Best Social Justice Poems
What a clamour
What a noise
To bring social justice
To answer the cries
That's gone on for centuries
That they keep maintaining
With promises and lies
Black lives matter
So we shout
But who hears the cries
When the establishment do nought
After the cotton fields
Up comes the continuity
In the justice system
When we are gunned down by agents
Who prey on our community
The leaders are aware
But do they really care
When they fail to dismantle
A system , which is so unfair
Slavery maybe abolished
But injustices lingers on
In its many disguises
And the many layers
We face, all day long
Martin Luther made a stand
Bob Marley, sung redemption songs
Freedom fighters raise their rifles
And in the graveyard
Gather the mourning throngs
There is no hope for change
When you maintain a system
That heaps suffering on the wounded
And depravity prolongs
For in the utterings
There is a promise of change
But when it comes to implementation
Not A Stroke
No progress made.
Once our land stretched from coast to coast
and the drums of the people beat proud
we were mighty and we were strong
we were happy . . .
then the white came to our shores
they thought our land was theirs to take
they called it Canada
they brought disease unknown to us
when we fought for what was ours they killed us
and we killed to . . .
we were a savage people true and skilled at death
many of our chiefs were tricked to come in peace
many of our chiefs were hung . . .
they called this justice
the whites stole our land and our way of life
they massacred the buffalo and bear only for their fur
and left their rotting bodies and we wept for them
the ancestors of our people fly with the eagles
drifting and falling on the wind
their cry is our cry . . .
we were herded into reservations like cattle
starved into submission and left a broken people
and they called this justice
but in each of us burns a fire bright that can never die
in each of us is a strength and courage
a tranquility and serenity
we accept the past as the white acknowledge the wrongs
and the Prime Minister of Canada
is trying to say sorry
with tears he apologizes to the people for
the hangings
the killing of our people
the stealing of our land
the 1960 scoop of our children
the residential schools of abuse
the highway of tears that goes on and on
yet, the social injustice to the people is still present today
when they steal the land we have left
for pipelines, and other projects without our agreement
we want to keep our lands pristine for wildlife
we do not want polluted water where the fish die
some of us are living in third world conditions still
with no water, electricity, heat . . . still on reservations
so you tell me where the justice is . . .
I am just a girl of the here and now but
but I hear the drums of my ancestors beating
in my heart . . .
_____________________
April 1, 2018
Poetry/Free Verse/They Call This Social Justice
Copyright Protected, ID 18- 1009-383-01
All Rights Reserved. Written Under Pseudonym.
Written for the contest, Social Justice
sponsor, John Hamilton
First Place
The Salon of Forbidden Ideas
is a place where the free-thinkers go
to express their unsanctioned opinions
and explore what they aren't meant to know...
At twilight, they slip through the shadows
of the alley 'twixt Far-Left and Right,
wearing black masks and cloaks of red satin,
bearing lanterns of unfiltered light.
The door to the salon is fastened
with various fashions of locks---
each one with a key and engraving
of the name of a theory or hoax.
For the one with the keys to unlock them
there awaits a most pleasant reception:
A tea in an elegant parlor
with others so-freed from deception.
Over salvers of tea cakes and lokum,
and samovars piping with steam,
they indulge in uncensored discussions
(like the cats who have gotten the cream).
The portaits of Nietzsche and Darwin,
and of Freud and Marcuse and Marx,
gaze down with intense indignation
as the fireplace feasts on their works.
Engraved on the mantle is FREEDOM,
and the roar of the flames, "Liberation!",
and the parlor is bright with the fireglow
from the canon of indoctrination.
Outside, in the mist and the darkness,
the justice wolves prowl on patrol---
sniffing fiercely for dissident skeptics
in their bloodthirsty lust for control.
The tea in the parlor continues---
as the wolves run the alleys in vain---
til the night-shadow fades into sunrise
and the guests don their masks once again.
Do you know the way to the Salon?
Do you have the keys to its door?
Simply follow the compass of Conscience,
and the pull of your heart to know more.
The alley is narrow and lonely;
you might lose your family or friends,
your religion or good reputation
before you arrive at its end...
But if you are yearning for freedom,
and the knowledge of truth is your goal,
there's an ear for your voice at the Salon,
and refreshment and peace for your soul.
Dissenters dominate the streets,
The public dominion of demonstrations.
This POTUS threatens military domination.
Just forget the pesky First Amendment.
Sowing seeds of civil war
The best path to reelection.
Yet remonstrations rally relentless,
One man’s terminal chokehold
A symbol of structural racism.
A metaphor for the socioeconomic suffocation,
The clamor and commotion
torn and tormenting in every town.
Protestors street hue and cry,
voices of the marginalized and forgotten .
A human chain of disputant dissentients,
Occupiers striking for a new order.
Rebels demanding
a new systemic justice.
