Community chest.

It was thanks to Paul Prinsloo that I became familiar with the annotated image of the Monopoly board.

He used it in his brilliant presentation entitled:

Faculty as quantified, measured and tired: The lure of the red shoes.
[slides]

Faculty as quantified, measured and tired: The lure of the red shoes.
[script]

Quantified, measured and tired.

It is taking more energy than I feel that I have to type this here.

A pop up notification appears on my phone:

"Congratulations: you have won an open badge for succesfully completing a course."

I feel no joy or achievement.

I feel only tired and demoralised.

I shan't ever wear those red shoes...

God be blessed (blasphemy). I suppose that is a mercy.

As a kid, I wasn't even seduced by brown shoes.

"We were never allowed brown shoes, only the privileged had them. We wore black army boots and gaiters on Thursday afternoons."

http://tachesdesens.blogspot.com/2014/02/body-and-sole-rhizo14-meets-metaphor.html

I count myself lucky to have shoes at all; others aren't so privileged.

Open badges and closed borders.

Yesterday, I conducted an English exam for a student who needed some sort of grade, any sort of institutional credit, to avoid expulsion from the country.

"Congratulations, you have won an open badge for successfully completing a course."

A survival badge.

He started his university career with minus ten years of study of English compared with the French students.

He started his university career with minus ten years of practice of computer skills.

"Congratulations, you have won an open badge for successfully completing a course."

A survival badge.

Community chest.

As I arrived at the university, I looked at the ongoing building work. It was for a spanking new research laboratory.  The occupation of the ex-library, once a potential space for an open learning centre, is a concrete demonstration of the power structure within the institution.

We had imagined a new pedagogical space.

Hours and hours of time invested...in praxis.

Does praxis make perfect?

Poor naive souls...

Pedagogy comes way down the list in terms of institutional priorities.

"Pedagogical project" vs "Research lab"?

There was no contest.

Shattered dreams of open community learning....

I shall get that off my chest.

Budget cuts...any budget cuts.

Rationalisation, financial control, personnel insecurity...personal strife.

I wrote about my time at Marylhurst: “As the financial woes of the institution mounted, the mistreatment of faculty, and especially adjunct faculty, increased ... Tears were not unusual at committee meetings.” https://t.co/wjp4SyggKO

— Jesse Stommel (@Jessifer) May 19, 2018

"Congratulations, you have won an open badge for successfully completing a course."

Bored room meetings.

I met a couple of bored students waiting around for an exam.

What were they waiting for?

The opportunity to gain a bit of credit to move onto the next square in this ludicrous game.

They know that they are not invited to the main board table.

The real games go on in "Grandes Ecoles", then in board rooms, or amongst the bankers.

The real winners don't need "badges" like us, they employ people to sort out pesky legal problems.

The real winners don't need to write blogs, they don't give a fuck about that, they own the platforms.

The real winners don't play games, they don't take prisoners, they have no qualms, they are killers.

"Congratulations, you have won an open badge for successfully completing a course."

Not the banker?

I am a loser, I am not even winning at that.

I am a middling, meddling, signed up member of the mediocrity messing around in a sham meritocracy, piddling around in a sham democracy.

"Congratulations, you have won an open badge for successfully completing a course."

The real losers, don't play games, they don't take prisoners, they have no qualms, they are killers.

Those real losers buy semi-automatic weapons from the real winners.

Oh, you can't blame the winners for over-estimating their importance.

Why be critical when you are winning the game?

You wouldn't want to question your good fortune for too long.

You're a great guy!

You're a tough guy!

You're a really mean guy!

Oh Bravo!

I listened to Piers Morgan speak on TV.

The devil's apprentice.

Devil's apprentice winner, Piers likes the sound of his winning (whining) voice.

Great guy!

Listening to Piers Morgan speak on TV about winning the ratings battle, crushing the competitors to his girly eye-brow raising, colluding, co-presenters and I feel an urgent need to vomit, to take several showers.

Oh isn't he a naughty boy!

Piers sounds like a fucking loser to me.

The real winners don't need to present morning TV, they don't give a fuck about that, they own the platforms.

Good morning Britain.

Good morning Vietnam.

Il est cinq heures, Paris se reveille...

On n' est pas couché...

Are you sure?

I am sure il a couché...ou elle.

Red shoes, brown shoes? Brown shirts...

