The way was shown by women
Claudette Colvin and Rosa Parks
In the year 1955 and things changed.
You arrived on the bitter racial scene
With a dream within the American Dream.
Content of character, not colour, should be
The sole criterion for judgment for a nation
You asserted and became an overnight sensation!
Thinking of the poor and others on the social margins
Always talking of their rights and aspirations
A real leader of the masses and international
Public figure advocating of real equity, justice and freedom.
On April 4, 1968, a radical, a challenger to status quo
Was assassinated in the evening at Memphis.
They killed a body
Not the voice or spirit.
A black eventually came to live in the White House
Thanks to visionary guys like you and others.
However, sadly, the battle is not over.
A young black teen/youth in a hoody is still
Taken to be a threat on a deserted evening
And night-time worsens the situation.
They are shot dead by the police department
And riots follow each senseless killing.
Although you endure and live on
In your work and words,
Each succeeding age demands
Angels like the non-violent Gandhi or
Martin Luther King, Jr. for awaking a dormant nation.