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Patrick S. De Walt, M.B.A., Ph.D.

~ Communal Conversations for the Promotion of Active Critical Engagement

Patrick S. De Walt, M.B.A., Ph.D.

Tag Archives: Community

She’s Crying

03 Sunday Sep 2017

Posted by Patrick S. De Walt, MBA, PhD in Poetry

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Art, children, Community, expression, Family, Flooding, Freewrite, Golden Triangle, Grief, Harvey, healing, Houston, humanity, Hurricane, loss, nature, Performance, perseverance, poetry, Purpose, Rebuilding, Sadness, society, Streams of consciousness, Texas, Trauma, tribute

Rising tides of insurmountable waves
Indiscriminate to zipcode and identification to a degree
Uncertainty and displacement
Helping hands extended in harm’s way
Humanity at a time when circumstance and situation require her best
Young and old
Equally dependent and deserving of a calming presence of safety and shelter
Flooded homes and dampened realities will yield to the power of hope and possibility
Created when one cares about others more than themselves
We must see the beauty in a difficult situation once again
Fleeting memories are etched with the trauma born from Harvey’s tears
Yet a city named Houston has been left to do the crying…

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Bipolar Nation

18 Sunday Jun 2017

Posted by Patrick S. De Walt, MBA, PhD in Poetry

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Art, Community, Culture, Freewrite, healing, History, humanity, law, Performance, poetry, police state, Politics, self, social awareness, social critique, social justice, Social norms, society, Streams of consciousness, struggle

Civil unrest
Civil disobedience
Calls for subordination
Calls for enforcement of divisive ideologies of othering
Lives in turmoil as fear blankets them
ICE agents knocking on doors
Rounding up breathing, living, loving beings as if they were cattle being led to slaughter
Mothers and fathers separated from their children
Families in disarray as if they were being auctioned off for Southern plantations
For a simplified prescription for a complex circumstance
The hypocrisy of the time is one of major concern
Those who celebrate their ancestors’ arrival on such places as Ellis Island
Seem to not recognize that they too were from legacies of foreigners
Yet the romanticism ends quicker than it really began as this has been forgotten
We want them invisible to our lives unless they are speaking “our language”
Obeying our laws which we ourselves often abuse or ignore
Cooking our food
Washing our clothes
Making our beds when we travel
Manicuring our lawns
An underlying principle of the “American Way”
Exploitation of laborers in the form of free or significantly reduced labor
Voiceless
Faceless
Humanless
A nation is again putting those who are different on notice
Pray like us
Believe in our God
Believe in our Way
Concede your history and beliefs for a better way
A way made in “America”
Bipolar Nation
Should be our new anthem
For we have continually practiced a policy of forcing either or outcomes
Whether it was 1776
Or during the antebellum period
During the times of McCarthy and his hunt for Communists
We remain steadfast in being the obstacle in our own way
Bipolar nation
Either you have or you do not
That includes education, financial freedom, and health care
Yet we continue to look the other way until our hatred of others spills on our doorsteps
Our rhetoric of violence to not only those beyond our boundaries but those who reside within is disheartening
If you speak too sharply you may find yourself in the reach of the tentacles of the “Patriot Act”
More so like yelling “fire” in a crowded movie theatre
You are labeling yourself as if you wore a scarlet letter or Star of David
Bipolar nation
We are who we’ve always been yet most do not want to see
A nation whose fractured past prevents us from un-fracturing our present and future…

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Assail

18 Saturday Feb 2017

Posted by Patrick S. De Walt, MBA, PhD in Poetry, Uncategorized

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Tags

Advocacy, Community, Culture, Discrimination, Diversity, expression, Florida, Freewrite, Gender, homosexuality, humanity, Identity, injustice, oppression, Performance, poetry, police state, Politics, power, Race, racism, sexual orientation, social critique, social justice, Social norms, society, Streams of consciousness, violence, voice