Social Justice
Social justice is the fair and just relation between the individual and society.
I am an American
I just want fair and just treatment
wanting my fellow man and government
to represent, me
fairly
A measured explicit and tacit terms
for the distribution of wealth, opportunities
for personal activity and social privileges
this is social justice
fairly
I am black-African American
I just want fair and just treatment
wanting my fellow man and government
to represent, me
fairly
I profess Christ in my life
I am not ashamed to tell my boss or my job
religious discrimination
retail and governmental confinements work on required days
Or your fired
just want a right to be respected
fairly
There are four types of justice
Distributive, procedural, restorative and retributive.
I just want to be equally representative
child labor, miss-cradled
Racism, still hating for the color of our skins
education, teach the same have the same contents of books
Shelter/housing, all should have a descent place affordable place to live
Bullying, corruption jealous ashamed people sorrowful wanting power over you
Medicine, disabled people I must miss some meals sell my used car to afford
poverty I control but yet my governmental task masters really control
I am a Christian
Not ashamed to tell you or the government
I just want fair and just treatment
wanting my fellow man and government
to represent, me
fairly
Economic justice is a component of social justice
It's a set of moral principles
I need equal opportunity created for a sufficient
material foundation upon which to have a dignified, productive, and creative life beyond economics.
to represent, me
fairly
Racism, violence in schools, drug abuse
Unemployment,
Hunger and unfair labor conditions
Main reason we're in this
Is because of individual free-choice process
rarely
I am human caught in this mess
Called social justice?
03/29/18
Social Justice free verse - Poetry Contest
Sponsored by:John Hamilton
Scare-City
by
Rick Folker
Here on these mean streets...
The palpable lack of love
Threads through the alleyways
of brutal loss and unanswered prayers;
The anguished cries of despair rise
with the unforgiving heat.
Here among the forlorn refugees,
the frightened and the poor,
Can be found the ones who
forgage for a phantom friend
and beg for an absent god to speak;
where Hunger Games
are played for keeps.
Here are those we pray for
Yet, never pay for...
The addicted, the afflicted
Those we would rather not see
And those we wish might have
never been.
Here, a thousand miles and a thousand tears
from the suburbs of the cynical elite
One may, if one tries
Travel to this city of the meek.
“We have no milk,”
you speak quietly
in a tone reminiscent
of another’s observation
that wine had run out
at a wedding feast.
Miraculous transformation
of wine or milk
from pitchers of water
seemingly absent from
the church job description
of educator and
director of parish music,
a deficit, in proportion
to the yearly salary of
nine thousand dollars
for seven days work
each week with two
weeks off for good behavior.
As there is no blood-letting
from turnips, there is
no milk-letting from music.
Your milk-filled breasts
have not enough milk
for baby and cereal for
two growing boys
at the table. Evenings
liqour store clerking and
weddings and funerals
cannot fill both
refrigerator and bellies.
Nine thousand dollars,
before government
expenses and other
deductions, does not
provide well for a
family of five.
Well below the income
for a family of four,
much less five,
no food shelves yet
conceived for the
impoverished and
hungry. Reaganomics
mock the poor
who fight for the
crumbs from the
richman’s table.
Trickle down’s
empty promises stab
visciously at the
hunger-panged
stomachs of the poor.
The class of ‘70
golden ring, the weight
far too heavy
for a musician’s right
hand, would decorate
finer the hand of
another man. Perhaps,
remolten into glimmering
shimmering light,
the golden reshaped
circlet might hang
from a chain
adorning the neck
of some young woman.
The jeweler’s eye
gauges carefully
its worth, twenty
dollars, no more
no less, twenty
dollars it is.
There will be milk
and bread on
the table for
another week.
© 2015, Robert Charles Wagner. All rights reserved.
Blue Light Bulbs and a Bottle of Bleach and The Incandescent Must Win
(part 1)
By: J.R. Wren
A wilting flower and a blade of grass
No presumptions of the way things ought to be
Feeding plenty on light through a tinted glass
Patiently waiting and resting in what it means to be free
“Steal, Steal, Steal. Make it up and patch it.
Feel. Feel Feel. Facts don’t matter and from all myth gleans.
Reel. Reel. Reel. Fish it in and match it.
Lies from the lounge and drunken dither. -- Our ends will justify the means!”
Knowledge of privilege and equity to learn
Servers, red phones, and Benghazi aflame
Crossbones, Chicago, Philly and -- -- Her turn!
“She will win! She will win!” Crumpling papers did proclaim
Deep, deep, deep. In plain sight -- a hidden gate
“He doesn’t win. Right? -- -- Right? ---Isn’t that right?
Steep, steep. Drip from a leaking deep state
What's fusion? It's cash stowed in the store late into the night
A wilting flower and that blade of grass
May not have thoughts of what ought to be
But the Deep aim to crash through lids of glass
The steady, sure swap of twenty-one to rid of sovereign - ty
“Steal. Steal. Steal. Lick it up and stamp it.
