A land of gold, silver, and blood

We are from every wrinkle, history embodied.

We see paintings of old white men

and wonder what they think of us coming here,

Stories woven from distant lands, a tapestry of culture on every hand.

We practice creating and taking up space where space was never made for us 

In community, we learn with and from each other

We are still edge-walkers,

Still bridge-builders.

We are from crossed cultures

And the quiet space between,

We are growing and outgrowing,

And learning to find our own voice,

We are from bridging 

Past and present,

East and West

In community, we practice deep listening, 

listening to really hear others and sit with their thoughts.

Through empathy’s embrace,

we strive to bridge all divides

In community, we practice grace.

We practice understanding and being open to learning when we don’t understand.

We are from playing school and making syllabi on our etch-a-sketches to 

rise above stereotypes and divides

We seek peace while chaos plays its trick

We seek unity

We reach and refine with roots and rhythms as our guide 

In community, we co-create healing

We come from a desire to leave the world a better place than we found it

We hug trees and dance away the pain our freedom is causing beneath the wide black sky 

In community, we seek goodness in each other

We practice holding tensions

We practice letting go

but may we clutch to what matters most 

We hope to find rooms where its possible for people to show up as their true selves

And for the number of rooms where that's possible to expand to infinity

We wonder if we’ll find our place among so many,

if the people we’re becoming will be understood

if our stories will resonate in the vastness of our community 

In community, we practice learning how to swim.

We dream about what we have yet to contribute, that will set our souls aflame. 

We seek blue skies signaling new opportunities,

And we wonder what parts of us will bloom next.