Another mediocre privileged protofascist populist on French TV, channeling Trump, channeling Farage, channeling Orban spitting out vile.

Debout la France!

I feel an urgent need to vomit, to take several showers.

The real winners don't care about divisions created as a result of the air-time given to these bastards on their fucking platforms.

Civil wars win ratings battles.

Give them blood.

They'll have the bullets.

"Congratulations, you have won an open badge for successfully completing a course."

Get out of jail! Free?

I wanted to be inspired by Sean Michael Morris's blog post that I read yesterday.

Reflecting on < Imagination as a Precision Tool for Change https://t.co/hhpPkD9WfK @slamteacher

— Simon Ensor (@sensor63) June 25, 2018

I read it.

I think of agency.

I feel tired, demoralised and measured in these words...

Oh agency...would that be like the drive for survival which brings people to get into boats to cross the Mediterrenean?

We need virtual exchanges to build up understanding between young people in Europe and those in the South Mediterrenean countries (Africa).

They say in the pamphlet.

"Congratulations, you have won an open badge for successfully completing a course."

Oh fuck, I am oh so so happy.

I am so fucking content with my badge.

Imagination as a precision tool for change.

I feel tired, demoralised and measured in these words...

How the fuck can I, white, bi-national shoe-wearing member of the mediocrity, imagine the lives of those risking their lives to cross the sea with their kids to come to France?

What did my imagination ever do to really change fuck?

Imagination, precision tool for change...my arse.

[I measure my words, I regret the tone, I regret the potential upset caused, I so want to be cheered, to cheer the work of those who I respect, I want to encourage, to feel encouraged, and the only words I can find to write are 'my arse'. I so wish I could steal the words of others, Freire, hooks, whoever, to feel better.]

I am sorry.

Open badges and closed borders.

I reread a paragraph about plagiarism.

What the hell is Turnitin?

I claim ignorance.

I read it and it sounds like some drug sold by Pfizer.

Can ignorance enable agency?

I feel myself writing words that I will only regret.

I am sorry.

The paragraph reminds me of the "exam" earlier in the week.

I had to explain the concept of "plagiarism" to the "candidate."

He had no English words of his own.

He was desperate to avoid expulsion.

He stole the words of others.

I begin to feel more like a border control officer than a teacher.

I find a space in the marking grid for him to express his plight in one of the five languages he masters.

Four of the languages, he points out, are not much use outside of his country.

English, he says is essential to him...to work in...management.

I hear the protofascist on TV whining on about France being colonised by African migrants.

I feel an urgent need to vomit, to take several showers.

I go back and reread Sean Michael Morris's:

"Is critical pedagogy aligned with the interests of the academy? In an ivory tower increasingly interested in credentialing as currency, competitive completion rates, models of efficiency that have given rise to online program management companies, the outsourcing of pedagogy to Pearson and Turnitin, are we confronting a reality where “Dreams are caught in the meshes of the saleable; possession of consumer goods is the alternative to gloom or feelings of pointlessness. Ideas of possibilities are trapped in predictability”? (“Art and Imagination” 124)"

However you turn it, in this occupied territory, the answer to Sean's question is:

YES

I go back and read Sean's last paragraph.

"Before I sat down to write this talk, I would not have thought that my best pedagogical advice might be to go seeking after monsters. But I think it’s good advice, and advice I want to take. To front the reckless world. To be reminded that some things cannot be reasoned."

Some things cannot be reasoned, yes.

I don't need to go seeking bloody monsters.

Does one really need imagination to see monsters?

NO

One does need imagination to survive these monstrous times.

GO directly to jail.

Being human.

"I believe in recognizing every human being as a human being - neither white, black, brown, or red; and when you are dealing with humanity as a family there's no question of integration or intermarriage. It's just one human being marrying another human being or one human being living around and with another human being."

Malcolm X

Les maux des mots... Critical Prostitution.

I did a Google Search for prostitutes.

WARNING THIS PAGE CONTAINS ADULT CONTENT AND STRONG LANGUAGE WHICH MAY SHOCK.

After a page of women in various poses, I thought that:

a) Google Advanced Image Search wasn't very fucking advanced (they should know that I am a MAN - don't their algorithms sort that one from tracking my photos?)

b) Prostitute = Women

c) Prostitutes generally work under duress.

d) Duress may be to finance their habits.

e) I thought I would settle for an arty perhaps androgynous photo of a cocaine sniffer.


