Song of Ourself

Song of Ourself
by Isaac Wilder

Have I felt so proud, to get at the meaning of freedom?
Have I stopped and tarried in the rhythm of our new awakening?

We are a creating thing, creating things,
we are a burning thing, burning things,
we are a liberator, come not to claim.

We wake to the sound of our own breath,
drawing slowly near from the dawn that surrounds us.
We wake to the sound of our own hearts,
echoing the ancient rhythm of slave-beaten drums.
We wake to the sound of the city beneath us,
which ebbs easily, and lazily, and in syncopation.

Do you feel the pulse of this consciousness,
what wakes behind our eyes before they have blinked?

Do you embrace the pulse of the-that-without-end,
as the genesis of our own pulse?

Even here, with this impulsive erection,
of city walls, and city halls:
I have never been so proud, to get at the meaning of freedom.
No. Never.

I will stop a while, and let the slithering riptides subsume me-
subsume me.