A Dream for Tookie

You came to me in a dream
And in your eyes I heard you say
“My soul lives on forever
Though my body died today.”

My boyfriend was there beside me
In the 7-Eleven line
When in the door you came
Cops and journalists close behind

Your arms were clasped behind you
Your body clothed in grey
Some people stared and whispered
In fear, some moved away

Even in the frenzy
You seemed a breath of calm
A man who knew his destiny
Could not his spirit harm.

Our eyes met for a moment
You smiled not, nor frowned
Yet your message shook the walls
Without the slightest sound

My lover whispered in my ear
As they guided you away
“That was Tookie Williams,
His execution day’s today”

My legs felt to buckle
In that instant my soul knew
If I had just one moment
This prayer I would sing to you:

“You are just a child
In the eyes of God’s great light
And the angels, once your victims,
Will welcome you tonight

With wings of deep compassion
Not revenge nor knife nor gun
For in God’s home of heaven
All souls are forgiven
    and All spirits rise as One.”

© 2006 Devin Grace

“Thank you, Carole, for inviting me to speak about my poetry. For me, poetry, like film, is story telling. My screenplay “Our Lives” just poured out of me; there was no stopping it. The same happened with the poem I wrote for Tookie Williams. On the night that he was executed he came to me in that dream; I awoke from it and wrote the poem the next morning. When I began writing it the “7-Eleven” line was originally a “five-and-dime”, but something told me to change that verse to a 7-Eleven. I didn’t know much about Tookie, so after writing the poem I went to his website and learned that he was on death row for four murder charges – one of which was a store clerk in a 7-Eleven store – not a “five-and-dime”.

My poetry and my screenwriting are living entities. I believe that each soul chooses its parents for its ultimate growth this time around, and I also believe that like a soul, a story chooses its parent – you! You the filmmaker, you the poet, you the dancer, you the actor, are the parents of these stories. And just like a story, a child will wake you at 3 a.m., will have you decline invitations that distract you, will whisper to you in your dreams, stand with you in the shower, talk to you as you drive down the freeway. I am still not sure why artists, when a creation is birthed, don’t hand out cigars to all of their friends boasting “It’s a newborn baby _______!!!

I see artists as gentle warriors. Warriors fight for what they believe in, and the reward they seek is the honor they feel within themselves. Sure, some do it for medals (money, awards), or for their king (ego), but most, like the filmmakers you mentor everyday, Carole, are in it for the honor. It is an honor to birth something into the world that adds to uplifting society, making the earth a better place; telling the truth, through art, cleans the earth, shifts it to a higher frequency. Mother earth loves her artists because her artists love her.