|
 |
 |
|
|
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||
|
|
|
ArticlesDestiny’s Essence is the Many Colored Drum Beat
She flew over to us, and started drumming. Behind her, a colorful banner with the words “Promote the Peace, Participate” lay next to the intergenerational circle of people drumming. Periodically, Destiny brought the beats to a sudden stop, then counted out a new beat for them to pound out, maybe mirroring the pound of her heart, I thought. Drummer Mad X, who had been keeping the beat for twenty-years deferred to Destiny’s command. He listened to her count out the rhythm, watched her hands on the drum, and followed her lead. So did her little brother, their friends, a little four-year old girl named Essence, the little girl’s uncle, a veteran activist, and me. We could all feel Destiny’s spirit soaring. “A one, a two, a three, a four –now,” she cried, just like a band conductor. The neighborhood seemed to feel the essence of the drumming following Destiny. A group of high school boys came over to where we were, wearing skull caps that made shaved heads look sleek under the sun, with their Hilfiger pants hanging low. They shyly crowded around and watched, then one came over and started drumming. Another asked me for my juggling balls, and showed me his tricks after I threw them to him. And Destiny’s beat kept marching on and on. I met her after a neighborhood People’s Parade to Promote the Peace where the YLSN had started out as a rag-tag group of activist artists, musicians, and writers and then grown to a critical mass as youth saw the banners, the crazy cat puppet, and heard the triumphant horns mixed with snappy drums – and joined the procession – pouring out of their homes and playgrounds to be a magnificent streaming ray of hope. Destiny pranced down her neighbhorhood’s streets, running up to every passer-by and car to hand out fliers explaining the simple concept of the parade in the simple phrase, “Promote the Peace, Participate.” However, violence underlies her life’s reality in Petworth. “Everyday I hear gunshots and everybody’s fighting,” she said. Destiny marched, “so we could have peace.” Sitting at my side in the grass, and keeping the beat on a drum, Destiny quietly sang “peace in the town/peace in the world.” She sang with her heart, as a child who knows violence and sees hope’s marvelous possibility within reach. Maybe it was something inside her, waiting to leap out. Maybe the Peace parade helped to kinder it. Young people pouring out of their homes to march in a peace parade, or youth running to the park to sit in a circle and play drums together shouldn’t be radical, it should be everyday. Or the everyday should be radical. But, as far as I know, Petworth has never seen a parade like the that passed through its streets last October on a pretty sunny day. The YLSN builds an infrastructure where positive community-building spontaneity will occur. Its about Destiny leading us….”And a child shall lead them.” She’s our future, and we better give her an opportunity to exercise leadership now, so she knows. So she won’t make so many of the mistakes our own leaders are fumbling through. Interview with Destiny and her Younger Brother Why are you out here? Why? Do you like to play drums? What is peace? How do you get along with your sisters? -Destiny’s little brother Interview with Destiny Were you at the parade? What did you think? Neighborhood reaction to the parade? Why were you marching in parade? What does peace mean? What is your neighborhood like? More peace
or more violence? Why? Why? How can we promote peace? What do you think about the WTC and bombing
Afghanistan? How will this stop? (violence) Should we be bombing Afghanistan? Why not? Is the bombing right? What should we do with this situation “terrorists”? Why aren’t we doing that? -Destiny, Age 9
© 2007 Youth Leadership Support Network |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||