A festive congregation of diverse forms
Gathered in joy and celebration
Unknowingly targeted for reasons
Subjectively debated and/or ignored
The setting places those who truly
Seek to be advocates and allies
In perilous conundrums
Scared hearts and bodies
Others cold and riddled
Propaganda is the last thing needed
Or wanted to be heard
By a family, lover, and/or friend of anyone
Who was assailed
Violated
Traumatized
Or even scapegoated
Identities fractured by incomplete
Or politicized objectives
The absolute truth may never truly be known
Yet we can concretely deduce
There are no true winners if all of us
Truly embrace our humanity
Advocacy means we share our voices with those
Who oppression continues to work to mute
Advocacy means not playing the victim-blaming game
That often becomes the means of historical erasure
With each last breath or aching wound
Whether physical or emotional
We have all lost and are under assail
Race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, and culture among other aspects of our humanity
Have been further eroded
Orlando is just one of many examples of the
Detrimental effects of hate no matter the rationale
Love is not the solution when it is cloaked in complacency and inaction that shuns levels of sacrifice
Until each breath inhales this unalterable truth
There is no true we, yet the current national, societal, and political stances
Empower an assailant that has historically mutated
Each second, minute, hour, day, year, decade, and century
Known as the “American” F
Fear…

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Timorous Island

29 Sunday Jan 2017

Posted by Patrick S. De Walt, MBA, PhD in Poetry

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Art, Community, Culture, expression, humanity, injustice, law, Performance, poetry, police state, Politics, power, Purpose, Revolution, social awareness, social critique, social justice, society, Streams of consciousness, voice, World

Fixed in an outdated past
Where sheeted figures assailed the night
Burning lumber at the entries of those deemed inferior
A time fallacy was accepted truth to preserve a stunted status quo
One that could find a charred figure extended from a tree
We are supposedly beyond those moments within our history
Yet, as much as most continue to deny, as a nation, we have not healed
A legacy of contempt and hatred for those who are systematically “othered”
Made to disavow their identity and personhood to stay or enter
By the embodiment of a misguided arrogance
of a figurehead whose political stances should upset most’s sensibilities.
We are hoarders of a figmented freedom and truth as espoused.
We are fragmented factions of individuals who are forever works-in-progress towards ideals that were more exclusionary than collectivizing.
Internment camps, reservations, plantations, and forced institutionalization mark a history that is often absconded by revisionists.
As the rights of women continue to be decided by those who seek to objectify and posses them while not listening
oil continues to be placed at a premium in respect to the lives and traditions of Native Peoples.
Black lives are forever contemplated whether or not they matter.
Theoretical boarders are being replaced by executive orders and cowardly Congressional puppets.
Reclamation of antebellum doctrines and ideologies reignite divisions reminiscent of the North vs. South.
Those who love the same sex are denied all or many aspects of their civility because of debatable rules and rationales.
Allies are being made into enemies.
Neighbors are disrespected while simultaneously depended upon for their labor.
The continued poaching of a fragile morality is what remains.
Silence and pre-war isolationism didn’t work then and won’t work now.
While an audacity of hope was an idealistic battlecry
we are left with an undeniable truth on this metaphorical timorous island…

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From Beyond the Prism

16 Sunday Oct 2016

Posted by Patrick S. De Walt, MBA, PhD in Identity Politics, Poetry, Racialization Impacts, Uncategorized

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Tags

Art, Community, Culture, expression, Freewrite, healing, humanity, law, oppression, Performance, poetry, policing, Purpose, social awareness, social justice, Streams of consciousness, voice

Captivating in ways that are detrimental
Far fetched and historically incomplete
Figments of others’ imaginations
Yet fundamentally an ascribed reality
Fear has reintroduced itself as fictive kin
Predating hands being raised
Votes being denied
Necks being roped
Bodies being burned
Left to be
To rot
To never become because many viewed us as never complete in the first place
Or maybe the 3/5 place
As compromise often happens to us but not for us
From beyond the prism
We are in a land that still finds ways to question our humanity
Personhood
Sense of self-actualization
Young boys and grown men recognize that Predator’s sights are historically locked on them
Young girls and grown women are both recipients and protectors of generations of young people who are precious gems even when a society seeks to denigrate them
As history tells us…
when not found in the history books of revisionist dehumanizers
whose fear of those who have been “othered” continues to permeate
The pores of a nation as many revisit its birth within theaters
The sweat off one’s brow from determination and a false belief of Meritocracy
Leaves much to be desired for those who were constitutional add-ons of the 13th, 14th, and/or 15th varieties
If we’re honest about Abe then would we really see the
Emancipation of physical bonds only to preserve psychological and economic ones can not be erased nor flipped as done by the party he’s so adamantly revered by
No donkey nor elephant seems to reach deep enough
Effectively address
Morally renounce
The effects resulting
From beyond the prism

