Choices or None at All

 

I was never refused service because…

never told to leave because...

I was never stopped and searched because…

I was never demanded to show my hands because…

I was never accused of because…

I was never not chosen because…

I was never chosen because…

I was never slammed up against a car,

never cuffed and hauled off because…

How was I ever to know discrimination,

intimidation and accusation because..?

I was never asked to step out of line

or to move to the back of the bus because...

Never singled out and called something

I never was.

I was never beaten, shot, kneeled on,

strangled,

incarcerated or hung from

a tree because…

Once in 1988, while on a bus stopped at the

airport in Rome, Italy, I was asked by armed

guards to see my passport, likely because I

was a middle aged white man with a long beard.

For the same reason, a boss I once had asked me

at work one day if I had forgotten to shave?

Had I refused to hand over my passport or

told my boss to go screw himself, I could

have been detained or lost my job, but I

had choices to make because...

And I had my goddamned rights,

you see, but only because.

                 -30-

Chris Hanch 6-17-2021