On giant's bits...

[this is crude in French]

I felt a bit shaky on the shoulders of giants.

That's where Google Scholar told me I was.

I was rather apprehensive in case I ended up on a giant's knee.

Then what might happen?

In my thirst for knowledge I accepted the transaction.

I typed "Critical Pedagogy" into the Google Scholar search box and waited for the client to give me its best hits.

Top on the server's list, no doubt he came with glowing references, page-ranked was he, a Mr Henry Giroux esq. Mmm.. I thought to myself, sounds French might be worth the risk.

If I quote him, I thought, it would probably be a safe bet, he's probably loaded.

Into the RED ROOM

I clicked on the link and to my dismay, not only I would have to lie on my back (chest?) for a bloody hour (perhaps 3 minutes) reading his crap but I would have to pay for the trouble!!

That's not prostitution that's a racket I thought to myself.

There I was wanting to get high on Giroux and he goes and gets sadomaso on me.

It made me want to weep.

Next on the list was....

Henry Marquis Sade Giroux again.

Wanting me to pay for the pains of being less dominated by the fucking system, I mean what is the world coming to?

It didn't make me feel any less oppressed I can tell you.

I was already tiring of the game.

I tried client three.

My hopes were raised.

I had heard of her (him?) er Ellsworth, Maha recommended er her (him? sorry dunno)

"Why doesn't this feel empowering? Working through the repressive myths of critical pedagogy"

E Ellsworth - Harvard educational review, 1989 - hepgjournals.org

Elizabeth Ellsworth finds that critical pedagogy, as represented in her review of the literature,
has developed along a highly abstract and Utopian line which does not necessarily sustain
the daily workings of the education its supporters advocate. The author maintains that the ...

Cited by 3223 Related articles All 4 versions Cite Save

That was exactly what I needed to know: why doesn't this lark feel empowering Ell?

And what can you share with us?

I was beginning to have illusions that Harvard had got all critical and generous and open.

You know open as in LOVE.

I have been delirious recently, maybe I'm going cold turkey?

Nope. I was disappointed.

Bloody ELL doesn't come cheaply either.

Another bloody pervert.

Prostitution doesn't fucking make me feel empowered.

I understand that prostitutes are on the game to pay for their habits.

I am addicted to learning.

It's my only habit.

It's worse than cocaine.

It can get you in deep water.

Dominatrixes and nasty pimps.

Maybe I shouldn't be too hasty too judge I thought.

Maybe they were loving like this for a reason.

(I thought of Grey).

Maybe they were sad, or got tied up by some family Dominatrix?

It made me stop a moment.

Maybe they are loving like this out of fear?

Pimps are violent with their chattel.

I thought of scenes from crime series on TV.

They are great references for serial torture of poor sculptural lost girls from Eastern Europe.

I am becoming an expert on torture thanks to TV....that and shopping and feeling bad about myself.

I did a little research when the clients had left.

I am thankful that I don't have to lie so bad as some, whore that I am, I do more vanilla teaching stuff.

I found an article about the savage revenge of one powerful pimp:

Publish means “make public”. Paywalls are the opposite of publishing #lesmauxdesmots https://t.co/wAA5sQy40P

— Simon Ensor (@sensor63) May 7, 2016

And another one about the network that keeps whores down.

Why is Science Behind a Paywall? https://t.co/7Dn33U2ai2

— Simon Ensor (@sensor63) May 7, 2016

I think actually if I am thinking of my whorelife's lot today it is thanks to Gardner.

With thanks to @GardnerCampbell for this. #lesmauxdesmots pic.twitter.com/1jZc2UZ5Pp

— Simon Ensor (@sensor63) May 8, 2016

I have been feeling a little suffocated recently by the network.

I have learnt more than I ever imagined about tenure, adjunct, submission, brothels, peer review.

Torn Halves tried to cheer me up with a joke (you can always count on him to ligthen the mood)

@sensor63 Concerns about the psychology of professors and the academic hierarchy should not obscure the fact that scholarship is oppressive.

— Torn Halves (@tornhalves) May 7, 2016

I was beginning to feel emotions ranging from despair to anger.

