Report says:

January 21, 2014 at 11:32 pm

I think they lack experiential context, which is hard to impress, in my opinion. Because they might not be exposed to the type of injustice involved in the struggles for economic and social equality for all that MLK was involved in, it almost requires finding a way to get them emotionally invested in the potential repercussions of those social norms and what if they were still so prevalent today – it’s a tough thing to teach without context, I would think. I’d be happy enough if everybody were treated fairly regardless of their natural-born attributes.

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