Poetry

Bootstraps [ Listen ]
Tim Becker

My eyes bleed
And my tongue swells
And my chest blazes
For the little boys without bootstraps
And the old women without bootstraps
And the young girls without bootstraps
And the young girls without bootstraps
Who pull themselves up by
Pulling on down some random man's pants
And never coming to see
That seeing him come releases her from nothing
And only begins to increasingly compound her everyday suffering
Suffering from her dad's neglectful rejection
And every subsequent man's crooked erection
And christians who don't know the meaning of a real resurrection
Because a Christ crucified means
More than Jews are to blame
And more than Judus' name
And more like Romans being somewhat the same
As American flags representing stars and stripes and crosses
Consumed by red white and blue flames
My throat aches
And my back breaks
And my head spins
As my soul swims
For the spaces and the places
That our history chalks up
Then by rearranging
Erasers erases the nameless and faceless
By erasing the poor and oppressed historical traces
Because a Christ crucified means
One more who should have been a nameless and faceless
But instead
His grace was too deep
And his passion too real
That his death couldn't steal
His veins filled with steel
Stealing away in the night
To weep over Jerusalem
And Harlem
And girls without bootstraps
Who pull down to pull up
And pull up to sink down
And sink even further
The more they cruise around town
And get blamed for not pulling themselves up by their bootstraps
When their bootstraps were gone from the beginning.

But Jesus was there from the beginning
And I wasn't there from the beginning
Because I was too busy being thrilled with my lavish beginning
Because a Christ crucified means dying
And suffering and never being remembered
It means dying in place of a terrorist
And next to two terrorists
And being sentenced to death on a cross
And being sentenced to death on a racially biased
And 98% economically unfair
But socially acceptable death sentence electric chair
And being sentenced to death by a dictator
Under the rule of an empire
And being laid in the grave of a rich man
And being laid in the grave of a rich man
Who believed so much and cared so deeply
That he gave his tomb to a non-violent political leader
To a non-violent political leader
Like a Martin Luther King and an Oscar Romero
Not like an America
Who celebrates Christmas and Easter and King day
By celebrating violent political actions
By violent political leaders
Against violent political leaders
Who learned in part how to be violent
From our violent political leaders
Who love Jesus deeply but casually forget
He was a non-violent political leader
Who cared most about
Little boys without bootstraps
And old women without bootstraps
And young girls without bootstraps
And rich men who give bootstraps
And Jerusalem without bootstraps
And Harlem without bootstraps
And Bogata without bootstraps
And West Bank without bootstraps
And Rwanda without bootstraps
And Kathmandu without bootstraps
And the Sudan without bootstraps
And the Congo without bootstraps
And Jesus without bootstraps
Who died without bootstraps
And resurrected without bootstraps

But I don't care.
Because I've already got my bootstraps
Because I've already got my skin
And my smile that wins smiles
And my mind that sings
And my checks that swing for the fences
That's why I love my bootstraps
More than I love a Jesus
Who never had bootstraps
Because I've already got my bootstraps
That's why I don't need
A Jesus without bootstraps
Because Jesus should have just pulled himself
Up by his bootstraps.

[ Back ]