Beyond Rigor (Sade)

Fortunately, I have been scouring Hybrid Pedagogy recently looking for any signs of love...

A breath of fresh air. Thank you @slamteacher I felt I was suffocating... @NomadWarMachine #lesmauxdesmots pic.twitter.com/2p13K2DZRv

— Simon Ensor (@sensor63) May 9, 2016

I fell upon sections that had been written by Jesse Stommel and Sean Michael Morris and Chris Friend which made me feel that there might be signs of faint hope.

Listening for student voices was the source of the quote which perked me up.

http://www.digitalpedagogylab.com/hybridped/listening-for-student-voices/

This one took my fancy - was called appropriately 'Beyond Rigor'.

http://www.digitalpedagogylab.com/hybridped/beyond-rigor/

And this one which was shared to acclaims...

Lovely post. One day when I grow up I will write like this @slamteacher https://t.co/lxoab26fOQ

— Paul Prinsloo (@14prinsp) May 8, 2016

And generated a tweet from Mia Zamora which inspired me to create.

"Text is not what needs taming; it is the whole of the story that has slipped our grasp." #elit #digped #dh #NWP https://t.co/aBme2imqLs

— Mia Zamora (@MiaZamoraPhD) May 8, 2016

I love creating...I do it freely.

An addict will grasp at anything which resembles what they need for a fix...
(however bad it turns out for them)

Capitalism is an amazing dealer.

The internet is like the fucking Afghanistan my hippy cousins told me about before the war. (er was that ever a time?)

A Junkies heaven!!!

TV Junkies heaven!!!

Rap Gangstas heaven!!!

WWW Junkies heaven!!!

So I thought that the other whores wouldn't maybe all beat me up for coming clean, for talking about what goes on behind the boredroom walls.

I mean we all need our fixes.

It's better than being a beggar or a banker.

I mean what sort of service do the well suited lot offer?

They take your cash and then hide it in bloody Panama.

You get mixed up with the wrong sort (drug dealers).

At least we pedagogos offer some sort of psychological support.

And if that don't  work, well we can always get the whips and chains out.

Love,Terror & Forgiveness.

They are wrong. He is wrong. She is wrong. I am wrong. You are wrong. It is wrong.

We are wronged.

It came from discussions, conversations,
tangled monologues, challenges, squabbles,
crossed swords,
that alienating platform 

and 

ended in
feelings of hurt
and
hard words. 

We are right.

It is written.

Striving for moral high ground we crash
Icarus wings flaming
to Stygian mire.

Nobody is listening.

Nobody knows.

Nobody cares.

We feel bad.

We think, and we think, and we think, and we think, and we think and we are lost to our thoughts.

We can not think freedom.

We feel bad.

“ if I do not love the world if I do not love life if I do not love people I cannot enter into dialogue.” 

― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed

Does freedom lie in love?

“The secret of freedom lies in educating people, whereas the secret of tyranny is in keeping them ignorant.” 

― Maximilien de Robespierre

Does freedom lie in dialogue?

“To defend the oppressed against their oppressors, to plead the cause of the weak against the strong who exploit and crush them, this is the duty of all hearts that have not been spoiled by egoism and corruption… It is so sweet to devote oneself to one’s fellows that I do not know how there can be so many unfortunates still without support or defenders. As for me, my life’s task will be to help those who suffer and to pursue through my avenging speech those who take pleasure in the pain of others. How happy I will be if my feeble efforts are crowned with success and if, at the price of my devotion and sacrifices, my reputation is not tarnished by the crimes of the oppressors I will fight.” 

― Maximilien de Robespierre

Who are our oppressors?

Is there justice in vengeance?

“This, then, is the great humanistic and historical task of the oppressed: to liberate themselves and their oppressors as well.” 

― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed

Does liberation lie in forgiveness?

“To punish the oppressors of humanity is clemency; to forgive them is cruelty.” 

― Maximilien de Robespierre

Oppression lies in terror.

“[T]he more radical the person is, the more fully he or she enters into reality so that, knowing it better, he or she can transform it. This individual is not afraid to confront, to listen, to see the world unveiled. This person is not afraid to meet the people or to enter into a dialogue with them. This person does not consider himself or herself the proprietor of history or of all people, or the liberator of the oppressed; but he or she does commit himself or herself, within history, to fight at their side.” 

― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed

I steal words of others.

