His first Sunday School experience was being
taught about the disciples under the teaching
of a kind, sweet, white woman named Mrs. Lambert-Neeling,

All twelve from Peter
to (well not) Judas said she
were good, white boys working hard to be
fishers having fun by the sea,
singing songs of reverie,
resembling more Robin Hood’s
band who were so very merry,

but that, of course, wasn’t reality.

And so he grew up
with a white, suburban mentality
of what was Christian truth and spirituality.

And what did that get him, really?
He was indoctrinated to a false reality
of God’s revelation to humanity.

Only by the grace of God,
did reality begin to sink in.
Mrs. Lambert-Neeling actually
read the words of Jesus
and over time, the man
began to see biblical reality.

But for years he wore white privilege
as he swam in a sea
of social justice inequity.

He climbed out of the sea
naked as he could be,
baptized by cold reality,
and began to breathe
a little more freely,

but he knows and
so does (better than he)
just about every other ethnicity,
that he has a long way to go
in his life, to actualize biblical reality —

as do most white Christians
as they look out upon
on the harsh reality
that they (in some
cases, at best, with benign neglect and naïveté)
have caused so much
injustice and inequality.

And now, he thinks, maybe
he is just being a guilty,
white, privileged, self-indulgent, crybaby.

Lord, have mercy,
Oh, woe is me.

Then came a voice from eternity,
Oy vey, you aren’t dead yet.
You can still do something.