Feel. Feel. Feel. Feed the Feds and nothing of the Deep careens
‘Real. Real. It’s real!’" TALL thinks FISA won’t catch it.
“Checked (not checked) but might be confirmed!” And the judges are part of the means
They say “check your privilege” and “equity’s sublime.”
But the phone kept ringing and a message was left
Equality and equity can’t be done at the same time
Not by the color of my skin, but a perfect dream left bereft
A blooming rose and a patch of grass
And a new child doesn’t carry what the elders see
Feeding plenty on light with no prejudice of gold or brass
Seeing no difference between daffodil or lily
Hare over turtle “and beware the snitching fox!"
“Feel, feel,feel for all our shadow’s past."
A broken doll in an empty box.
Lemon spiel and Meadow’s blast
An abrasive sponge and a bottle of bleach
Fluorescent morgue lighting - “ask for their consent!
The clinical culture is calculated for all and for each”
Ballots appear. Nanny will fear. “And soon we’ll get you out of that tent.”
Dogs Included Push
Raven Vegetable Fear
Pleading Gum Arrest
...And in that lies the irony
of this whole ‘social justice’ phrase,
it exists to excuse racism,
to put a nice name on mere hate.
You want to hate pale people or
attack any one that succeeds,
just claim that it’s ‘social justice,’
then you can go and make them bleed.
You want to say bigoted things
and not have to take flak for it?
Just claim that it’s ‘social justice,’
and that your group ‘cannot be racist.’
You want to put quotas in place,
and get jobs that you have no earned?
Then just cry out ‘social justice,’
and watched those wrong-colored folk burn.
You want to smash and loot your town,
but now have to do time in jail?
Just say that it’s ‘social justice,’
and they let you go without fail.
We really shouldn’t be surprised,
the left always divides by race,
from slavery down to Jim Crow…
of course they’d cheerlead this disgrace.
But there’s no need to buy into
a concept that’s so disgusting,
justice can never be social,
it’s an individual thing.
Always.
"The soul of a person can be hurt
along with pain inside their heart.
Life is so unpredictable and very
crazy where there's so much hate
and less love which we all need.
Wars need to stop with all the
fighting and show friendship and
a good faith where we can all
work together and reunite as just
one.
The president is human yet he can
try to make life just a little less
strained.
Stop racist fools because there is
no color in Gods eyes.
Judgement and prejudice is not
needed or wanted.
some dreams are meant to come
true.
We all can only dream can't we?"
Once I threw a mouldy bread
into the dumpster
and when I went for groceries
I saw a Gypsy boy taking the bread
and being content about it.
A tear dropped down my cheek.
I was always surrounded by
immoral people;
drug addicts, alcoholics,
small thieves, the poor.
Perhaps they see me as one of them
or they like the fact I don’t see them
as immoral. Or they see me as a saviour.
Yes, that is who I am.
Mother Theresa for drug addicts.
Mouldy bread for hungry Gypsy boy.
An evening of social justice
paid for by the “alleged” perpetrators
of the grand injustice.
What cads, these bastards
of the billions, usurpers of
our “common” wealth,
cream skimming purveyors
of the entrepreneurial spirit.
“They did not build it alone!”
No, they did not. They built it –
first in their minds imagination,
fashioned into a dream,
molded into a plan
hammered by determination.
Brick by brick, stick by stick,
thread by thread,
hour by endless hour.
And now the bread is made.
Now they come - the naysayers,
the doubters, the mockers,
in the guise of “social sainthood”,
to tear down the success,
condemn the economics
regarding the slicing of the loaf.
“The laborers may be worthy of their hire”*
but The Little Red Hen* runs the kitchen.
3/29/2018
*paraphrased biblical quotation
**1950’s(?) childrens book (The Little Red Hen)
submitted to – social justice free verse – Poetry Contest
sponsor – John Hamilton
Husband, brother, son,
lover, friend -
Will we see you again?
Will you be a headline on the news?
Unarmed and unashamed.
We stand fearful and furious
in tear soaked silent pleas.
Something must change.
His skin won't warrant death,
and our hearts won't continue to pay
the inexcusable cost
of love in America.
Just make believe
And your dreams will set you free…
Actually, it’s your sleep
And blissful dreaming that sets you free
In a la-la land of make believe.
The real world doesn’t require belief
It requires action
Eat or be eaten, fight or flight.
But dreaming is much more fun
Especially when someone else does your hunting.
This is the world of childish wonder
Of dreams projected onto reality
Of fears projected onto others
A world where I’ll grow up to become
A fireman, a healer, a Marxist rebel, a world savior.
This is the world of make believe
Where everyone follows their bliss
Into ever deeper sleep
A world where the biggest concern
Is, is my pillow soft or firm enough…
(8/21/24)