Others remain silent.

Am I oppressor?

Am I oppressed?

Who will name me?

Who will love?

Who will listen?

Who will forgive?

Paolo Freire

Maximillien Robespierre.

Love is foolhardy.

"The earth has music for those who listen."

William Shakespeare.

It was foolhardy...
[Middle English: from Old French folhardi, from fol 'foolish' + hardi 'bold' (see hardy).]

It came from reading Sean Michael Morris's post

"On love, critical pedagogy, and the work we must do."

It was his final paragraph which really touched me:

"As I finish writing this post, I can hear the distant call to prayer carried on the breeze over Cairo. I pause to listen, to wonder at why it stirs me. I must always allow myself to be stirred -- by learners, by teachers, by pedagogy, by the weird transpersonal nature of digital networks -- and I must always let that stirring call me to critical practice in my teaching."

I not so much thought but was captured by this instant.  I took a piece of paper and scribbled some words and some lines and some shading.

"What is most precious?" I wonder.

Love - that is present - in the moment.

Giving-forgiving.

To be attentive to ourselves, to others, so that we may move beyond ourselves.

To be alive to silence, to words, to meaning.

To accept our common vulnerability, our inability to communicate, our ability to not quite communicate...

To be alive to our common humanity and our relationship with time...

The time that is counted which counts for all but nothing.

What is knowledge without love?

It is foolhardy.

I put in the word "Love" in the search box of this blog.

I couldn't contain the word...it was beyond me.

I strived and I failed.

I gave up. 

There were too many occurrences for me to contain them here.

I browsed through the posts, picking up pieces which caught my attention.

Other pieces will capture my attention tomorrow.

I make some sort of order of this.

It is vain.

We cannot be contained my friends, neither love, neither learning, neither education.

We are for ever in movement, spirit more than bones.

We are ether with a voice.

Educare
Making space is the most important role for the teacher,

In MemorIam
"There is no sense if there is no love.
There is no education if there is no love.
There is no learning worth learning if there is no love."

So that we may be alive.

"A light breeze is dancing on my skin.
I can feel the hairs on my arms moving.
I can hear the leaves in the trees..."

Educational Complex
"There is this idea of always striving, never arriving, of being authentic in our relations with the other...in this our lives."

Remember Stormier Days

"Hacking 'On the shore', I discover hidden waves, hidden rhythms.

I am swept out to sea.

I love the sea."

Feint intention.
"Scrawl etched on surface
Criss-crossing haphazard lines;
Feint intention felt."

In a Different Light
"I contemplate photos in no particular order.
I am not looking to do anything.
I let myself wander.
I love this feeling of freedom.
Where will I be taken today?" 

Doodling in Latin

"We are thrown out and there we lie, helpless.
Little by little we try to make sense of our lot.
I think we all come to the same conclusion: Alone we are meaningless."

Dear Maha
"We must unpick the colonisation of our minds, bodies, spirit, as children of the slaves and the slave-owners, as mothers, as fathers, as sisters and as brothers." 

Distance Learning
“Looking at the past must only be a means of understanding more clearly what and who they are so that they can more wisely build the future.” 

― Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed

Being Here.
"The word content is beginning to feel like a pervasive prison.
We have all the content in the world but we appear to be unhappily self-contained.

I am coming to the impression that the concept'content' hides a distinct world view...the politics, the economics of enclosure, of appropriation, of extraction, of individual isolation/wealth/poverty/identity, of identifiable authors, of 'scientific progress', of superiority over nature.."

Order from chaos.
"An inflexible frame is a corpse"

The Fear of Silence
"Colossal rigidity, whether in dinosaurs or dictatorships, has a very poor record of evolutionary survival."
Carl Rogers


Souk
"Navigating through formatted academic wasteland where orderly discussion is the order of the day, 
I soon start tapping my fingers, looking out of the window, find any distraction from the monotony."

Learning is a mechanism.

"We need STANDARDS to stand for.

We need STANDARDS to brandish.

We need STANDARDS to rally the troops."

On becoming

"There's always some clever clogs who shows off his obsessionally finicketedly constructed plastic scale model."

Keeping up LOL

"non-feeling of being undead one can get when one looks at one's watch every two minutes to see when the working day will be finished."

Time is not money.
"While it lasts...
Take your little paper envelope.
"Now hush!"
I shall not just take."

