Twelve Years in Georgia

I feared we were alone. We left our homes for a strange land. We were welcomed with care and love, But we stayed strangers. When we were seen, they blessed our hearts And left us strange.

In music I am not alone. Hopes and dreams cross generations, oceans, and tongues. I sing my new hymns. I bring the words from other times, I bring the tunes from other lands, To mine.

I can stay a stranger if that’s my call. Whiteness may be the state religion, But I don’t have to lend it my good skin. I can hold no laws sacred Until they leave no rich and no poor, Noone bound, And don’t stop at the rights of men.