Amy Bergeron
Sartell
A young poet, Amanda Gordon, pleads when she speaks and writes about protecting our democracy and voting. She warns us to take care of our earthly home and to respect one another as people of equal rights and responsibilities.
She implores:
We face a race that tests if this country we cherish shall perish from the earth and if our earth shall perish from this country.
It falls to us to ensure that we do not fall for a people that cannot stand together, cannot stand at all.
We are one family regardless of religion, class, or color
for what defines a patriot is not just our love of liberty but love for one another.
We all love freedom, but it is love that frees us all.
Empathy emancipates, making us greater than hate or vanity.
Tomorrow is determined by the audacity of our hope, by the vitality of our vote.
We are becoming that perhaps the American dream is no dream at all, but instead a dare to dream together.
Let us not just believe in the American dream. Let us be worthy of it.
The late John Lewis said to a group of young leaders, “The vote is precious. It is the most powerful non-violent tool we have in a democratic society, and we must use it. And so you must go out all across America and tell young people and people not so young: VOTE: The vote is powerful.”
