Becoming Just: Poems That Explore Commitment to Justice for All

By S T Kimbrough Jr. and Jackson W. Carroll

The poems in this collection ask--How can we become just people? What is human justice? Is there a justice that is equal and/or appropriate for all human beings? How can an individual in action, speech, and behavior be just? How does one think of oneself as just in interaction with others? These poems also address prevalent injustices to children and of society's frequent denial of its responsibility to them, the privileged and the underprivileged. Further, how do we wish to live in a society--isolated, completely independent, self-centered? Living in a society implies association with others. How do we wish to relate to others? The poems query: how will the governments under which we live initiate and execute just rule and governance for all citizens? The book concludes with a lyrical case study of apartheid, especially in Israel that claims to be a democracy. Some of the poems acknowledge that the US's democracy has failed in many ways and has an ongoing need of recovering the principles of justice and equality. Americans know well the meaning of ethnic cleansing in their own land. The poems here make no claim at successful resolutions to the issues raised. They do point to the ongoing need of repentance for wrongs done, and for steering a steady course to guarantee the rights of freedom and justice for all people.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Release date: Aug 31, 2022
• ISBN: 9781666750355

S T Kimbrough Jr.

S T Kimbrough, Jr. is a Research Fellow of the Center for Studies in the Wesleyan Tradition of the Divinity School of Duke University and founder of The Charles Wesley Society. He is editor of its journal Proceedings of The Charles Wesley Society and author/editor of several books on Charles Wesley including: The Unpublished Poetry of Charles Wesley, 3 vols., and The Manuscript Journal of the Reverend Charles Wesley, M.A., 2 vols.

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Becoming Just

Poems that Explore Commitment to Justice for All

S T Kimbrough, Jr.

Foreword by Jackson W. Carroll

Becoming Just

Poems that Explore Commitment to Justice for All

Copyright ©

2022

S T Kimbrough, Jr.. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in critical publications or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permission from the publisher. Write: Permissions, Wipf and Stock Publishers,

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paperback isbn: 978-1-6667-5033-1

hardcover isbn: 978-1-6667-5034-8

ebook isbn: 978-1-6667-5035-5

07/29/22

Table of Contents

Becoming Just

Foreword

Introduction

Section 1: Human Justice

1. Becoming Just

2. The Humane Test

3. Dignity

4. Truth, Honesty, Respect

5. Death-Lust

6. Human Magic

7. Sacredness

8. To Be Born

9. Human Will

10. Forgotten Mercy

Section 2: Personal Justice

11. Break Bread with Others

12. Greed

13. Rare Good Samaritans

14. The Old Revised

15. The Test of All Mortality

16. What Will We Give a Child?

17. Who Am I?

18. Whom Will You Ask to Share Your Food?

19. Word Assassination

20. The Domino Effect

Section 3: Child Justice

21. To Be a Girl or Boy

22. Repairing Broken Children

23. Children at Risk

24. A Child Alone

25. Guns

26. Do Children Have a Chance?

27. A Privileged Child?

28. Evil Cares Not

29. A Refugee-Child’s Plea

30. A Freedom Coup

31. Spoiled Angels

32. Too Late

33. Wishful Thinking

34. Knowledge and Reason

35. An International Language

Section 4: Societal Justice

36. Vision of Humanity

37. Civility

38. Why not Compromise?

39. Complicity

40. Corona, Delta, Omicron

41. George Floyd’s Eight-Minute Death

42. Hospitality

43. Ignorance We Can’t Afford

44. Injustice

45. Intellectual Brain Drain

46. Learning from History

47. Love Is Why

48. One Race

49. Thanksgiving

50. Trust Reality

51. We Shall Overcome

Section 5: Governmental Justice

52. We Pledge Allegiance?

53. Accountability

54. Another July 4th

55. Another Year

56. Colonialization

57. Death to America?

58. Destructive Addiction

59. Evil

60. God Bless America?

61. 9/11 Reflection

62. Insurrection

63. Lust for Power

64. Reclaim Democracy?

65. The Death Penalty

66. What if?

67. Voting Rights

68. The Idea of America

69. Long-Awaited Justice

70. Autocracy

71. Meritocracy

72. Demise of Neutrality

Section 6: Apartheid & Justice

73. An Israeli Earthquake

74. Children of Abraham

75. Palestinians Have No Rights!

76. Covid Apartheid

77. Commandment Eight

78. Vaccine Poverty

79. Common Belief and Common Goal

80. Defenseless Gaza

81. The Fate of Gaza

82. Israeli Kristallnachts

83. Lifta

84. One More Palestinian Orphan

85. Water Injustice

86. Silent Censorship

87. When Israel Was in Egypt

88. The Death of Shireen Abu Akleh

89. Moral Law?

90. Masáfer Yatta

91. Tolerance

92. Who Are My Sisters and Brothers?

93. Peace of Jerusalem

94. All We’ve Left Are Stones

S T Kimbrough Jr. raises a myriad of critically poignant questions about justice issues confronting the world, including our own paradigmatic status on democracy and rights. He does not offer platitudes, but stresses an ongoing need for repentance, and a steady course guaranteeing freedom and rights: love kindness, do justice, so it rolls down like water and an ever-flowing river; this is indeed to walk humbly with our Lord.

—Charles Amjad-Ali, Martin Luther King Jr. Professor of Justice and Christian Community (Emeritus) at Luther Seminary

"The many verses in S T Kimbrough Jr.’s Becoming Just speak to me. They remind me there is no ‘just’ for justice. Not really. For justice is more than just race, or just gender, or just creed, or just nationality, or just us. Becoming just is a constant quest for decency to all, a concerted push for equality, an evolution within ourselves and in the parts we play to the world."

—John Archibald,

2018

Pulitzer Prize winner in Commentary

"The foreword to S T Kimbrough Jr.’s new book of poems, Becoming Just, opens with Martin Luther King’s words, ‘The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.’ These poems further the bending of that arc in a fascinating and challenging way. The poems largely focus on personal, societal, and governmental injustices, and the reader is left with the challenge of ‘What can I do to right these injustices?’"

—William N. Clark, attorney

Foreword

The arc of the universe is long, but bends toward justice. These words,¹ often quoted by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., reflect the conviction that enabled him to persevere in the face of fierce opposition and abuse.