(Un)critical mass

"Critical moments, of connecting with others uncritically, semenly critically, a mass of bodies, a mire."

Eclosuredisclosurenclosure
"The definition of scholarship seems to be open to negotiation.
I prefer to be called Simon anyway.
If that name gives me no authority to be curious and to be heard...why?
Wasn't that the idea of democracy?"

The amusing problem of education

"When I hear 'it is generally accepted that we need to be raising a generation of life-long learners', I fear that what we may be saying is that we need to have a generation who will have to accept geographic mobility, instability, constant retraining, for ever diminishing returns." 

Fear of flying.

"I don't believe that we can progress as communities, as societies, without play, without taking risks.

I don't believe that we can work with people as if they were disconnected parts to be machined.

I believe that we are in the dark ages of human social development." 

The Fear of Silence
"The degree to which I can create relationships which facilitate the growth of others as separate persons, is a measure of the growth I have achieved in myself."
How on earth can our growth be measured?
Can pedagogy be sustainable if it does not accept change?
Are we really concerned about the growth of others or are we too full of our empty selves?
"The curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change."
Carl Rogers

Ajar

"There were so many silent years.

I am beginning to miss listening.

There are so many unexplored avenues." 

Nature, Nurture, Network

"I think my educational world changed when I started viewing myself and my fellow learners as one of these 'little guys', part of a wilder, wider learning ecology."

Summer Holiday
"They begin to realise that the real interest of the holiday was not the bus, was not the destinations, was not the surf-boards, the bucket and spades and the whole palaver but the shared story.

The man with the umbrella joins them again in St Tropez, they sit down on the beach, they exchange stories around a glowing camp-fire, they laugh about the madness of the venture, the absurd sight of seeing Mildred trying to waterski, they sing songs, they plan new trips.

Finally, those instants spent around the camp-fire make the rest of it all seem worth it.

From afar, young kids hear the laughter, see the glow, and dream." 

Sowing Seeds

"Joyfully sow seeds narrowly and widely, nurture saplings, tell stories, share fruit...have a laugh." 

Joy

"There was a gleam in his eye.
There was a connection.
I suddenly felt a spark run through me.
I suddenly felt a whole lot less tired.

Joy rises. 
This is joy.
This is spring.
This is love. 
It is infectious."

From Mobs to Communities
"People care, people are generous, they would love a better lot for them, for us, they are awaiting a lead not a promise. We are not all maggots."

Walking out loud

I thought back to Maxime's lines:

"Fermez vos ordinateurs, allez courir, allez rire, serrez vos proches dans vos bras, envoyez un message d'amour."

Let it bleed.

"Let us weep. 
These sheets are tagged with our humanity.
Let it bleed my friends, it is that which binds us. 

Let us laugh out loud at this madness.
Laughter gives us strength.
While we may..."

Black Wholes in Time

"Whatever they had done, however many steps they had taken, however many places they had seen, they had all disappeared into some black hole."

Distant Voices

"I suppose that when I am absent other people might imagine or say that I have 'presence'.
Well I suppose I have presence in my absence."

Say 'How' and Die

"I have proof that they have ceased to exist now...of sorts.
They still talk to me.
Maybe I am in touch with the spirit world.
I am still deeply attached."

Road Trip

"I am becoming unable to follow their traces. I am now reliant on others who will be able to tell their part of the story, a part in which I am now absent." 

Hybrids Rising

"We are unfinished monsters....

We are alone, at the mercy of others, helpless...

What is needed my friends is not passion driven learning but compassion driven learning."

Please push with care

"Perhaps that is the most important thing to try to learn from these courses: how to push ones' own limits and continue to live peacefully with others who challenge them."

In a tangle

"If there is no one 'COMMUNITY' then there can only ever be personal ethics and desires which will vary and fluctuate according to who, with whom and when and where people interact." 

Random Eyes
"No matter. I am now looking at this page anew.
It is blank,  crying out for a release from its mutism.
It is a dumb waiter.
I am flying down to a basement.
If only the top will keep spinning.
I will write before it is too late."

Voice off.

"How did my voice escape? 

It is living on borrowed time."

Our Silenced Voices

"There is power in our silence."

Amazing Grace

"Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound,

That saved a wretch like me.

I once was lost but now am found,

Was blind, but now I see."