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The Importance of Family

21 Monday Jul 2014

Posted by Patrick S. De Walt, MBA, PhD in Poetry

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Tags

Art, Community, Culture, expression, Family, Identity, Legacy, Performance, poetry, social critique, Streams of consciousness

We live our lives for defined purposes
Whether it is of Biblical, Koranic, another sacred text or even our own belief systems
We are fashioned by our thoughts
Our inner desires
Our inner voices
We are driven
In many cases, the driving force is something more closely linked
Linked to our foundation that has been set in motion
Since our births
Family
Immediate or distant
Family is the common denominator
Whether biological or fictive
Family is the centerpiece
Mothers, Fathers, Grandparents, Aunts, Uncles, Sisters, Brothers, Nieces, Nephews, Cousins and other extensions
We are family
Family shapes our experience
We are so lucky
Lucky to have people who love us for who we are and what we are not
Those who honor us by being the best models that they can be
They are our templates for who and what we can be
Often sacrificing their dreams and possibilities so that those who follow have clearer paths
Our heroes
Our hedges
Our sounding boards
For those of us who are fortunate enough to remember or have
Found memories of being held when we were scared or hurt
Being nurtured when we needed direction
Being disciplined when we left the proper paths
Family is our center
Our regulator of sorts
As many us of do not want to let them down
Fail them
And what they envision in us
Family, as we get older, extends to lasting friendships
Bonds that last through many decades
Through many pivotal points in our respective developments
Reflect on those names for a moment
Reflect on their significance in the shaping of your present and possible future
Honor them as they are embedded within your journey
They are your personified landmarks
They are your consciousness in human form
They are the most trusted voices in your life
Your heart is in tune with them
You have no doubts of their significance
When you’re honest with yourself
They are the importance for what keeps me willing to try
Willing to sacrifice
Willing to endure
All that my journey requires
To honor all of the elders who endured all that history tells us is no more
To be a role model and inspiration for all of the future and current generations who have my walk in their sights
They are watching
They are listening
And more importantly
They are waiting for me to be the best me that I have to offer
The importance of family can never be underestimated if we are truly wishing to be complete
It takes many forms and I’ve only identified a few
Envision what importance family has for you
Now that you’ve begun to do so
What are you going to add to that image?
What are you offering to that so important legacy?
The importance of it is love
Love for all that you are and aren’t
Love of your strengths
Love of your weaknesses
Love of your vulnerabilities
Love of your potential
The importance of family is that if you are willing
It can be created no matter where you are or go
It is one of the most beautiful aspects of the lived experience
Guard your journey as if it is the only one you’ll get
There is a good chance that it is…
And with each day moving forward
Embrace
Savor
Enhance
The family that is and even the family that isn’t
Build your family on the premises of love, respect, honesty, dignity, and support without neglecting the necessity of wisdom
Family is found in a hug
Family is found in a kiss
Family is found in each of us
Please allow its importance to radiate from within you for others to see and encounter
In doing so, you have the essence of
Family…

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Contact Email

dewalt@patricksdewaltmbaphd.com

Recent Posts

  • In Search of Leadership April 6, 2020
  • She Calls April 24, 2018
  • She’s Crying September 3, 2017
  • Letting Go To Let Live June 26, 2017
  • Bipolar Nation June 18, 2017
  • The Casual Eye June 11, 2017
  • In Hopes of Tomorrow June 4, 2017
  • To Capture a Heartbeat June 4, 2017
  • Transient Echo June 4, 2017
  • The Reason June 2, 2017
  • Thoughts in Motion February 18, 2017
  • Assail February 18, 2017
  • Timorous Island January 29, 2017
  • From Beyond the Prism October 16, 2016
  • Trajectory June 19, 2016

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